30/03/2024
THE CASE OF MATTHEW BENNETT A RUBBISH BIN AND THE HAWKESBURY POST
Local property developer Matthew Bennett has been caught about to stuff copies of the Hawkesbury Post’s March edition into a Hawkesbury City Council rubbish bin at an official function at St Alban’s School of Arts. Bennett was accompanying his domestic partner, Hawkesbury Mayor Sarah McMahon who was apologising to local residents for lengthy council delays on the hall’s upgrade.
It’s the latest attempt by Bennett to try and silence the Post, which is provided free around the Hawkesbury to inform ratepayers and residents of the news in their region and local government area. Bennett and McMahon also use online platforms to block and try to silence and attack other critics.
The couple represent the mingling of property development and local government that has proven so problematic for much of New South Wales and further afield, triggering serial scandals and corruption investigations.
McMahon went to great lengths to get the Office of Local Government (OLG) to issue a letter saying Bennnett was not a property developer during the previous government. Hawkesbury Matters is not suggesting any wrongdoing by the OLG. But the letter allowed McMahon a pass on her decision to fail to declare that she had any relationship with property developers, on a statutory declaration that all councillors must sign.
But two major developments underway by Bennett in Kurrajong, one on a property registered in the name of his octogenarian mother Pamela, give lie to the official word. And there are often differences between official “definitions” and real world actions that McMahon - who has a legal degree - either appears or, pretends not to understand. HM also understands that the OLG’s previous position is now under review.
On the evening of Tuesday August 22 last year, two Windsor police officers paid a visit to the home of the Post’s and Hawkesbury Matter’s co-publisher Sam Magnusson. They told Magnusson they were acting on a complaint by “the Mayor Sarah McMahon.” It was a brazen abuse of her position and appalling waste of police time.
They said McMahon had complained she was “being harassed” by Magnusson and she wanted them to take out an Apprehended Violence Order against her. “… do you have contact with her?” one of the police officers asked. Magnusson explained she was simply a journalist and writing articles about the mayor and her boyfriend Bennett that they did not like.
When queried further, the police admitted that the basis of the complaint had been two recent letters. One sent by the Post’s lawyers to Bennett, after his own online harassment of Magnusson and her co-publisher. The second letter was sent to the state executive of the NSW Liberal Party to alert them to the defamatory campaign being waged by Liberal Party members, Bennett and McMahon against the publishers. Magnusson explained to the police that it was a private civil matter and they had no basis on which to be questioning her, based on the Mayor’s complaint. The police agreed. McMahon has previously claimed to have reported Magnusson to the NSW Police Fixated Persons Unit - a police unit set up to monitor extremists and fixated persons who may not fall under Australia’s counter-terrorism laws. It was set up in 2017 after the Lindt cafe siege in Martin Place, Sydney.
As well, McMahon has used her official, mayor’s page to smear the Post, its owners and journalists with defamatory abuse, false imputations and manufactured outrage, bringing what many observers have seen as shame to the office and herself. She regularly blocks ratepayers and residents whose comments she does not like.
In recent weeks, Hawkesbury Matters has learned that McMahon has used highly derogatory language and false commentary about the Post to both other counciillors and council staff. She is also known to have wielded the official councillors Code of Conduct against colleagues, such as independent councillors Mary Lyons-Buckett and Eddie Dogramaci, at great expense to ratepayers.
Bennett has a history of attacking those who write stories about him online.
A person claiming to be McMahon’s nephew Mitch posted a highly abusive attack against the Post on Facebook including a description of Magnusson as a c**t and calling for an act of physical violence against her. McMahon has never disavowed him or his comments in any way, yet she ever so righteously “calls out” others for bullying.
When the game was up at St Albans, Bennett angrily returned the newspapers and slunk off in his hot pink runners.
Hawkesbury Matters is not aligned with any political party or Independents.
