Development Assessment Pathways

Dr HARVEY (Newland) (14:52): My question is to the Minister for Planning.

Mr Malinauskas interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Leader!

Dr HARVEY: Can the minister update the house on the government's statewide planning reforms and explain how the recently released draft assessment pathways will benefit residents?

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL (Schubert—Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Local Government, Minister for Planning) (14:53): I thank the member for Newland for his question. I know he is somebody who wants to see our state—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —grow and prosper and is part of a good government that wants to achieve that. This is certainly a very important question. I note that this works off the back of a bipartisan approach that this parliament took in 2016 to help provide a new framework for improving our state. We took to the election, and our Premier took to the election, a strategy that is going to deliver growth, jobs and a deregulatory environment for businesses and households across our state. It is very much this Liberal government's and this Premier's mantra to help drive investment forward and, in that spirit, we as a government want to do what we can to get our state moving and to drive investment here in South Australia.

To do that, we need to improve the way our planning system operates. We on this side of the house, through our last budget, have shown that we are committed to delivering investment in public infrastructure in our state—$11.3 billion worth of money invested across the forward estimates to improve public infrastructure. Whether that be hospitals, whether that be schools, whether that be roads, we are here to drive investment in public infrastructure—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —right across our state. But we also want to—and this is maybe something that the former government didn't understand—drive private investment across our state, the idea that we can actually also have private money invested in projects right across our state.

To do that we know that we need to get our planning system unlocked to unlock investment right across our state. Can I tell you that, over the four years before the election, talking to my community, talking to businesses and households, the frustration—

Mr Malinauskas interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition is warned.

The Hon. S.K. KNOLL: —at the inability to get projects underway was immense. I had, for instance, a small food manufacturer who simply wanted to extend her premises. It took 18 months to be able to get that approved. There are jobs on the table and it took 18 months to get an approval on a simple, small food manufacturing facility. A cellar door, would you imagine, in the broader Barossa region took 2½ years to get approval. This is ridiculous and simply not good enough, and it is why the system needs to change, and that is something that will change as a result of the draft regulations that we have out at the moment.

There is a huge level of variability in the way that our councils make decisions and the timeliness of how they make decisions, and I would like to put on record my congratulations to some of the councils that do really good work. I would like to pay particular attention in relation to complying development applications. The Adelaide Hills Council and The Barossa Council, with zero median days to approve complying developments, which I think is pretty good. The Charles Sturt council, one of our largest, has an average of four days. Also, Light Regional Council, Prospect and Victor Harbor councils are all able, within a matter of a few days, to give a tick to things that need to get on and be delivered across our state.

There are other councils, which I will not name today, that do a far worse job and need a system that pushes them to do a lot better. In that regard we need to see quicker time frames. So, under our new development regulations we are going to see complying developments having to be assessed within 10 days—10 days for a simple house to get ticked off and get moving. But for more complex situations, instead of the year or two years it takes to get things assessed, we are putting in place a system that is going to say 'in a matter of months, three months’, for noncomplying developments to see those things assessed so that we can create jobs here in South Australia, that we can bring private investment here into South Australia, and that we can build and drive investment and growth in our beautiful state.

The SPEAKER: Before I call the deputy leader, I warn for a first time the members for Wright, Reynell, Badcoe and Ramsay. The deputy leader.