The Rockliff Liberal Government is committed to supporting and strengthening Tasmania's local government sector and ensuring councils are well equipped to serve their communities.
The Office of Local Government has released a discussion paper outlining proposed reforms to the framework for managing councillors' conflicts of interest.
Minister for Local Government, Nic Street, said that the discussion paper has been developed in consultation with the Local Government Association of Tasmania and council representatives.
"The Managing conflicts of interest of councillors - framework proposal discussion paper sets out a contemporary approach for identifying, managing, and mitigating councillors' personal interests and conflicts of interest," Minister Street said.
"Elected representatives from local governments are expected to conduct themselves with honesty, professionalism and dedication to their community.
"At times, situations have arisen that have highlighted a need to revise the way councillors declare and manage their personal interests when fulfilling their public duties.
"Having a strong framework to manage councillors' conflicts of interest is vital to protecting the integrity of councils to ensure the community can have confidence in the decisions they make."
The discussion paper proposes changing how conflicts of interest are classified and managed, broadening when councillors are required to disclose interests, requiring councillors to submit annual personal interest returns and making Tasmanian penalties proportionate to penalties in other States.
