HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT (ADMINISTRATIVE ARRANGEMENTS) (URBAN RENEWAL) AMENDMENT BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 6 June 2013.)

The Hon. M. PARNELL (15:41): For the last year or so, the Legislative Council has been debating and passing important bills to reform the planning system, yet the government has at every opportunity declined to support those bills, and the government, as part of its reasons, has cited the review being conducted by the expert panel, chaired by Mr Brian Hayes QC, into planning law. It is therefore quite incredible that the government has brought before this parliament at this time one of the most fundamental changes to planning law we have seen for some time. This bill overhauls many of the accepted and traditional responsibilities and demarcations between local councils, the state government and various statutory authorities.

When planning minister John Rau introduced this bill into the House of Assembly back in May, he said the following:

While the Expert Panel on Planning Reform will continue its comprehensive review of the planning system, this Bill will provide a kick start to an important reform of our planning and development system. The Expert Panel has reviewed and supports this Bill.

I took the opportunity on Tuesday to ask the Chair of the expert panel whether that statement was correct, and I remind members that the minister's statement was, 'The Expert Panel has reviewed and supports this Bill.' Brian Hayes said:

The bill was referred to us, and we had a look at it, and we had a look at it strictly on the basis of the technical aspects of the bill, and that's it. We made some suggestions as to how it might be changed to make it, in our view, better in terms of those aspects, and that was all we did. I recall I did a report in writing on that saying, 'You should look at these sections. You might like to consider amendment this section in the following way.'

Mr Hayes then went on to say the following:

It wasn't a lengthy report, from my recollection. It was literally a letter in which we went through some of the sections and said that maybe you should change these sections because they don't actually meet with other sections. It was very technical in that way. That's all it was. It was not a report which did any more than comment on those technical aspects of the bill.

Further, in evidence to the Environment, Resources and Development Committee—and for the information of the house, this is now the published Hansard record on the committee's website—

An honourable member: Not a leaked one.

The Hon. M. PARNELL: It's not a leaked version, as has been interjected. In this published version, the Hon. Michelle Lensink also weighed in and asked whether it was Mr Hayes himself or whether it was the panel that provided the report. Mr Hayes replied that it was the panel.

The Hon. Ms Lensink also went on to ask whether the panel had made a recommendation that perhaps the bill (the bill we are talking about, what we are calling 'the urban renewal bill') should wait until the panel's work had been concluded. Mr Hayes' response was, 'No, not that I recall. I really just did what we were asked to do. Have a look at it and give us your comments.' I do not see in that answer any support for the minister's comment that the expert panel had reviewed and supports the bill.

What I would like to do on behalf of the Greens is to put on the record now the fact that we are disinclined to deal with this bill in isolation. It seems that if it is good enough for the government to reject every other parliamentary suggestion for law reform, then it should wait before introducing its own bill. In any event, we certainly need to make sure that we do not progress any further with this bill until we see exactly what the expert panel has reported to the minister and also until we see the responses that the minister has made to the various detailed submissions, made primarily by local councils and the Local Government Association.

The bill itself is flawed at a number of levels, and I will go through some of those problems in a second. I also note that in the second reading contribution the government put this particular reform in the same category and regards it with the same degree of pride that it regards its notorious capital city development plan amendment. As members would recall, that rezoning of key parts of central Adelaide was brought in under interim operation, and that meant that binding development approvals were granted before the public consultation process had finished. In fact, the Mayfield development was approved two weeks before the public hearing at which members of the public got to have their say over whether they thought the rezoning was appropriate.

This house has appropriately dealt with that debacle by passing a bill which clarifies the interim operation powers under the act, but for the minister to state with pride that they regard the reform in this bill as an equivalent reform to that of the capital city DPA shows that they really do not care about what the community thinks about this particular bill or this law reform in general.

The minister in the second reading speech said that the capital city DPA was broadly welcomed by industry and the community. That is only half right. It was broadly welcomed by industry because the whole objective of that rezoning was to get cranes on the skyline. We now have cranes on the skyline. There are some happy people in the construction industry, but I have to say my inbox and my letterbox are not full of congratulatory communications from members of the community; in fact, it is quite the opposite.

This bill is being pitched to us as providing an alternative model to urban sprawl. If that was in fact what it was, then the Greens would be much more sympathetic in our treatment of it, but in fact it does no such thing, and it is certainly not a bill that applies exclusively to urban infill as an alternative to urban sprawl. The bill could just as easily apply to fringe development. We also note that the government's newfound love of urban consolidation or infill is following five years of going hell for leather after urban sprawl and the rezoning of farmland for housing. You need think no further than Mount Barker, the now notorious Buckland Park development, as well as Gawler East and a range of other urban fringe locations.

