A councillor who criticised a million-dollar partnership deal with the Parramatta Eels rugby league club has had her censure quashed by the NSW Supreme Court.
Councillor Kellie Darley was censured in July last year after she publicly criticised the council’s three-year partnership with the Parramatta Eels on social media and in media interviews in December 2023, following a closed Council meeting.
Fellow councillors complained she had breached confidentiality rules in spreading information about the deal.
However, on Friday morning, Acting Justice Monika Schmidt ordered the censure be quashed.
Justice Schmidt found the council’s disciplinary process denied Ms Darley of procedural fairness.
She also ordered that independent reviewer Phil O’Toole’s conduct review was “invalid”, and should be quashed.
“The role which (the Council’s Ombudsman and Complaints Co-ordinator, Ms Renneberg) took up and Mr O’Toole permitted, was not one envisaged by the Code,” Justice Schmidt ruled.
The judgment also criticised the council for actively defending its own censure decision in court proceedings.
“The role the Council pursued by its appearance in these proceedings to defend its own decision, did not enhance the appearance of its impartiality,” Justice Schmidt found.
It was originally alleged that Councillor Darley had disclosed confidential information following the council meeting.
Of the information it was alleged she disclosed that the deal may be worth $2.4 million.
However, this figure was published in media reports, which Councillor Darley then cited as the source of her information in her social media post at the time.
Councillor Darley claimed she was a victim of bias and that another councillor had shared the same information.
The City of Parramatta Council approved a $1.1 million partnership deal with the Eels in January 2024.
City of Parramatta said it was “currently reviewing” the court’s decision.
Speaking at the launch of the partnership, City of Parramatta chief executive officer Gail Connolly said: “World-class sporting teams drive business and recognition for the cities they call home – LA has the Lakers, Chicago has the Bulls and San Francisco the 49ers.
“The Eels are already synonymous with Parramatta and a powerful brand in their own right.”
The council said that, in the first year of the partnership, achievements included free school clinics and holiday clinics across the city, a bespoke initiative introducing girls from culturally and linguistically diverse communities to rugby league and branding and advertising at home games and events to help drive visitors to the city.
