Stonnington locks in an annual chanukiah

Stonnington Council in Melbourne’s south-east will display a chanukiah every year under a new Civic Recognition Policy.

This comes ten months after a deferred vote on the same question split the chamber, prompted accusations of antisemitism and led to a councillor’s suspension.

Councillors unanimously adopted the policy on Monday night. It creates a civic recognition garden in Malvern City Square, on the corner of Glenferrie Road and High Street opposite Malvern Town Hall, with a flagpole and space for temporary displays.

A chanukiah will stand there every Chanukah. The council’s calendar of recognised occasions also includes Lunar New Year, Ramadan, Diwali, NAIDOC Week, Midsumma, Remembrance Day and Christmas, and community groups can apply to have other occasions added.

Toorak Ward councillor Tom Humphries, who moved the original menorah motion last December, was not at the meeting.

He was serving the final day of a four-week suspension over remarks he made in that debate, and was due to return to his duties on Tuesday.

South Yarra Ward councillor Kate Hely, who backed last year’s motion with Cr Humphries, Cr Sally Davis and Cr Jamie Bell, told the meeting that for years Chabad Malvern had asked council to light a chanukiah “in our civic heart”, and “the answer was essentially that it was too hard”.

“Last December, I said our policies should be the pavement we walk on, not the walls that block us,” she said.

“Tonight, we have that policy, and it’s pavement. It puts a menorah in our civic recognition garden every Chanukah. Not once, and not as a favour, but as a standing part of our civic calendar, which only this council can change.”

Cr Hely said last year’s concern, that recognising one community meant considering them all, had been answered by the policy itself.

“Chanukah is not the exception to this policy. It is the template.”

To residents who wanted the council to stay neutral, she said recognition “is not endorsement”.

Jewish Australians had “lived through a frightening period,” she said, and many had told councillors that seeing their festival honoured in a public place “would tell them that they are safe and they are at home here”.

Rabbi Reuvi Cooper of Chabad Malvern addressed the council before the vote, thanking Cr Humphries, “who initiated this proposal as a councillor a year ago and has continued to champion it”.

He said Chabad was working towards a memorandum of understanding with the council to hold a public menorah lighting, and invited councillors and residents to attend.

“Inclusion is not simply about allowing people to live in a community,” Rabbi Cooper said. “It is about making sure they feel that they belong to it.”

The inaugural lighting will be held this December at a community event run jointly by Chabad Malvern and the council.

Cr Davis, who moved the motion, said she was sorry Cr Humphries was not there “to publicly celebrate this new policy”.

She cited census figures of about 4500 Jewish residents in Stonnington, 4.3 per cent of the population, and said many Jews were now reluctant to declare their religion on census forms.

Mayor Melina Sehr said the decisions to install the chanukiah and to develop the policy had both been unanimous, and the policy meant the council would avoid “any angst that we experienced last year”.

The dispute began on December 1, 2025, when Cr Steve Stefanopoulos moved to defer Cr Humphries’ motion to install a chanukiah at Malvern Town Hall.

Councillors split 4-4 and Cr Sehr used her casting vote to defer, which meant no menorah would be in place for the festival. Cr Humphries called the decision “nothing short of antisemitic”, a remark he later withdrew, as Jewish residents in the gallery jeered “shame”.

Cr Sehr and three other councillors later took Cr Humphries to arbitration.

On September 12, arbiter Diana Price found he had breached the Model Councillor Code of Conduct, ruling that his escalating language, including “unlawful”, “grotesque”, “an affront to the Jewish community” and “antisemitic”, went beyond legitimate political persuasion and was an attempt to “bully, intimidate or harangue” his colleagues.

He was suspended for four weeks.