In my humble opinion, and I’m still a strata novice, he is wrong. While powers can be delegated to the Strata Manager by the Strata Committee and the Strata Committee can ASK for communications to be directed to the Strata Manager, no way is it an ‘invasion of privacy’ for you to attempt to speak to an elected representative on your committee. And they should, in fact, be willing to speak with you.
Have a google and look at the forms on the NSW Office of Fair Trading’s web site and maybe even NCAT and find reasons a Strata Committee may be found to be dysfunctional. Sounds like you may have a few different ones.
In my neck-of-the-woods, stuff-all notice is being taken of the changes to the Act encouraging transparency, probity and good governance.
I hope anyone more knowledgeable than I will correct me if I’m wrong or help further.