Stuff strata reform – give us a revolution!

I like this piece for some of its no holds barred shaming of the State for its dysfunctional system. Specifically I like the criticism of the failure of the State to take responsibility for the alleged professional the State licence.
The odd person has had a licence revoked only to get a fresh one a few years later and continue on there merry way fleecing owners corporations for a not yet competent service.
Strata Managers; so often in business for the money and too often not fit for purpose.
Anyone with some strata savvy or who has been around long enough knows it is true. Liberal and Labor governments have come and gone yet here we are with the perennial problem both created and neither can (will) fix.
You get what you vote for. The fix lies in moving away from the two party system hence we are still talking about this perennial problem and will die still talking about it because it is not going to go away under a two party system.

The issues with the resolution mechanism are I feel best resolved by making the system inquisitorial rather than adversary. David can not battle Goliath in such an environment and I for one am sick to death of seeing costs order because some inept Member got something wrong and one party had to escalate the matter to resolve the mistake thus in too many cases leaving one party picking up the tab for the States initial failure. The State needs to take responsibility for its mistakes and that happens in an inquisitorial system, it doesn’t happen in an adversarial one.
Sick of seeing legal representation at NCAT as well. It should be only in the most extra ordinary cases that legal representation is allowed. The objects of NCAT include dealing with matters with as little formality as possible. I think NCAT hopelessly fail that objective; CAT Act 3(d) –  any claim that NCAT is meeting that criteria is pure fantasy.

Standardize the terminology. The labeling of the committee, oh please. There are over 250 uses of the word “must” in the Act and there is about half a dozen meanings depending on which must one is looking at. It is an absolute dogs breakfast created by the higher Courts in this State and it makes the ‘Strata Act’ incomprehensible to all but those who like to make these fun little distinctions between this must, that must and the other must. It is garbage because most the musts in the Act have been reduced to meaning should because there is no consequence for failing to must. Cognate words is a section in the Interpretation Act which distills down to saying that a word has the same meaning if used on many occasions. Until must becomes a cognate term the Act is an incomprehensible wish list For 2024 I would like to see legislation that actually means what it says.

Take s 238 for example. No strata committee member has ever been removed (no reported case) and so am I supposed to believe the problems that led to the section just magically went away or is it more the case the alleged solution was just window dressing and there was no real product.
Smart money is that David Chandler will leave the job and the bread and butter issues in strata will still be there.
Sure we can expect to see some Rob Sitch Utopin style announcements but he will not fix strata because it is broken at a different level to what he will be looking at. Strata Commissioner – great pay packet, nice announcement for the Government and all that but I will gladly come back when he is gone and remind everyone it was just a shallow facade.

I live in what is clearly a dysfunctional strata plan (with an agent) and the State do not seem to care.
In 2024 I am so looking forward to the new provision that empowers the Commissioner of FT to request NCAT order management.
Looking forward to it for two reasons. One is the hope it is actually useful to solve the issues in my SP, the other is I need the laugh that comes from it being another s 238 facade. I will get one of those outcomes so something to look forward to.

I like it when the keymaster takes the SHAME stick to the system.
Don’t agree with a lot of the keymaster solutions but still when it comes to the use of the shame stick there should be much more of it.

I tell you where we need a revolution: a dramatic change in strata lawyers’ fees. They’re opportunistic and  expensive. Recent experience also involved my writing their proposals. Owners Corporations should not be forced to fork out excessive amounts of money with little evidence that their case will be successful.

The revolution: the OC pays lawyers only if they win.