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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-11-25 Daily Xml
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Question Time

GAWLER EAST DEVELOPMENT

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Leader of the Opposition) (14:24): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Urban Development and Planning questions about the Gawler East development.

Leave granted.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: As the minister knows, the development has been widely criticised in Gawler for its failure to deal with the traffic management problems and, in fact, potential congestion in the main street of Gawler. As members would be aware, it is a plan to convert by Delfin Land Lease some 219 hectares of Gawler into 4,000 new homes. At the outset the developer said that a commitment deed would be prepared to address the concerns of social and environmental outcomes; in particular, one of those needs would be in relation to the transport infrastructure and the construction of adequate roads. This commitment deed would be a binding agreement between Delfin, the Town of Gawler, the Barossa Council and the state government.

Recently, I met with the developers who expressed concern that the opposition had not been informed about the commitment deed. In fact, I believe the minister asked the Chief Executive of the Department of Planning and Local Government (Mr Ian Nightingale) to meet me—which he did—and he told me that the commitment deed was now in place and that it had been signed off. Last week, I met with residents and officials in and around Gawler and was quite concerned to learn that the deed had not been signed and that Barossa Council now has no intention of signing the deed. My question to the minister is: has the deed been signed and, if so, when was it signed and when will it be made publicly available?

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) (14:25): My understanding is that the deed itself has not been signed but there was an agreement that was signed between the parties in relation to intentions as far as infrastructure was concerned. My understanding was that, because of the election and the fact that Gawler council was in a caretaker period, that there would be—

The Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins: The Barossa Council.

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: The Barossa Council. I will come to that in a moment because the Barossa Council is really peripheral to any agreement on Gawler East. The Barossa Council is peripheral and is a tiny part. There is just a tiny landlocked part—

The Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins interjecting:

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: There is a tiny landlocked part of Barossa East in the Gawler East development. In the main arrangements traffic is the big issue. Traffic is not going to go back east into Barossa, it is going to go to the west and that is where the traffic issues lie. In particular, the Hon. Mr Dawkins will be well aware as to where the traffic flow needs to go, which is south of the town of Gawler towards the Tiver Road direction. That is where the key infrastructure issues are.

I understand that, in relation to the Town of Gawler and the developers, there has been some agreement signed but, as I said, I do not think it is the final deed. They were waiting for the election to take place so that Gawler council would be in a position to sort things out, and I think there were also some matters in relation to transport. My advice at the time was that there had been a general agreement.

DPAC held its meeting in Gawler on 30 July and, on 26 August 2010, after considering submissions received in response to consultation and the advice of DPAC, I approved the DPA with amendments. Those amendments included the insertion of a policy that seeks to prevent development that would result in the capacity of the road network being exceeded, insertion of policy seeking protection of key electricity and gas transmission infrastructure, adjustment of policy regarding the risk of and protection against bushfire, and also adjustment of policy regarding a range of design matters, including the height of buildings at interfaces and setbacks.

However, as I have indicated on a number of occasions, development plan amendments have traditionally been simply the zoning of land. For the first time this government is seeking to incorporate consideration of infrastructure within the process, and that is completely new to this state; it is appropriate but it is new. I find it rather amazing that a number of people should be criticising the government, particularly in relation to not just Gawler East but also Mount Barker, for example.

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway interjecting:

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: They don't. Do you really think that people—

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway interjecting:

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: Saying that has to be one of the greatest pieces of stupidity of all time. Do you think that, when Governor Hindmarsh landed, suddenly the tramline was running so that he could hop onto a tram and come into the city? We are talking about new areas and you actually have to have a plan. We are talking about a development plan. The first thing to do is to have a plan and ask, 'Where are we going to put the township? It will grow so, first of all, let's look to see where it will be located physically and where we should put the infrastructure.'

The honourable member seems to think that you should build the infrastructure and then do the plan afterwards. The fact is that it has to be concurrent. We are still going through the development plan in places like Mount Barker; it has not even been approved. The honourable member is saying that we should have infrastructure before we even approve a plan. It is absolutely ludicrous, and there are a whole lot of ill-informed people in this city who are jumping on the bandwagon.

First of all, you have to get some idea about what you want to do before you start building things, and that is exactly what we are going through. In relation to Gawler, my understanding—and I will check it; as I said, I have not had a briefing on Gawler East for some time—at the time was that the formal final deed had not been signed, but there had been some agreements, certainly with Gawler council, and that these were to be finalised following the election. I am happy to supply an update to the honourable member in relation to the progress on that matter.

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