Even if up to one quarter of Shoalhaven houses are “unoccupied” holiday houses, this means the other 75 per cent which are made up of families with some of the lowest household incomes in the country will also be hit by your 28, 34 or 61 per cent rate rise.

What should families on fixed incomes from either government or pension funds (many of whom are only on $20,000 a year or even less) cut from their budgets in order to pay for your cycle ways, climate change committees and cultural centres that you and your Greens colleagues are spruiking?

Suggesting that those who do not have the means to pay for these increases should use the hardship policy, which leads toward a debt collection process, helps nobody. Many in our community have so much civic pride that they go without to pay their bills. They expect their community leaders to be fair and reasonable in setting these charges.

If the Greens/Gash campaign to increase our rates was “transparent” as you say, then you would be instructing the general manager to quote these increases according to the dollar impact over time that they will have on household budgets. The current method ignores the cumulative effect of these charges and overlooks expected increases in other council charges like water, sewerage, waste and user charges.

Those of us who sit around the council chamber are comparatively well off. It is these personal circumstances that mean we can end up being “out of touch” with others in our community.  We all must live within our means and that includes Shoalhaven City Council.

I spent eight years as an elected councillor at Campbelltown City Council. That included four years as chair of the Finance and City Properties Committee and two years as deputy mayor.

I can tell you from that experience is that there are a whole bunch of elected councillors who have delusions of grandeur and are desperate to build monuments to themselves. Those delusions are most prevalent among members of the progressive political parties who are addicted to spending money they never earned and which they don't own. That disease has now apparently spread to our own council.

If there was a real need to raise our rates by somewhere between 20 and 60 per cent it was not made apparent during the life of the previous council. Were we lied to by the omission to tell us or is this supposed need something that has now been invented? Now there is a supposed need to build a cultural centre (to disseminate progressive propaganda perhaps) and cycleways with perhaps a little bit left over spent on roads. That spend on roads would be a little out of character for progressives mind you, so don't hold your breath.

The creed for local government is governed by the three 'r's - rates, roads and rubbish. Funding of anything else is most appropriately the responsibility of the next tiers of government. It is not the responsibility of a council to humour the next thought bubble of fresh young people.

I am unable to understand the logic of the comment by Cr Gartner, who reckons that 13,000 vacant homes is a justification for increasing our rates by up to 60 per cent. Was something left out in that report?

I am feeling so frustrated by this betrayal of trust I am thinking of starting a new political party. I'm thinking of calling it The Dinosaurs because as a species they survived for a couple of hundred million years and the modern ones all live within their means. If anyone is interested please contact me and I will organise a meeting in a phone booth not being used by some local self styled superhero who has not already been elected to our council and we can solve the problems of our local world.