Yes, you can curb proxy harvesting

“Are there any limits on how many proxies can one person hold to vote in a meeting?” writes Chak in the Flat Chat Forum. “If one person holds 10 proxies, does it mean a show of hands by him represents 10 votes plus his one?”

The simple answers are no to the first question and yes to the second, if you mean a general meeting in NSW or other states where proxy farmers are free to harvest as many votes as they can from all the ‘don’t knows’ and ‘don’t cares’.

Proxy harvesting can turn a healthy democratic community into a one-party state literally overnight.

In one building I know, the chairwoman ran a scare campaign about proxy harvesting before their AGM. Predictably, she ended up holding a record number of proxy votes as a direct result.

She then used her overwhelming power to have a clear-out, with dissenting members of the executive committee replaced by others more “on message”.

And when problems arose from such unfettered control – as they inevitably do – ‘confidentiality’, aka secrecy, became the watchword and all the owners who had blindly (dumbly?)  handed over their proxy votes started asking where all the checks and balances had gone.

That’s the problem with proxy harvesting; even in well-run buildings, democracy becomes autocracy and, when mistakes are made, holding on to power becomes more important than what you do with it.

However, in NSW at least, there is something you can do if you think your building is being so badly run, partly as a result of proxy harvesting,  that it could merit orders being issued by the CTTT.

If you make a complaint against your Executive Committee and can show that it has used excessive numbers of proxy votes to get to the position where there are no brakes on its behavior, then that can be part of the complaint too.

“If any party lodging an application for adjudication could provide evidence of proxy harvesting and in doing so, could also demonstrate that these activities are having a detrimental and dysfunctional impact on the functioning of the scheme, then the Tribunal member would take this aspect into consideration in making its orders within the powers of the legislation,” says Garry Wilson, Deputy Chairperson of the CTTT.

Presumably these CTTT orders include the ultimate sanction: statutory appointment of a strata manager to replace a dysfunctional Owners Corporation. And you’d have to accept that some EC members in some buildings have an excessive number of proxies simply as a result of doing a good job.

However, NSW Fair Trading assures us proxy harvesting is being looked at in the current review of strata laws. Meanwhile, if your building or scheme is suffering because of excessive proxy harvesting, at least you know the CTTT will take note.

You can read the original story and comment on HERE on the Flat Chat Forum.

By the way, this problem doesn’t exist in Queensland where the standard residential laws for strata limit proxies to one per owner for schemes of fewer than 20 and five percent of the total lot owners for schemes over twenty units.

Both Victoria and NSW specifically prevent owners being pressured into handing over proxies and in NSW particularly, any proxy obtained as a condition of the purchase of a lot is invalid.

And South Australia has a postal voting system whereby you can vote on issues directly without needing to send a blind proxy to someone who can then use it to vote whichever way they want.

Strata law is different all across Australia so if you want to know what’s happening in your state or territory, go HERE for all the links to your legislation.