Rae – Whilst I wish that Strata Legislation was the same across all States & Territories, regrettably each seems to take whichever of those has the most recent Legislation, and then makes it their own by way of subtle changes that don’t always amount to improvements.
Consequently, some of the responses to date from people in other States/Territories are procedurally (and legally) incorrect in Victoria, particularly so with with the vote of your rusted-on Committee Chair, who as you’ve stated does have a casting vote at both Committee and General Meetings under your State’s Legislation.
Furthermore, there’s no point lobbying the other Committee Members about the removal of the Strata Manager, because as others have advised that can only be done by way of a simple majority vote at a General Meeting, and in order to have one specially convened for that purpose in circumstances where your Committee won’t, you need to to have a written nomination by ≥25% of your fellow Owners (determined by lot entitlement); a petition in lay terms.
Once you have been nominated, you can call upon the Committee Secretary or, if delegated, the Strata Manager (SM) to convene a Special General Meeting to consider and vote upon Motions to terminate the current SM’s Contract of Appointment, and to engage another.
As has been suggested in other posts, you and like-minded Owners will need to provide evidence in support of the Motion to terminate, have made substantial inquiries about a replacement SM sufficient to make a recommendation, and have thoroughly checked the specific termination procedures outlined in the current SM’s Contract of Appointment.
If the Motion to terminate is passed (simply majority), it’s then that the procedures referred to above come into play, and your Owners Corporation must follow those carefully in order to ensure a smooth hand-over of records etc from the current SM to the new one; not always an easy task when one of the parties is disenfranchised.
Should the Motion to terminate not receive majority support, then your only remaining avenue is to apply to the VCAT for “Orders of Termination”.