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2. Strata Managers Responsibility wrt Strata Rolls
We appointed from within the SC roles of Chair, Treasurer, and Secretary, notwithstanding that there is a delegated authority in the agreement with the strata manager.
I am pretty sure that the Strata Manager is not providing the committee with the information necessary for it to meet its obligations, unless they are informing the appointed Secretary and he is not informing the committee.
Your committee needs to clarify the role of the strata manager in writing. If they are saying they ARE the office-bearers under the terms of your contract with them, then you need to hold a general meeting to rescind that delegation and rewrite it so that they are only a back-up (which is the proper, standard agreement). Then you can examine whether or not they are properly fulfilling their duties as strata managers and deal with that accordingly.
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This is a long and complex set of questions, so I have broken them down and answered them separately.
Conflict Of Interest and Voting How does the prevention of participating in a vote where committee members have a financial interest work? What is this meant to help manage? Does this have implications/relevance when a developer continues to own multiple units in a building and also has multiple seats (but a minority) on a strata committee?
This is meant to prevent owners who have a financial or business interest in the scheme from swaying votes to favour their business. For instance, owners who are running short-term lets might fall foul of this or if they are renting their property to business that the other owner want to restrict and have the power to do so.
It’s a very loosely worded law (see below) which is yet to be tested at the Tribunal and has a few grey areas. But in a nutshell, judging by section 18 of Part 3 of schedule 2 of the Act (below) any committee member who makes money from a matter being discussed, or is an employee of a company that similarly makes money, must declare their interest (Max fine $1100 for failure to do so) and should leave the meeting while it is being discussed.
NB, this only applies to strata committee meetings. They could still rock up at a general meeting and throw around such voting power as they may have.
Also, if the conflicted party has multiple members on the committee and they vacate, depending on the numbers, that could leave the committee inquorate, meaning any decisions made would be potentially subject to challenge.
For that reason, if no other, the number of representatives of the developer elected to the committee should be restricted, if possible.
18 Disclosure of pecuniary interests(1) If—
(a) a member of a strata committee has a direct or indirect pecuniary interest in a matter being considered or about to be considered at a meeting, and
(b) the interest appears to raise a conflict with the proper performance of the member’s duties in relation to the consideration of the matter,
the member must, as soon as possible after the relevant facts have come to the member’s knowledge, disclose the nature of the interest at a meeting of the strata committee.
Maximum penalty—10 penalty units.(2) A disclosure by a member at a meeting of the strata committee that the member—
(a) is a member, or is in the employment, of a specified corporation or other body, or
(b) is a partner, or is in the employment, of a specified person, or
(c) has some other specified interest relating to a specified corporation or other body or to a specified person,
is a sufficient disclosure of the nature of the interest in any matter relating to that corporation or other body or to that person which may arise after the date of the disclosure and which is required to be disclosed under subclause (1).
(3) Particulars of any disclosure made under this clause must be recorded by the strata committee in a book kept for the purpose and that book must be open at all reasonable hours to inspection by any person on payment of the fee determined by the strata committee.
(4) After a member has disclosed the nature of an interest in any matter, the member must not—
(a) be present during any deliberation of the strata committee with respect to the matter, or
(b) take part in any decision of the strata committee with respect to the matter.
(5) (Repealed)
(6) A contravention of this clause does not invalidate any decision of the strata committee.
(7) Without limiting subclause (1), a person has an indirect pecuniary interest in a matter if a person connected with the person has a direct interest in the matter.
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CLO? FTB? WT…? It would help if you at least spelled your acronyms and initials out when you first use them. I’m assuming FTB is Fair Trading “something” but I have no idea what CLO is. Please explain.
IMHO (joke!) acronyms are used to exclude rather than explain or inform. Doctors, scientists and politicians use them all the time because they really don’t want us to know what they’re saying to each other.
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You can however ask – and in my experience such a request has never been refused – that votes be recorded by lot number instead of a simple “resolved” or “defeated”. You must do so at the beginning of the meeting.
In NSW an owner can call for a “poll” vote at any point, even after a show of hands has been taken. A poll vote, based on unit entitlements, would by necessity record which lots voted in which way.
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Make sure you have evidence of a motion passed at a general meeting, if you did not authorise the strata manager to issue such notices.
This would be a motion to delegate the committee to act on behalf of the owners corporation – a standard motion at most (but not all) AGMs.
There are laws about “abandoned goods”.
I had a look at these too. They are generally about stuff left behind by residents who have moved on. I don’t think they would apply here.
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Jimmy you may raise this point with David Bannerman when you do the lawyer in a hotseat this month. As the issue of Strata Roll disclosure was confirmed to Stephen Brell in a SCA Webinar last year, by David.
I certainly will and I would love to be able to publish some of Brell’s comments to me made when I was trying to get the strata roll for our investment property which, sadly, is managed by Netstrata. However, they were part of a private discussion and protocol forbids me from making them public except to say I described them at the time as “pretzel logic” (shout out to Steely Dan fans).
This topic is now closed until someone PROVES with proper legal references from courts or tribunals that I am wrong.
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I have shown you why that if one meets 178 1(b) then (c) does not apply. I have shown you the State’s own website does not say you have to give it if you have it, which i believe it would if there was the requirement you press.
