A Critical Appraisal of the Queensland Reform Commission's Final Report #

Abstract

In 2005 Local Government Association of Queensland (LGAQ) and the Queensland state government launched a Size, Shape and Sustainability (SSS) program to assess the sustainability of local councils and generate solutions to the problems the programmed was intended to uncover. Despite subsequent repeated assurances by the state government that the SSS process was proceeding satisfactorily, in a shock announcement on 17 April 2007 the Queensland government unilaterally abolished the SSS program and established a Reform Commission to consider compulsory council amalgamation possibilities. As a consequence, in its Final Report released on 27 July 2007, the Reform Commission recommended a drastic forced amalgamation program that would reduce the number of local councils from 157 to just 73 organisations. These recommendations were passed into law amidst great acrimony in the early hours of 10 August. This paper provides a critical evaluation of the arguments for amalgamation presented in the Final Report in the light of the scholarly literature on local government mergers.

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