Conflicts of Interest: Dealing with them

Some situations will need to be the subject of discretionary judgements as and when they arise.

There are two aspects to dealing with particular situations:   

• identifying and disclosing the conflict of interest (primarily the responsibility of the member or official concerned); and
  
• deciding what action (if any) is necessary to best avoid or mitigate any effects of the conflict of interest (primarily the responsibility of the public entity).   
  

The member or official with the conflict of interest is obliged to identify it, and disclose it to the relevant people in a timely and effective manner. It is better to err on the side of openness when deciding whether something should be disclosed. 

If a matter in which a member or official has an interest arises at a formal meeting, the member or official should declare to the meeting that they have an interest in the matter before the matter is discussed. In other situations, the matter should be raised and discussed with a relevant person (such as a manager or chairperson) as soon as the potential for a conflict of interest is identified.

The moral of the story is...

If you have an interest in viticulture don't think that some people won't view that as a conflict of interest when forming policy on viticulture related activities (such as frost fans).