You haven’t “shown” anything except your opinion. There is no proof or ruling cited. And, by the way, I assumed you were excluding yourself from the “plebs” because you said that it wasn’t something for “plebs” to interpret, then you interpreted it.
Finally, I would draw your attention to the adjacent post from SPmanager.
Once I have responded to that, because we are just expressing competing opinions, I am shutting this discussion down until someone provides authoritative proof, in an uncontested court or tribunal ruling, that I am wrong.
Until then, Flatchatters, this is my position:
- The NSW SSMA 2105 says strata owners are entitled to see their strata rolls (and most other documents related to the strata scheme)
- The SSMA also says the strata roll must include the email addresses of strata owners, if they have one.
- There are no relevant privacy law issues here.
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Firstly, the owners corporation can certainly acquire personal property and then designate it as common property. Your problem here may be that you will need everyone to agree to giving up their limited right to do as they please with their property. Why would anyone do that? I can think of half a dozen reasons, none of which are logical or reasonable – but that’s strata for you.
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Yes that is what the law says but what does it mean is not for plebs to say unless we are quoting the Courts.
Again, you seem to think the rest of us are plebs because it IS for you to say what this means. Or am I misinterpreting that too?
I would go to the barricades on this one as I did recently with Netstrata and, to great and vociferous length with their boss and now departed president of SCA Stephen Brell. Upshot, my strata scheme got the strata roll with the email addresses of the owners attached. Even plebs can prevail, just by following what the law says and not by what it might mean if you turn the words around a bit and take out a couple here and there.
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Yes that is what the law says but what does it mean is not for plebs to say unless we are quoting the Courts.
Agreed. So please point me in the direction of a court ruling that clearly states that this clause doesn’t mean what it says. Unitl I can read that, I will join the other plebs who don’t apply pretzel logic to find a meaning that doesn’t seem to be the intent of the law.
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You’re probably bound by the contract.
Yup, but procedurally the strata manager should have advised the chair not to allow the motion, so that reason was at least recorded for future reference. Next step, remove that clause from the contract at the next opportunity. But be aware that debt collection fees and sweetheart deals with favoured lawyers is the next scandal after insurance commissions.
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I’m trying to figure out if I have a case against them for not fulfilling their responsibilities.
Against whom – the committee or the strata manager?
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The lot owner has been breached multiple times and has received a notice to comply.
and
…we’ve been told mediation is the next step and after that NCAT tribunal which could cost upwards of $20K.
Sounds to me like you are getting bad advice. The resident has not been “breached” until they receive a Notice to Comply. I hope you haven’t fallen for the nonsense that you need to send three warning letters before you can issue an NTC. If the owner has been sent a Notice To Comply, mediation is not required: you go straight to NCAT and seek a fine if the breach notice is ignored. Also, if they defend the NTC when it is clear that they were in breach and knew they were, you have a fairly reasonable chance of having costs awarded.
Whoever is giving you advice is either not giving you the whole picture or isn’t explaining themselves well.
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It is just not true that anyone “should” and “must”.
OK, for the umpteenth time, here is what the law says:
178 Content of strata roll(1) Information about lots
The following information must be recorded in the strata roll in relation to a particular lot in the strata scheme—
(a) the name of the holder of the estate in fee simple in the lot (in the case of a freehold strata scheme) or the holder of the leasehold estate in the lot (in the case of a leasehold strata scheme),
(b) an address for service of notices,
(c) an Australian postal address, and an email address if the holder has one, if not provided as the address for service,
There’s more, not relevant to this point,but if you editt out the padding an legalese it says:The following information must be recorded in the strata roll… an email address if the holder has one, if not provided as the address for service,
Can someone please explain how or why that means anything other than you have to supply an email adress if you have one. Seriously, I’m intrigued to know on what basis some people are uterly convinced that I am wrong (and are not slow to tell me). If I have somehow misread this, I will retract and apologise.If you want to be alerted when anyone replies to your posts or responds to this topic, please register and login, then you will be able to subscribe to the topic. The opinions offered in these Forum posts and replies are not intended to be taken as legal advice. Readers with serious issues should consult experienced strata lawyers. NB: Longer threads may spill over to additional pages - look for the numbers on the bottom right, under the last post.
But because he’s refusing to give me the details about it all (he’s claiming that I can’t access any of that detail because it’s only the strata committee that are allowed to see it),
This where the committee member is playing in the grey areas. They don’t have to provide you with the documents but you or your agents are entitled to see ALL the documents at your strata manager’s office. So perhaps it’s worth hiring a strata search specialist and I’m not sure how much that will cost.
Personally, I would tell the committee that if they try to push through this by-law, you will challenge it as being “harsh, unconscionable or oppressive” as well as being in breach of section 136: “A by-law has no force or effect to the extent that it is inconsistent with this or any other Act or law.”
Let them do the leg work and find out which side of the law they sit. For what it’s worth, I believe that if an owners corporation has chosen to save money on the premium by including an excess on the policy, they can’t expect an individual owner to make up the shortfall when a claim is made.
And if they push ahead with it, this will stand or fall on the legalities, not on what their motivations may or may not have been, so pursuing a conspiracy may be a waste of time and money.
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