Mayor asked to be stood down with full pay

The Queensland government has defended its decision to suspend a controversial mayor with full pay after he was accused of misleading voters about his army service. Townsville Mayor Troy Thompson was stood down for 12 months on full pay of $225,206 by the newly minted Local Government Minister Ann Leahy after ongoing controversy at the north Queensland council. Ms Leahy said the mayor requested to be stood down on full pay by the state government earlier in the week. "We thank him for doing that," she told reporters in Townsville. "It is the right thing to do for the people of Townsville." She said the government had no other option to suspending Mr Thompson on his full salary due to the legal restrictions imposed by the show cause notice. "We're very hamstrung by the requirements in the show cause notice," Ms Leahy said. Mr Thompson said he was disappointed in the decision and rejected the allegations of corruption levelled against him, vowing to continue fighting to clear his name. "This has set a precedent for councillors across Queensland, that the state government may suspend a democratically elected member without a proper judicial process taking place," he said in a statement on Facebook on Friday. Mr Thompson plans to return to the role of mayor after the 12-month suspension, despite the ongoing corruption investigation. He is accused of misleading voters during his 2024 mayoral campaign by claiming that he served five years in the army, later admitting to the deception on the Nine Network and blaming "100-plus" concussions. It sparked a unanimous no-confidence council vote in Townsville, the country's biggest garrison city boasting more than 15,000 Australian Defence Force personnel. Mr Thompson then resisted calls to stand down amid ongoing issues with colleagues. The state's former Labor government issued a show cause notice in one of its final acts before going into caretaker mode ahead of the state election. Opposition Leader Steven Miles said he was "glad sanity prevailed" and the LNP government agreed to stand down the embattled mayor. "Townsville is just too important to Queensland for its council to go on paralysed," he said in a statement. "That's why we started the show cause process and loaded the gun ready for the LNP to finally pull the trigger on Troy Thompson." Deputy Mayor Paul Jacob will take over the top job while Mr Thompson is stood down.