Ms BURNET (Clark) – Deputy Speaker, I rise to make a contribution to this Land Use and Approvals Amendment (Development Assessment Panels) Bill 2024. There are many comments to make in relation to Dr Broads contribution, but I will start by thanking the minister’s staff and the Planning staff who provided a couple of briefings, once on the unamended draft and framework and this morning we had three-quarters of an hour to go through over 60 pages of this bill.
The other people I would like to thank are all the people who provided submissions on this process. We received 461 submissions to the framework and proposed bill by 12 November, but all up there were 482 submissions in a very short time frame, and 21 outside the consultation period. That is a significant interest in planning, as we always seem to have, Deputy Speaker.
Out of those 482 submissions, 440 opposed the creation of the development assessment panels. It was not just 50‑50 or 60‑40. It was 92 per cent of those submissions written against the development assessment panels – 92 per cent. It is hardly a ringing endorsement of these draconian and significant changes, a gutting of the standard of planning and how planning is done in Tasmania.
I will go through a number of points. I will refer to submissions that have been made in relation to this, and clear up a few points so that the House, and any members of the public who are listening, understand the changes that have been made in that short period of time – with this being brought on early. Those changes have not salved the concerns of many who feel that this is a complete takeover by the minister. It is a complete interference of how planning may be done in this state – and it has huge ramifications.
I will go into all of those, but I will start to raise my concerns by going through the minister’s speech and highlighting a few of the salient points.
I think the reason for bringing this forward is based purely on a couple of false premises. They obviously have interest in your former role as local government minister and your responsibility in overlooking those reforms in local government.
The bill, as the minister has suggested, provides an alternative pathway for certain developments in Tasmania. Why, I ask? This is not justified. There is no justification for an alternative pathway. There is some phoney information put forward in relation to social and affordable housing projects. I will get to the statistics in relation to the success or otherwise of development applications in the current system. It is not justified. The Greens do not believe that this bill is justified, and this gutting of Tasmania’s development approval system is not the way that this parliament should be heading.
The minister, unfortunately for democracy, provides too much power. Labor is going to hand too much power to the minister for planning in relation to this – on statutory issues. Also, on how the development assessment panels are formed and what actually is considered, or could be considered, by the minister to take an alternative pathway to an otherwise not perfect ‑ planning is not easy, as you are well aware, Deputy Speaker – but this parliament should not be introducing an alternative pathway. That arguably is going to be longer, in some ways. However, for developers to be able to pick and choose how they want their assessments undertaken, how they can be at arm’s length from the prying eyes and consideration of the community who love and know Tasmania very well – every inch of Tasmania. This is going to be corrupting a process that is already in place.
The minister talked about the future of the Local Government Review Stage 2 Interim Report and thought planning was a critical issue. I did not read that in that, to be honest. In fact, Dr Broad was talking about how some councillors do not know their role as a planning authority. Let me tell you that one of the very good things that came out of your review as former minister of local government was to have education models for councillors, for elected members, but also those who are interested in taking a chance on local government, for good or for bad. Actually having greater understanding of their role, their responsibilities, was very, very important. Having an informed local government industry, or sector, is very important when it comes to making decisions around being a planning authority. In Tasmania, that is what they are skilled in and that is what they do. That is their role.
It is a question, probably, that the minister might want to answer. The number of appeals on codes of conduct, perhaps, that suggest that the planning authority, or members of the planning authority, have been challenged. I can remember Mayor Gerrity was challenged at one stage for probably overstepping the ‑
Dr Broad – Lost, as well.
Ms BURNET – Yes, but how many people in local government have been challenged? That is my point, Dr Broad.
Mr Bayley – Even then, how many have been found to have a conflict or not being able to do their job?
Ms BURNET – Yes. We are not all perfect and we do not all know much about planning. Some people know very little about planning, it seems, but it is really important that people know their role. If they do not know their role, they have that chance to do further education.
The involvement of councillors in controversial complex planning applications is one of the other reasons this bill wants to address. The conflicts of interest – again, you have to know your conflicts of interest within a planning authority. What is a controversial and complex planning application? How is that described? How is that defined? It is not very clear.
What this bill allows the minister to do, should this pass, is to dip into what they might think is controversial. There are no clear boundaries. Perhaps I can have a clear, definitive answer in relation to the definition of complex planning applications.
Deputy Speaker, this bill does not take the politics out of planning, but what it does is fairly and squarely put the politics right in the middle of how planning is done in Tasmania.
Dr Woodruff – Sure does.
