Victorian council’s use of online meetings to avoid conspiracists ‘conflicts’ with democracy, court hears

Yarra Ranges council employee tells supreme court of ‘chaotic’ scenes after a January meeting

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A Victorian council’s bid to stop conspiracists disrupting its work has been challenged in the state’s supreme court, which heard a “chaotic” meeting led to a planning official being accused of trying to “lock people up”.

Yarra Ranges council, in Melbourne’s outer eastern suburbs, announced in April it would close its public gallery for council meetings citing verbal abuse and intimidation from some of those attending them, including members of the conspiracist group My Place. It reopened its meetings to the public last month.

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