State Planning for and on behalf of the NSW Development Industry

There is significant concern regarding the use of Planning Law to remove the rights of local communities to determine how their community will develop.
Part 3A of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act is well known for its use, or abuse, to remove from Councils, developments that are considered State Significant. There have been calls for Part 3A to be removed. Clearly there are times when the use of Part 3A is appropriate and it would be counter productive for it to be repealed. Part 3A should either be used sparingly or modified to more clearly define what is State Significant.

The current Government has shown contempt for local planning and decision making. Instead of working with Councils to reach agreement on streamlining the planning process, it has capitulated to the demands of the development industry and chosen their policies against the advice and concerns of Councils and communities. And this is a LABOR government!

One mechanism the government uses to invoke its call up powers, is SEPP No. 71, Coastal Protection.

SEPP 71 – Coastal Protection (policy aims listed below) applies to coastal land, including the lake foreshore, within 1 kilometre of the Mean High Water Mark. An area such as Lake Macquarie, with a poulation already approaching 2000,000, quite naturally, has significant demand for development in reasonable proximity to its foreshore. SEPP 71 has as its overwhelming principles and goals, the protection of the coast against inappropriate development. While at face value this is laudable, the reality is that this SEPP removes, in a most patriarchal way, the responsibility and opportunity for local elected representatives and their community to shape the future of their area.

There are examples in Lake Macquarie of what would otherwise be minor developments, easily within the resources and expertise of Council to determine and which have been removed by this SEPP. Other controversial developments such as Trinity Point at Morisset Park would have been well within the capacity of Lake Macquarie City Council to assess and determine. Indeed, it is very likely that the proposed development would have been much more in line within community thinking if the proposal was not trapped by SEPP 71 and the option to use part 3A was not available to the developer.

SEPP 71 should only do what was envisaged, i.e. ensure protection of our coast against inappropriate development. This can be best done by altering SEPP 71 to provide for the State Department of Planning to be required to consider making a submission on any such Development Application to the Consent Authority (the Council) and also by providing the ultimate power of veto to protect against inappropriate development. It should be used to stop bad development, not to take consideration of development away from the local community.

Part 3A should only be used for developments that fit strenuous tests of appropriateness. Examples of what might be appropriate include rail and regional/state/national road infrastructure, gas and water pipelines, and major regionally significant infrastructure such as the Tillegra Dam.

Local communities should make the decisions as to what their communities will look like in the future. Elected Councillors are members of that community and directly answerable to the community. The largely succesful developer led charge to remove Councils from decision making must be reversed.

State Environmental Planning Policy No 71—Coastal Protection.

(1) This Policy aims:
(a) to protect and manage the natural, cultural, recreational and economic attributes of the New South Wales coast, and
(b) to protect and improve existing public access to and along coastal foreshores to the extent that this is compatible with the natural attributes of the coastal foreshore, and
(c) to ensure that new opportunities for public access to and along coastal foreshores are identified and realised to the extent that this is compatible with the natural attributes of the coastal foreshore, and
(d) to protect and preserve Aboriginal cultural heritage, and Aboriginal places, values, customs, beliefs and traditional knowledge, and
(e) to ensure that the visual amenity of the coast is protected, and
(f) to protect and preserve beach environments and beach amenity, and
(g) to protect and preserve native coastal vegetation, and
(h) to protect and preserve the marine environment of New South Wales, and
(i) to protect and preserve rock platforms, and
(j) to manage the coastal zone in accordance with the principles of ecologically sustainable development (within the meaning of section 6 (2) of the Protection of the Environment Administration Act 1991), and
(k) to ensure that the type, bulk, scale and size of development is appropriate for the location and protects and improves the natural scenic quality of the surrounding area, and
(l) to encourage a strategic approach to coastal management.