If the policy wonks and powers that be in NSW didn’t know what apartment owners in the state want and expect in the proposed and much-vaunted training for committee members, with the publication of a strata committee training survey, they now should.

Our good friend (and strata lawyer extraordinaire) Amanda Farmer has surveyed her subscribers about what they want from strata committee training – to be compulsory later this year –  and how they expect it to be delivered.

Uppermost on the wish list is a call for SC members to better understand their responsibilities regarding repairs and maintenance, as well as knowing the basics of strata law.

Some respondents wanted to see better behaviour to be coached leading to an end to bullying and self-interested promotion of specific issues.

Some wanted the training to be paid for by the owners corp, some by the strata government and a roughly equal number wanted a combination of the two.

There was a feeling that having undertaken the training should be a prerequisite for election to the chair, secretary or treasurer roles.

And the majority of the 700+ strata residents polled favoured an online training that could be accessed as and when SC members had time, rather than being coached directly in a classroom.

The report on the survey makes very interesting reading and you can download it absolutely free HERE from Amanda’s website.

Now, you lot from Fair Trading, sitting at the back, flying paper aeroplanes and making general nuisances of yourselves, sit up and pay attention – education is a two-way process, and this survey is lesson number one.