One of the committee members is a bully… There are four other members of the committee and we would like to vote him off the committee. Is this possible? -Jill, NSW

One of the committee members is a bully. He is constantly criticising every cent we spend, even if it is a safety issue such as fire doors; sensor lights in the hall; roof repairs, etc.

He contributes nothing to the building by way of doing things on the property but he constantly insults and bullies us and never listens to our opinions/suggestions.

Luckily we can make decisions with a majority vote. There are four other members of the committee and we would like to vote him off the committee. Is this possible?

– Jill, NSW

Answer: Hi Jill,

Committee members cannot vote off other committee members. However, the owners corporation–as a collective–can vote off a committee member.

To remove a member, you will need to call a general meeting of the owners corporation and enact a special resolution. If your annual general meeting (AGM) is coming up soon, it may be better use of your time to ensure that the member causing issues is not voted onto the committee again.

Alternatively, you can put in place a communication protocol for committee members, and owners as a whole. In this scenario, all correspondance is passed through the strata manager rather than directly between committee members. That way there’s a filter between people. If you adopt this approach however, you will not be able to directly communicate with other committee members.