“Landcom on steroids” … Planning Minister Brad Hazzard says Urbangrowth NSW will have compulsory acquisition powers. Photo: Andrew Quilty
The Planning Minister, Brad Hazzard, said the new body,
called Urbangrowth NSW, would be ”Landcom on steroids” and would be
modelled on government agencies in other states that have broad powers
to encourage new housing projects.
”We learnt the lessons from Victoria and south-east
Queensland and understand the benefits of having a government
organisation that can drive delivery of housing,” he said.
Under plans in the budget, the 30-year-old government
agency Landcom will be merged with the 18-month-old Sydney Metropolitan
Development Authority, to form a new body to co-ordinate developments
on greenfield and existing urban areas.
Although many details of the new body have not been
finalised, Mr Hazzard said its key function would be to assemble land,
often by using government powers to buy properties and amalgamate them
into sites suitable for large-scale developments.
”The critical thing is to identify and put together
parcels of land that may not have been identified or where it is not
practical for the private sector to do so,” he said.
Developers have been lobbying for years for a body with
these powers, arguing developments are often stopped because one
landowner won’t sell or holds out for an exorbitant price and stops them
assembling the complete development site. The metropolitan development
authority has powers to compulsory buy, but operates in only two areas,
Redfern-Waterloo and Granville.
In contrast, Urbangrowth NSW will work across the state
and identify areas such as Parramatta Road, which has often been cited
as suitable for housing, and co-ordinate housing projects.
Urbangrowth NSW could be set up immediately with powers
to force landowners to sell the new body their property, Mr Hazzard
said, but he wanted to provide some protection for private landowners.
”SMDA have compulsory acquisition powers but there are
no fairness provisions in it, we will look to ensure this does not
operate in a willy-nilly fashion,” he said.
The former Coalition leader John Brogden, recently made the chairman of Landcom, will be the head of Urbangrowth NSW.
Developer lobby groups including the Property Council of
Australia and the Urban Development Institute of Australia were
delighted with the plans for the new body but warned it would need money
to buy sites to fulfil its potential.
”The most important thing is the body needs money, one
thing we could not see is any major additional funding in the budget,”
the institute’s NSW chief executive, Stephen Albin, said.
Mr Hazzard said Landcom already had its own funding but
believed the government would be reluctant to agree to Mr Albin’s
suggestion the new body be given power to borrow money to buy land for
development.
The Property Council’s NSW executive director, Glenn
Byres, said the new body would need to do far more than SMDA, which he
said had made little impact on Sydney’s historically low rates of
housing construction.
”Its brief was not big enough for our liking and it was never used in a way we imagined it could be used,” he said.