MOUNT BARKER DEVELOPMENT PLAN AMENDMENT

The Hon. M. PARNELL (15:30): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking a question of the Minister for Urban Development and Planning about the Mount Barker Development Plan amendment.

Leave granted.

The Hon. M. PARNELL: In response to a question that I asked on 14 September about the interaction between the minister, the community and developers on the issue of housing development at Mount Barker, the minister stated that he had met with the developers, saying:

Of course, if you are going to redevelop land, you will talk to developers. Who else is going to develop the land?

The minister also stated in the same response that he would not be attending any of the unprecedented and historic five public meetings held as part of the formal DPAC consultation, because, the minister said, his attendance would potentially open the process up to judicial review. In response to an angry spray from the Mount Barker Mayor and the media at the end of April about the lack of consultation with the District Council of Mount Barker, the minister did end up finally meeting with the Mayor, but my understanding is that they have not met since.

Tomorrow, there will be a forum in Parliament House with three perspectives on the proposed urban development: the Mount Barker council's planner and two local landowners, one being a farmer. These speakers are very keen to ensure all members of parliament, including the minister, hear first-hand their concerns about the Mount Barker DPA. The minister's attendance at this forum, I would respectfully argue, will not give rise to any judicial review. My questions are:

1. How many times has the minister met with the developers with land interests in the Mount Barker region over the last two years? When were those meetings and who was present?

2. How many times has the minister met with other members of the Mount Barker community who do not want this rezoning to go ahead?

3. Should the minister meet with both sides of this debate before deciding on the rezoning?

4. Will the minister be attending tomorrow's forum at 1 pm in the Plaza room?

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY (Minister for Mineral Resources Development, Minister for Urban Development and Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister Assisting the Premier in Public Sector Management) (15:32): It was not my intention to attend that meeting tomorrow. I have a number of other meetings every day on a whole range of subjects, but it will be good if honourable members are informed about various aspects of it. In relation to the senior planner from Mount Barker—I think it is Bill Chandler who is going—he has been at a number of meetings that I have had with Mount Barker council down the years. I did at one point ask for a list of all the meetings that departmental officers and I had had with members of the Mount Barker council.

I do not have it with me, but I am very happy to take that part on notice and put it on the record, because a significant number of meetings have been held, and incidentally still are being held. The negotiations on infrastructure in relation to Mount Barker are ongoing matters, and there are very regular contacts with the department. In relation to public discussion, of course, a lot of the public discussion in relation to Mount Barker was to do with the 30-year plan, and I certainly attended a public meeting; as the honourable member would recall, at the Mount Barker town hall in relation to the issues on the plan some time back, and I have met delegations on a number of occasions of members of the community.

In relation to that, I would have had far more meetings with members of the community than I would have had with developers. I did have a meeting with the proposed developer some years ago now. It might well be more than two years ago, but I remember at the time that this whole issue was being broached and the government was considering the urban growth boundary I did have some meetings, but I have had very few meetings with Mount Barker developers to discuss those issues as a group.

I think there is a consortium of a number of developers, and I may meet those people at various functions. There is an awards dinner at the Urban Development Institute on Friday night, for example. It is also the SafeWork awards dinner, I might say.

Often at those meetings I will meet individuals who are involved in that but, whereas I often meet those people in various guises, in relation to these issues I have not had many formal meetings at all with that group, particularly recently. I will look through the diary to see when the last one was, but it would certainly be a long time since I had a meeting with developers from Mount Barker in relation to those issues, specifically because, of course, the whole development plan process is under way. My meetings with those proponents were right at the start of this process, back in 2007 or 2008.

Since that time I have had numerous meetings with community groups, and the council in particular, in relation to those issues. As I said, those meetings are ongoing, particularly with the department, because there are a number of infrastructure issues that need to be addressed and, now that the DPAC hearings have been completed, I will be getting a report from the Development Policy Advisory Committee and looking at that very closely and, if there are further issues coming out of that which need clarification, I will talk to affected parties as necessary.

This is a significant development plan amendment. The honourable member talked about the unprecedented attendance, but it is not often that development plan amendments of such significance are considered. But, then again, in the past we have not really planned very well and it has been unusual that we have had a process where we would consider, so comprehensively, growth over such a significant period of time within a growth district and where we would also consider infrastructure issues. As I said, those negotiations have been going on in a parallel process with the development plan amendment. That is unusual historically; I hope that it will be much more common in the future.

We are now moving towards structure planning where we can look at infrastructure issues concurrently with land use issues. Mount Barker was one of the last of the old-style developments, but we have been continuing infrastructure negotiations concurrently that have involved, as I said, potential landowners, not just developers. There are landowners, the council and also the government. I am sure the department would be able to provide information about those meetings. It has been a very lengthy process—as is appropriate—but the number of meetings I have had with developers specifically in relation to this matter would be only one or two, and they were a long time ago.