Planning – a new approach?

The Department of Planning and Infrastructure (DoPI) has put on
exhibition until June 28 both a 200 page A New Planning System for NSW
White Paper and associated Draft Legislation. The White Paper has been
the focus of the DoPI’s road show but it is the Act that will determine
how the system operates. The two documents, however, currently contain
significant differences.

Not available are either the transition arrangements from the
existing to the new system, nor the details of the new codes and
policies that are to replace the existing State Environmental Planning
Polices (SEPPs) that govern the minutiae of the current system. “Trust
us to deliver what is in the White Paper” is the subtext of the DoPI
road show. This is difficult when developer groups say they have almost
everything they asked for.

It is difficult even for professional groups to get clear answers. At
a Heritage Council forum DoPI told heritage practitioners there would
be no change as far as heritage was concerned, while later in the
session DoPI invited input on how the codes would deal with heritage no
longer subject to merit assessment. The Heritage Council publically
lamented that DoPI had not listened to them and their three submissions.

One major change is the removal of the principles of Ecologically
Sustainable Development (ESD) which is one of the Objects of the current
Act. ESD is recognised federally and in 60 other NSW Acts with
established case law. In its place DoPI propose an object of “economic
growth and environmental and social well-being through sustainable
development”. Growth is the focus. Gone are the fundamental importance
of the precautionary principle, the polluter pays principle and other
pricing and incentive mechanisms, and biodiversity and ecological
integrity. The DoPI road show treats it as a name change rather than a
fundamental change in the focus of the system, and does not even
acknowledge that key principles are being lost.

Building on the Coalition’s pre-election promise to return planning
power to the people Minister Hazzard argues the main change in the new
system is to get people involved in deciding the key elements upfront
like strategic plans and development codes, so they will no longer need
to comment on up to 80 per cent of DAs. The difficulties of shifting
people’s focus from the local to the regional are universally
acknowledged and new online mechanisms are proposed.

Sitting alongside the Minister’s upfront promise is the concurrent
Metropolitan Strategy exhibition (see separate item). Community
consultation has been poor and not in line with the new system and yet
this strategy sets the planning parameters for Sydney’s future. So when
people turn up to work on their sub-regional and local plans they will
find the broad outline locked in. The Minister has extended the
exhibition by a month to try to get more participation, rather than
re-exhibit under the new system as requested by the Better Planning
Network.

The community participation aspirations are not reflected in the
draft Act. The Minister can override the plans and no plan or decision
can be appealed against on the grounds that community engagement was not
undertaken. The ICAC raised corruption risk concerns in their Green
Paper submission but the Minister’s wide powers remain unaddressed in
the draft Act.

With 80 per cent of DAs being under $290,000 DoPI wants to remove
most of these from being exhibited. They want them dealt with by Council
under new codes that should meet most contingencies. While neighbours
will still be informed work will start near them, they will have no
right to object to the development. Proposed in code development by DoPI
is the ability to build up to 10-storey developments and rows of up to
20 town houses in appropriately zoned areas. So it’s not just about a
home renovation next door. If zoned correctly much of the existing
Redfern Waterloo Built Environment Plan 2 public housing redevelopment
could be done under codes. Only those bits that exceed the code, say the
11th & 12th storey of some buildings would need to be exhibited and
merit assessed.

One of the benefits of the new system is supposed to be that state
infrastructure will now be delivered in tandem with new development or
within three years. The aspiration is admirable, like much in the White
Paper, but there is no way of forcing treasury or government to ensure
it is delivered nor any way of stopping further development if the
infrastructure is not delivered as promised. Again, it is a matter of
stated intent and trust of government, planners and developers to do
better than they have in the past without some of the checks and
balances.