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Thursday April 30, 2026 
11 February 2025
North Sydney Council has voted to back a proposed 87% rate rise over the next two years despite protests from nearly 300 residents in the public gallery and around 30 speakers against the motion.
After a rancorous three hour debate, characterised by repeated calls from Mayor Zoe Baker to residents to stop their heckling of councillors, the majority bloc of Real Independents, Labor and a Green voted their seven votes against the two Liberals and independent James Spenceley to support the motion. This now empowers Council to make an application to the NSW Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal for acceptance.
One of the speakers, local North Shore state MP, Felicity Wilson said that if the motion was passed, she would raise it in NSW Parliament this week with a view to having the state government investigate the council.
Proponents of the rate rise argued that it was necessitated by a blowout in the cost of North Sydney Olympic Pool’s refurbishment from under $60 million to $122 million has created a financial crisis and that council finances needed to be shored up. But opponents argued that the rate rise would lead to a surge of $550 million in council revenues over ten years and was mainly designed to fund a whole range of other infrastructure projects as well as bolster Council cash reserves by over $100 million.
While many of those in the audience appeared supportive of the Liberals, having participated in a rally organised by Liberal politicians on Miller St earlier, a significant percentage were not. One of the lead critics in the audience, Lisa Middlebrook, is a former Real Independent candidate who appeared on a ticket with Zoe Baker in 2018. Baker repeatedly called a heckling Middlebrook to order through the meeting, who in turn was collecting contact details with a view to forming a political group against the mayor and her rate rises. Several speakers were simply motivated local residents, some with professional training in accounting and data analytics, who critiqued the financial materials issued by council in support of the motion.
In extraordinary scenes, residents in the public gallery were openly derisive and mocking of councillors supporting the motion, one of who complained to the North Sydney Sun in the toilets later that it was like “mob rule.”
Council now has until Thursday to make its application to IPART, which will then open its own submission process and then reach its own verdict in time for the end of the financial year.