Question: Our Body Corporate Committee has three motions at our AGM that I believe are invalid. If they are not valid, what can I do about it?
Our Body Corporate Committee has three motions at our AGM that I believe are not legal:
- Any owner that doesn’t live in the building is not allowed to stand for the Committee.
- Any owner that has a Breach is not allowed to stand for the Committee.
- Use of proxies to appoint new committee.
Over the past 6 weeks, the BCC has issued nearly 40 breaches for trivial issues against all people wishing to stand against a useless and draconian committee.
Are the motions valid? If not, what can I do about it?
Answer: If you think these motions are invalid and must be ruled out of order, the onus is now on you to do something about it.
The power to rule a motion out of order sits with the chair at the general meeting and is provided for under section 98 of the Standard Module. For example, if a motion is unlawful or unenforceable, it must be ruled out of order.
I’m not going to say that any or all of the 3 motions you’ve presented are possibly out of order or not, because that’s for legal advice and/or an adjudicator to determine. What I will say is that the onus is now on you to do something about it if you think these motions are those which must be ruled out of order. If motions pass which you think should have been out of order then you can seek to challenge those through my former office [the Commissioner’s Office].
Having said that, given your comments about a ‘useless and draconian’ committee, it seems there’s a much bigger issue and set of conflicts at play here than just a set of possibly out of order motions. You are probably better off trying to address the root cause of that conflict rather than focus on individual issues. Remember, nothing will change at your body corporate unless someone initiates it to happen and there might be several options you can pursue to make life better at your scheme.
This post appears in Strata News #513.
Chris Irons Strata Solve E: chris@stratasolve.com.au P: 0419 805 898