Ms BURNET – There is too much overreach. Labor, if they support the government on this, will be handing too much power to a single minister.
I do not know of too many other responsibilities that other ministers might have. I suspect the minister responsible for TasWater might have quite a lot of discretion, but probably not nearly as much as the discretion that the planning minister has. Again, it is a bit of a power grab by Mr Ellis in relation to how planning is done in Tasmania. All the power in one person’s hands. Take the power out of the people who know what they are doing and hand it to a minister. It is not a good thing at all.
There were amendments in relation to the amount, and that was brought down as to what might trigger that as a pathway – this parallel process of going down the development assessment panel. It has been brought down to $5 million in metropolitan areas and $2 million in non-metropolitan areas, or $1 million if council is both the applicant and planning authority.
As it was explained to me in the briefing, and correct me if I am wrong, minister, but the reason why that was brought down from $10 million and $5 million, respectively, was –
Mr Bayley – The Master Builders Association asked for it. I am reading their submission right now.
Ms BURNET – Right. The developers wanted it. They make up a tiny amount of the submissions and the concerns that the community has, but you get a better deal – a flawed process that picks and chooses something that suits developers and does not suit the overall protection of the current planning process, as flawed as it is, in some ways. It is not perfect because, as you know, Deputy Speaker, planning is not a precise beast. It is something that really needs to be nuanced and understood, and I fear, and the Greens fear, that this is not the way to go. It is certainly not the way to go having something that is worth $5 million. What is that? It will be virtually a house in Sandy Bay.
Why should somebody who is building something like a residential block – it might be for short‑stay accommodation, who knows – that is not going to fix the housing crisis, is it? Why would that be preferred over the program and the process that exists now?
I can go on about what the minister has said in his speech. I will just point out that in a statutory sense, this is a longer process. It seems ironic that it takes a longer process to do the exhibition, but, hey, you do not have to worry about anybody appealing because there are no merits-based appeals, which is the cornerstone of development applications and development assessments. It is the cornerstone of the development approval process in Tasmania, and that is why TASCAT is there. TASCAT has a merits-based process, usually, so if something is contentious and goes discretionary, application is appealed – either if it is refused, or it is approved subject to conditions that a developer does not want, or the community or people are concerned about the development as it has been approved by the planning authority on planning grounds.
Once it goes to TASCAT, the first thing that happens is mediation between the parties, and nine times out of 10 – actually I cannot say nine times out of 10, because I am not sure of the figures, but maybe we can have that question answered, minister. In relation to the current TASCAT appeals process, how many times does an application that has been appealed go to mediation and stop at mediation because there is an outcome there?
When the minister – or it might have been Dr Broad, but it has certainly been brought up this afternoon – says that appeals at TASCAT are lengthy, why are appeals lengthy at TASCAT? If you think about the cable car, for argument’s sake, that went to TASCAT and I remember reading the submissions. Actually, I could not read all the submissions when I was on council making a decision around whether that is a suitable development application based on planning regulations and planning rules. But I kid you not – there were so many submissions – when we were reading the submissions or they were made available, it had to be rotated through where councillors would read these submissions, because there were too many to put in one room.
People are passionate about planning. That is a very good thing, and we should not be hindering that. We want people to be involved in the planning process. The submissions – I cannot remember how many appendices there were in relation to the cable car application, but there were many technical drawings, information about heritage, information about hydrology and so forth. When something does go to appeal on a merits‑based appeal, all of those things are considered as evidence. It takes time to go through that and it takes a lot of expert opinion to hear that properly.
That is what a merits‑based appeal process is about. You hear about the merits of that subject to the planning schemes, the acceptable solutions and the performance criteria. That is what planning is about in Tasmania as it should be. You are trying to get the best. It is not the worst. We do not want a race to the bottom, and I am sure this is going to cause a race to the bottom.
The minister talked about a decision taken to the development assessment panel being final with no right of appeal based on planning merit, and this reflects the commitment to natural justice. I do not know about natural justice; I do not think there is much natural justice there. It is about the merits of the development application and the merits of the decision, and that should be challengeable, whether you are a developer or a neighbour or another developer, if you have put in a representation, that should be considered and you should have the right to that.
Part of the reason, I might add, is that sometimes things do take a long time at TASCAT, and that is because TASCAT has been chronically underfunded. There has been situation where there has not been enough time or professionals to provide the information, but that should not be a reason for giving up on merits‑based appeals processes. It is shameful that this has happened and that this is what we are considering.
