The latest objects of the Sartorial power binge are
roadside advertising, on the one hand, and council planning powers on the
other, with special focus on the City of Sydney council.
On billboards, as we know, the racier the ad, the deadlier
the traffic. Athens
is just the latest city to start removing them for this reason. But in Sydney, under the new
draft State Environmental Planning Policy 64, we’re about to give billboards
carte blanche – sullied only by that sticky ministerial thumbprint.
Simultaneously, and on the day he yee-hahed the greenhouse
belching Anvil Hill coalmine through the Planning Act’s gaping Part 3A
loophole, Sartor announced he covets yet more of councils’ powers. Already Part
3A gives him a degree of discretion that in any less abstract portfolio would
be called dangerous. Not content, and egged on by the development lobby, Sartor
now toys with removing councils’ consent role altogether.
His rationale? That councils are sloppy, inefficient and
sometimes “advocates in their own cause”; that we need
“distance” between the rule-makers and the rule-appliers.
The phrase “breathtaking hypocrisy” leaps to
mind. Never mind that Sartor spent a lord mayoral decade venting against the
tiniest impingement, from court or state, on council planning powers. Consider
the rationale.
The truth is, all politicians advocate their own cause.
That’s the nature of democracy, and perhaps of humanity. But the presumption,
which the state peddles and most of us, having experienced council stupidity
and cupidity, swallow, is that such self-interest bites only at the local
level.
This is clearly nonsense. If the Labor Government’s
assiduous greasing of the planning system weren’t evidence enough, in light of
its $10.5 million receipts from developers since 1999, there’s the new draft
SEPP 64.
Until now, billboard advertising has been flatly
prohibited on NSW freeways and tollways. The draft SEPP lifts this ban,
allowing illuminated mega-boards on all freeways, tollways, associated roads,
rail corridors and all other state-owned, occupied or managed land –
specifically the Harbour Tunnel, the Cross City and Lane Cove tunnels, the M2,
M4, M5, M7 and the Eastern Distributor. Also land managed by a state-owned
corporation, such as in The Rocks, the fish markets, Eveleigh,
Redfern-Waterloo, White Bay, Botany, Central station and East Darling
Harbour.
Who gives the nod? The minister. And who gets the money?
The state. The draft SEPP does impose a weak “public benefit” test,
but money to the state is public benefit, right? So, who’s advocating in their
cause now? And where’s the “increased distance”? Hello? Anyone home?
On council planning powers, the arguments are equally
pathetic; the greed equally compelling. If councils were favouring friends and
rels, they’d be loosening the development corsets. But Sartor also accuses them
of slowness and inefficiency. So which is it, too fast or too slow? The
credibility gap widens.
Sartor threatens Sydney
with the “South Australian planning system”, tweaked to fit. This
means that appointed, professional development assessment panels make decisions
in stead of elected councils. Developer lobby groups, such as the Property
Council of Australia and the misleadingly official-sounding Urban Development
Institute, to which the Government has delegated planning reform, slaver in
support. They like mud cake, too. And they know that last time Sydney drew on
South Australia’s planning system, in the City of Sydney Act 1988, the model
was tweaked just enough to gag local government and give developers an
unassailable advantage. Then tweaked again, harder.
Sydney is not Adelaide. The cultural
differences are stark. John
Mant, a Sydney lawyer who
designed the South Australian system, argues instead for independent hearing
and assessment panels as operating successfully in Sydney
municipalities including Liverpool, Warringah
and Sutherland.
The panel does not replace a council but is appointed by
it – not by a developer-friendly minister from a cash-hungry party – and makes
recommendations to it, so council retains ownership. Hearings and decisions are
public, but presiding members are kept closet beforehand, to prevent lobbying.
This is crucial, and Sartor’s recent changes to the City
of Sydney Act
show why. The act, and its creature the Central Sydney Planning Committee, were
copies. But where South Australia’s
original assiduously shared power between state and council, NSW’s version gave
the state outright control and is now further enhanced by legislative changes
that make state members all either departmental staffers or friendlies.
The arguments for removing development decisions from the
politicians’ grasp are strong. But they’re just as strong at state level as
local. In South Australia
the minister is distanced by the appointed development assessment commission.
Why? Because they’re grown-ups. They know that mud cake is only good for you in
small measure; too much just gets icky.