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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-06-28 Daily Xml
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CHARACTER PRESERVATION (BAROSSA VALLEY) BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 14 June 2012.)

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Leader of the Opposition) (12:38): I think the last time we sat I started the debate on these two particular bills, discussing them together, I guess, because while the two pieces of legislation are slightly different they both have the same intent, and one of the bills has consequential amendments for other acts. So I do intend to speak to the Barossa bill and that will virtually be my contribution on the two bills.

The Hon. J.M. Gazzola interjecting:

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: The Hon. John Gazzola is delighted that I will be speaking only once, but it will probably take me a little while to get through this this morning. I raised a number of questions the last time we sat, and I have been provided with a letter from the minister, which I will refer to later. I think it answered most of the questions but there are still some issues that I think need to be resolved before we complete this debate. Of course, there are a number of amendments on file, both from the minister and the Hon. Robert Brokenshire, and there is a late one that we received today. I indicate that I will provide more detail about the amendments the opposition intends to file later on.

I think we should go back to where this all started. The Hon. Robert Brokenshire moved a bill in the last parliament—I think it was called the Willunga Basin Protection Bill—which the government refused to support. It said there was no need for a bill of that nature and that it was an over-reaction. I cannot remember the exact words, but I am sure that the Hon. Paul Holloway, the minister for planning at the time, would have been talking about another level of bureaucracy and another level of control that was not necessary. That was where this started.

The opposition at the time—and I was then the shadow minister for planning and am still the shadow minister for planning—recognised that areas such as the Willunga Basin or McLaren Vale and the Barossa play a significant role in our tourism industry and our wine industry and are important areas to South Australia not only in terms of agricultural production but also tourism potential, because they are so close to Adelaide.

We indicated that we did not really agree with that being the perfect model, but we wanted to indicate to the broader electorate that we thought there was some merit in looking at a model of protection that would give the locals some comfort that they would not be overrun and that they could get on with their lives and do what they have been doing in those areas, in most cases, for about 150 years. What we really saw was not a failure of the planning system to protect those areas; in fact, over the last decade we have seen a failure of the government, particularly under minister Holloway and then under minister Rau, to properly consult and understand what the community is talking about.

I suspect that the three areas that have caused most concern to the government include the ministerial DPA and the rezoning of Mount Barker—although it is interesting that it was initiated by minister Holloway, yet the final rezoning was announced by acting minister Snelling when minister Holloway was on annual leave, I think, around Christmas time just before he announced his retirement. It is interesting that the announcement was made by the now Treasurer and a very senior member of this current government. That rezoning was a ministerial DPA in Mount Barker.

We also saw the major development proposal for Buckland Park. The Hon. Mark Parnell was probably one of the first to ring the alarm bells about Buckland Park. It was a long way outside the urban growth boundary and there is the ongoing debate today about it being on a flood plain, the lack of infrastructure and transport connection. There are some real concerns. I suspect that either the developer, the community or a combination of both will need to make a significant investment to make the development work and be a success.

We also saw the issues around Seaford and the Seaford Rise development, where the minister again intervened. I think this land was rezoned to residential land towards the end of the Bannon government, so it had been rezoned for residential use for a considerable amount of time. Interestingly, through all of the turbulent years with the State Bank issues and the significant financial pressures that were facing the state during that time, the Liberal government made no decision to put it on the market.

I am not sure who would have owned it back then, but in recent times it has been the LMC, which is the body that took it to market under the government's instruction. So, in all of that period it did not come on the market. We can argue the merits of whether it should or should not have been rezoned, but that was some 30 years ago. The Liberal Party recognised that it was not an area that the community would support housing development on.

So we have those three key areas of Mount Barker, Buckland Park and Seaford. Clearly, the government took a reasonable amount of pain at the ballot box, although, interestingly, not in the seat of Mawson, where the local member was silent. It is interesting that, during the election campaign and prior, he was silent on the sale. The sale was an open, transparent tender, I think. I have not looked at the actual details of that, but I do not think there was anything secret about it. He did not make any noises at all in the lead-up to the election; it is really only since the election that he has made some noises.

Nonetheless, I think a significant amount of water, shall we say, in a nautical sense, was taken by the government in relation to the decisions, particularly regarding Mount Barker and Buckland Park. We had a change of minister. We had the Hon. John Rau as the minister after the Hon. Paul Holloway retired and moved on to other tasks. John Rau was making statements such as, 'Well, we failed in Mount Barker. We got it wrong. It will never happen again on my watch.' If we look back, I think that is the journey that this government and the community have been on over the last decade or more, the minister and the government of the day have imposed decisions on communities rather than the communities getting it wrong.