In effect, having secured what their mates in the development industry wanted, including major donors for the Labor Party such as the Walker Corporation (and again you only need to think of Buckland Park and Mount Barker), the government now says that a new model is needed so that we can manage the challenge of more complex urban infill developments. In some ways this bill, like many of the government's reforms, manages to get the question right, but the answer terribly wrong. The question that this bill poses for us is whether the model for decision-making and for planning in this bill is the way forward.

When assessing environmental legislation, including planning legislation, there are a number of very simple tests that I apply, and they include the following: first, does the model provide for improved or adequate access to information; secondly, does it provide for improved or adequate public participation; and, thirdly, does it provide for access to justice? When you analyse this bill against those three criteria, you will find that the answer in every case is either the situation is worse or there is no improvement. Again, for the record and for those students of environmental law and planning, those three elements I described are contained in a convention of the European Union, known as the Aarhus Convention, which is the standard for public engagement in environmental matters, including planning.

The objective of this bill, which is to try to set out a new regime that will improve the quality of planning processes and planning decisions in relation to complex urban redevelopment projects, is one that the Greens wholeheartedly support. We support what the government says it is trying to achieve, but we believe that such a fundamental change should come about following a comprehensive consultation and negotiation period which includes local communities and local government, and clearly that has not occurred in this case.

The Local Government Association is not happy and individual councils are not happy. I will not read the entirety of submissions that we have received from local government—as disappointed as members might be enjoying the sound of my new croaky voice—I will just read a couple of the dot points that the Office of the Lord Mayor has sent to all members in a letter dated 13 June sent to the Hon. John Rau MP as Minister for Planning. They point out the following:

Council is already the precinct authority which can exercise all necessary powers and responsibilities for precinct planning.

In other words, you do not actually need a new system because the councils are already well equipped and have the tools in legislation to do that job. The second point is:

The proposed legislation is a major reform of the planning system and of governance generally and should not pre-empt the extensive consultation and review of the planning system within the remit of the Expert Panel on Planning Reform.

That is exactly the point that I made before. The government, largely to nip in the bud planning reforms that they could see being generated in the Legislative Council—because this chamber does take this issue seriously—was one of the reasons they decided that after 20 years they should review the planning system—and the Greens welcome that review—but given that it will not be reporting until the end of 2014, it has provided a very convenient excuse for the government to reject planning reforms, but now they expect us to hop to and pass their reform. I think the Lord Mayor has nailed it: this is pre-emptive. The third point that the Adelaide City Council makes is:

It is noted that the proposed planning precinct tools could promote a range of development, including fringe growth, rather than urban renewal in accordance with the Planning Strategy...

That is the point I made earlier, that it is not exclusively confined to inner urban redevelopment projects, such as Bowden/Brompton, it could just as easily apply out on the fringe with farmland being rezoned for housing. Another point the council makes is that the public consultation provisions, including those for community reference groups and the limiting of local government's role to observer, do not facilitate participation by the community, and the Greens agree wholeheartedly with that sentiment. There is a range of other points they have made.

The Local Government Association as well picks up many of those points and, in a letter to all members of the Legislative Council, they advised us back in July that they were in discussion with the minister and that they were hoping that changes would be made. The Local Government Association also distributed a comprehensive list of comments and suggested amendments. To my knowledge, the government has not yet filed any amendments to this bill and I, for one, would be reluctant to proceed with this bill any further until we have had an opportunity to look at that and see whether the government has taken local council and community concerns seriously.

The bill also, as I alluded to earlier, seriously alters the balance of responsibility and authority in relation to a range of matters, not just zoning and not just matters concerned with planning. There are questions of rating and the ability of precinct authorities to establish different rates, and you also have something most people might not think of as that important: the ability for council by-laws to be overridden in these new developments.

What that effectively means is that by-laws that have been adopted by a democratically-elected local council could be overridden by new precinct authorities. You only have to look at the range of matters that the councils pass by-laws on to realise that they include environment protection by-laws—for example, restrictions on the keeping of cats. Other by-laws relate to the protection of public safety, public drunkenness, dry zones and things like that. All these democratically-driven by-laws could be overridden by undemocratic precinct authorities, so I think this bill needs to have a great deal more work done on it before it is ready for us in this chamber to seriously consider it.

