Meanwhile, abuse of staff has been escalating.
But the situation is being closely managed, the council’s health and safety adviser Bill Nelson says.
He recently advised councillors the pressure of the council’s current "transformation" process — in which most staff have to reapply for their jobs — was causing stress. The council plans to slash about 9% of its fulltime-equivalent staff from 211 to 191.
Mr Nelson said the stress impact was "being managed".
Meetings of the council’s health and safety committee were particularly cognisant of staff welfare at present and potential for "extra support" had been relayed to executive team members, he said.
In an accident-incident report for the council activity update meeting of September 10, Mr Nelson listed four staff abuse incidents for the 2024 year, ending June 30.
In 2023 there were seven reported incidents, in 2022 it was 11 and in 2021 there were 17.
While the numbers had been dropping, the degree of abuse had risen.
"The nature of abuse incidents is becoming nastier and more threatening," Mr Nelson’s report said.
Situational training for staff to counter this was important.
Mr Nelson said processes to deal with bullying, discrimination and harassment were in place.
There had been a further abuse incident of a staff member in July which also impacted councillors.
Cr Hopkins asked if the perpetrator in the latest incident had been a member of the public or if it was "an internal matter".
Mr Nelson said it had involved a call from a person overseas to a council officer, "with a very distressed puppy in the background and making threats about doing harm to that puppy".
There had been a subsequent debrief including seven councillors who were also approached by the same individual.
Mr Nelson said the police were following it through "to the best of their ability".
