Here's the situation.
VIC owners corporation, 36 lots. We have one owner who owns four lots.
I have been away from the committee for a while as i was overseas and in reading the previous minutes of the AGM I missed, the one lot owner with multiple lots had appointed three proxies to represent his other lots. The four of them voted themselves on the committee at the AGM which means that they hold four seats on the committee for the owner.
At the last AGM I put a block to this, namely because I questioned with the chair whether there were valid proxies recorded - there weren't ahead of the meeting. They (the owner and proxies) are not happy.
I spoke to Consumer Affairs Victoria to get some advice on this issue. Their advice was that the Act is pedantic about stopping owners from having multiple seats on a committee. They advised that under the Act, while an owner is allowed to appoint a proxy to represent them, the Act specifically says that the proxy represents a 'lot owner' not a lot. Their advice is that an owner who has multiple lots is still the same lot owner. While they are allowed multiple votes at a general / special meeting, they cannot appoint multiple proxies to occupy multiple seats on a committee.
Has anyone come across any VCAT cases where anyone has challenged this? I can't seem to find any but someone with more experience might be able to point me in the right direction.
I know that in practice, this clause has been interpreted differently and i have heard of developers holding multiple seats because of their ownership but want to find cases either way that have been tested at Tribunal. I want to make sure we have a strong case to say to this owner that they can be a part of the committee but they cannot have multiple seats.