I also put on the record that the Community Alliance, an organisation that was mentioned many times by me yesterday, has also expressed serious concerns about this bill and about the potential devaluing of community input into local planning. Their motto or mantra, if you like, is: they aim to put people back into planning. We have had several years now of the government giving free rein to developers and free rein to developers' lobbyists, and people really have been written out of the equation. The Community Alliance, representing community organisations from around South Australia, is determined to put people back into planning and the Greens are determined to help them.

With those brief remarks, I look forward to seeing what the government does next. I hope they draw breath and decide not to proceed with this bill at this stage but, at the very least, I would ask the minister if she could provide us with the documentation that was presented to the minister by the Expert Panel on Planning Reform so that we can test for ourselves the minister's assertion that that panel did consider not just technical aspects but also the merits of this bill and whether the minister's statement to parliament, that they had supported it, is in fact borne out. I, for one, will be happy to move and support adjournment questions until that document or those documents are provided to us.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Leader of the Opposition) (15:59): I rise on behalf of the opposition to speak to the Housing and Urban Development (Administrative Arrangements) (Urban Renewal) Amendment Bill 2013. I will make a few comments. The opposition supports, in broad terms, the concept of having an urban renewal authority, which is Renewal SA, and also legislative arrangements for that authority to work. In broad terms, we think that the concept is a good model to have powers for precinct planning.

Having spent six or seven years as the shadow minister for planning, I was often consulted on areas where developments were proposed or proposals were put forward to government where you might have had multiple council ownership. I know a lot of work was done by government on a north-eastern corridor up Port Road that has never actually seen the light of day. However, I think there are some opportunities where there is multiple ownership or a highly contaminated site where you can use an urban renewal authority and that authority have the precinct planning powers this bill gives.

We have seen some examples overseas and in Australia, such as in Subiaco and the East Perth Renewal Authority, which I think has now been formed into the Metropolitan Redevelopment Authority in Perth. Whilst on a Commonwealth Parliamentary Association trip, I had the good fortune to see one of these on a very large scale, that is, the site for the London Olympics Village, where a development authority was put in place. I am sure that the government is not envisaging that we will host the Olympics and have some massive abandoned industrial area to redevelop, but in principle we see that it is an important tool of government to be able to have special powers, if you like, over a certain precinct.

Of course, we have some areas here currently—such as the Clipsal site, which was highly contaminated with multiple owners—and the government went in and bought them. That is, on a smaller scale, an area where we think that this type of regulatory approach would work. We have seen the debacle at Newport Quays over the last 11½ years or so, with this government, and it was proposed by a former Liberal government, so I guess we can say it is something like about 12 or 14 years that has been in process. Certainly, it was the Labor government that appointed Urban Construct to have control over the whole precinct.

That development would have been much better managed had there been a redevelopment authority, such as Renewal SA, with some planning powers so that it could oversee the development. In that case, we would have been much better to have had a range of developers putting in a range of different products at different price points and different styles so that you had some competition in the quality of build, price and all the amenities. I think that is probably one of the reasons the opposition supports this legislation, as we see that there are some opportunities going forward.

However, we are a little concerned with the government having planning control and being a developer at the same time. I know that the shadow minister in the other place, Vickie Chapman (member for Bragg) has raised on a number of occasions, in the media and in the second reading debates in the House of Assembly, the concern we have that this gives the government a chance to be the developer as well as having planning and building control.

A fundamental principle of the Liberal Party is that the government should not be doing things that the private sector can do and should not be doing them to the detriment of the private sector—that is, undercutting them, using our government balance sheet, if you like; in that sense, carrying something on the government's balance sheet if it is a contaminated site or takes the mechanics of government to get that particular parcel of land to market—but the government should not be the developer. We think the private sector should play a major role and that the government should not be in direct competition with the private sector.

We have had a number of meetings with the LGA; in fact, shadow minister Chapman has had a number of meetings with the LGA. Our understanding is that there have been a number of issues that the LGA has raised with the government. I am led to believe that the government has agreed to draft a range of amendments. We have not seen those government amendments as yet, so I am a little unsure as to that.

I was going to make quite a lengthy speech, but it is my intention to seek leave to conclude because we really do want to look at the amendments prior to progressing the debate any further. If they are areas that we are having issues with and they are covered by the government amendments, it seems fruitless for me to make a lengthy speech and find that next time we see all those issues have been dealt with by the government amendments. In the absence of those amendments, I indicate that the opposition will be, in principle, happy to support this bill, but I seek leave to conclude my remarks at a later date.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.