The bill establishes the development assessment panels, but also provides for the minister to direct a planning authority to prepare a draft amendment to the local provision schedule. Again, this is the minister’s heavy hand and interference in relation to planning in Tasmania. It is not necessary, it is not welcome and the Greens absolutely oppose this part of the bill as well.
I want to go now to some comments from submissions. I will not read too many of them, but I will read from the Greens submission in relation to some of these concerns. Actually, I will start with a submission from Dr Broad’s former council, the Central Coast Council submission of 11 November 2024, which says:
Thank you for the opportunity to provide input into this draft legislation, which, if made into law, will significantly worsen Tasmania’s land use planning system while drawing focus and resources away from the real issues. The proposal does not align with our council’s objectives of reducing red tape and facilitating development and would increase the complexity, elapsed time and costs experienced by some applicants.
It is not your Greater Hobart councils. It is the Central Coast Council.
Dr Broad – What point are trying to make there?
Ms BURNET – The point is that it is not just the mayors from the councils here in Greater Hobart, it is councils from across Tasmania such as West Tamar and Break O’Day.
I will read from a statement released today, because we heard that the Local Government Association of Tasmania had a meeting today. In deference to that meeting, we could have put this off, we did not have to rush this through and debate it today, but in a very arrogant approach to this, unfortunately, the minister thought better and thought we do not need to hear or worry about the concerns of the local government sector. This is a media release from the LGAT meeting today, 21 November 2024:
Local government rejects the state government’s proposed development assessment panels. Today at the Local Government Association of Tasmania general meeting in Launceston, representatives from all 29 councils voted unanimously to inform the state government that our sector (1) rejects the DAP legislation; (2) is extremely disappointed by the government’s approach; and
Why would you disappoint 29 councils? Anyway, I will go on.
(3) remains open to professional consultation and collaboration with the sector.
LGAT President and Break-O’Day Council Mayor Mick Tucker – hardly a Greenie – said:
The state government should be focusing its efforts on completing the planning reform projects that are already underway. This includes the long overdue update to the regional land use strategies –
Sorry to sound like a broken record, but there you go.
which are nearing 15 years old and are critical to guiding local development and increasing certainty for developers. The issues created by the outdated regional strategies were recently laid bare by the rejection of the Stony Rise development.
It goes on to say:
The government’s own DAP position paper stated that the statistics indicate councils are doing a good job supporting developments and that Tasmania’s existing development assessment process is the fastest in the country.
We should be celebrating that and what are we doing? We are debating this crazy legislation. It is just unbelievable. The media release continues:
The Future of Local Government review further supported the great job councils are doing, reporting that a mere 1 per cent of discretionary applications across the state go to appeals, and importantly, the determinations made by elected representatives were no more likely to be appealed than those by council officers.
There you go. I think that that says a lot.
I also want to quote from a planning professional, who said:
I think the reality is that they are the most contentious applications. If they were just carving out Homes Tasmania applications, I think we could live with it. It’s all the other vague and broad powers the minister has that I think are inappropriate. Also, the value of projects in metropolitan areas has dropped from $10 million to $5 million. That would potentially capture a big chunk of our work.
There has been so much negativity towards local government it is quite unbelievable. Even pushing this through parliament five minutes after the consultation closed was disrespectful.
There has been an incredible disrespect for local government, Deputy Speaker. I am absolutely appalled that not only the minister but unfortunately the Premier came out having a crack at local government and talking about NIMBYs. That is outrageous. It is just incredible, really.
I will finish by reading from the Greens submission. It restates:
There is flimsy reason for these amendments and the proposed development assessment panels. The framework and bill in discussion continues to perpetuate a myth that there is a blockage in the planning system, particularly to approve social and affordable housing development applications. That is not the case at all. There is ministerial overreach and the Greens believe these DAPs are part of a continued and systematic assault on planning in Tasmania by the Liberal government.
and possibly Labor if they are going to agree to this as well.
It is an assault on the rights of members of the community to shape their place through input on planning in the area they love and know well. It also has environmental implications and will increase the likelihood of inappropriate developments on public lands, including reserves covered by the LUPA Act 1993.
In summary, this is a very disappointing bill that we have before us. It has been a rushed process. A bill that does not have the time to mature is, frankly ‑ I have been in parliament a very short time, but I would not have thought I would see so much departure from what good process is. It is poor process in relation to how we have this bill before us today, but it is equally and fundamentally poor process in relation to how we will depart from planning and how planning is done in Tasmania. Shame.
Time expired.
