Welcome to our new City of Ryde Councillors

Council election results are in! Congratulations to the newly elected Councillors of the City of Ryde, who will have the privilege of helping plan and manage one of the most economically significant areas in Sydney: Macquarie Park.

Macquarie Park will experience extensive change during the tenure of this Council, including the opening of the Sydney Metro extension, continued economic recovery from COVID-19, and master planning for an additional 20,000 jobs and 10,000 extra residents in the area.

Results were announced yesterday, 21 December 2021, and reveal the line up of our new Council:

• Bernard Purcell (Lab) *

• Sarkis Yedelian OAM (Lib) *

• Katie O’Reilly (Lab)

• Shweta Deshpande (Lib)

• Penny Pederson (Lab) *

• Roy Maggio (Ind) *

• Jordan Lane (Lib) *

• Sophie Lara-Watson (Lib)

• Jerome Laxale (Lab) *

• Trenton Brown (Lib) *

• Charles Song (Lab)

• Daniel Han (Lib)

  * denotes returning Councillors who served in the previous term

The Liberal party have won 6 seats, Labor have won 5, and 1 seat has gone to an independent candidate, Roy Maggio.

While an additional referendum to decide if Ryde should have a directly elected Mayor passed with significant support, it will not come in to effect until 2024. This means the next Mayor of Ryde will be chosen by the new Councillors. If the choice is deadlocked, a name will be drawn out of a hat, as was the case when Jerome Laxale secured the position in 2015.

During the election, Connect MPID and Macquarie Park Ryde Business Chamber hosted a “Meet the candidates” event, to provide an opportunity to hear from prospective leaders and to emphasise the importance of leadership for Macquarie Park.

Connect MPID General Manager Mark Ames believes our new Councillor’s advocacy and support for Macquarie Park will be more critical in this Council term than ever before:

“Macquarie Park is facing a pivotal moment in its history. It will need our local leaders to support the growth of our innovation district, to the benefit of all of Ryde.”

“Macquarie Park may not fill Councillor’s mailbags in the same way residential issues do, but the Macquarie Park community relies on Councillors to demonstrate passion and commitment for Ryde’s economic powerhouse – it’s so much more than just ‘roads, rates and rubbish’!”

I congratulate our new Councillors on their election, acknowledge their service to our community, and look forward to a productive and collaborative relationship going forwards.”

Full election results can be found on the NSW Electoral Commission’s website.