Cr Mustica and three councillors Wendy Buck, Gary Cleveland and Peter Lawless travelled to Italy last month, during which the group visited the Australian embassy.
Cr Mustica spoke about the group’s stop over in Dubai as well as visiting Venice, Rome and Florence. ‘‘We were privileged to go for an official visit to the Australian embassy in Rome,’’ Cr Mustica said.
‘‘We meet up with senior ambassadors and deputy ambassador Christopher Chong.
‘‘We discussed Australian politics, the current problems in Italian politics, the lack of funding in the south of Italy and the Brexit situation.
‘‘We also had discussions about Australian tourism as we are the third biggest spenders in Italy, spending over a $1 billion a year.’’
The group visited the Calabria region, including Cobram’s ‘twin cities’ Varapodio and Molochio.
While there, Cr Mustica said the group enjoyed great Italian cultural and hospitality.
‘‘We were welcomed into Italian culture which included great food as well as great hospitality and friendship from the local people from Varapodio, which has been Cobram’s sister city since 2004,’’ he said.
‘‘The current mayor (Orlando Fazzolari) has held office the entire time and he certainly knows how to present himself in his area. ‘‘We attended an official function with a visiting bishop from the Vatican and it was an honour to exchange gifts including a special plaque to remember the 2019 visit.
‘‘We were presented a cake featuring the Moira Shire logo as well as the Varapodio logo and both of our flags.
‘‘We were driven to wonderful places to enjoy the festive holiday season, often staying out till the early hours of the morning.’’
When in Molochio, the councillors presented the mayor of the town with a ‘special sister city certificate’, which was signed by Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison. The group also stopped to see the school Cr Mustica attended as a child.
Before presenting Moira Shire chief executive Mark Henderson with a commemorative plaque given to the group by the mayor of Varapodio at the meeting, Cr Mustica spoke about an newspaper article and two letters regarding the trip.
He spoke about an article in the Numurkah Leader which included details about the trip costing local ratepayers in the vicinity of $6000, as well as two letters to the editor where the trip was described as a ‘junket’.
‘‘On returning home, we faced the music regarding the Numurkah Leader’s article, which falsely claimed we took a ratepayers junket,’’ he said.
‘‘I can assure you, this was far from the truth.’’
Cr Mustica’s report was followed by Cr Buck, Cr Cleveland and Cr Lawless speaking on the tour.