We have now reached the point where we have these character preservation bills before the parliament, which were introduced last February, I think. The actual date escapes me, but an announcement was made by the then premier Rann and minister Rau that these were important pieces of legislation to protect the iconic areas of the Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale from urban sprawl. It is interesting that the only urban sprawl that was threatened was the urban sprawl created by the current government. It was not the local community that wanted it, it was not the opposition that was calling for it, it was not the Greens calling for more development in those areas: it was the government. So, effectively it was the government that was saying, 'We've got to protect these areas from ourselves.' Minister Rau and the premier announced it with great fanfare. One headline read: 'Rann promises no urban sprawl into wine regions.' The former premier said:

I have asked John Rau—

the Minister for Urban Development and Planning—

to look at ways that we can protect the unique identity and integrity of the Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale. We will look at special legislation. We must never allow the Barossa and McLaren Vale to become suburbs of Adelaide. The Barossa and McLaren Vale food and wine are key icons of South Australia. We've got to protect them not just for now but for all time.

I reiterate again that they were not under threat until premier Rann's government embarked on some of the rezonings that had been approved. I could go on and list a whole range of statements that the premier and minister Holloway made prior to that. Then premier Rann, with the Hon. John Rau, put out a consultation paper which had an interim DPA attached to it—this was back in February last year—which was interesting.

I will just digress slightly, if I may. We have the DPA for the Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale, and I know that we have a subsequent one which is less restrictive. However, the initial one meant that everything was noncompliant. So a house anywhere on a house block, a shop in a commercial zone on a main street, a factory in an industrial zone—all of them were noncompliant.

I think it was Mark Goldsworthy (the member for Kavel) who had a constituent whose house had burnt down. They were living in a caravan in a shed and they could not get approval to rebuild their house. I accept that this was the first one and that we have moved on a little. That constituent was very reluctant for us to raise their situation publicly because it was against council by-laws to live in a shed. He was concerned that if we raised the matter and he was not able to build his house, he would be kicked out of his shed as well. So, these are some of the unintended consequences.

It is interesting that last year minister Rau and premier Rann went down the path of an interim DPA for the Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale. Towards the end of the year, both the Premier and the minister released the interim statewide DPA on wind farms, which actually allowed wind farms to be developed closer to towns than any other state and closer to houses than any other state.

It is a bit of a strange anomaly. Interim DPAs are meant to stop people. The nature of them is: we are going to put a hold on everything until we do the development plan amendment and then we will know exactly what the rules are. The Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale one was to stop development, to halt it in its path, so that nothing could happen and you would not have the opportunistic developers or land owners trying to do little things that maybe are not in the best interests of the community.

On the other hand, we had a statewide ministerial DPA on wind farms that basically said: you can come within a kilometre of anybody's house, within a kilometre of the town, and build them pretty much anywhere you like. Apart from a couple of small zones, and I remember the wording, the zoning was to be where you could expect to see wind farm development. So, it was quite interesting. Last year we saw two different approaches from minister Rau: one, total prohibition, you cannot do anything, and the other was that you could have a fair crack and pretty much build them wherever you like. It was interesting to see that they adopted that process.

Parliament was then prorogued and the bills dropped off the Notice Paper. I expect minister Rau realised that there were a lot of unintended consequences. The honourable statement of: yes, let us protect the Barossa and McLaren Vale, I do not think anybody disputes that that is not an honourable goal to strive for. Whether this is the correct way to do it is what we are now debating. I think the minister realised that the interim DPA was flawed. There were people like the gentleman whose house had burnt down who was unable to rebuild his house. How crazy is it that that would be allowed to happen?

I know that minister Rau is a very busy minister, he is Attorney-General and he was, for a time, Minister for Tourism, and there is a lot on his plate, but I would hope that he has some highly qualified people advising him. I am surprised that we had a six month period where what was normal development, where you could go about your normal business, rebuild a house after it has burnt down, was a non-complying development. There was an officer appointed, and I cannot recall who it was, within minister Rau's office, who, if a constituent rang one of our members and said, 'Look, we've got this problem, my house has burnt down', there was a hotline to fix it. It was, I thought, a very clumsy approach to dealing with an issue that should never have arisen in the first place.

Parliament was prorogued, we came back with a new interim DPA, some changes to the legislation and some changes to the maps. The first maps, of the McLaren Vale especially, I found quite confusing. I live in Mitcham, and on the first map that was presented for McLaren Vale I would have been able to walk to the top of my street, taking a bottle of wine and a bag of prawns, and go to the Sea and Vines. I live in Mitcham, 300 metres from Scotch College, 800 metres from the Torrens Park Railway Station.

The Hon. R.L. Brokenshire interjecting:

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: It is a very nice part of the city. It is a great area to live in because our local member is a Liberal, so it is a fantastic part of the state to live in. However—

The Hon. R.L. Brokenshire: Is he a good local member?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: He is a very good local member. Where the Hon. Robert Lawson lives, he would be in the McLaren Vale protection zone. It was a crazy decision. So, we saw the map change and we saw the Barossa Valley map change. As I raised in this place by way of question, the Henschke's Hill of Grace winery had been excluded from the Barossa Valley zone because, as the minister said, the local council (the Mid Murray Council) said that it did not want to be in the protection zone: there is really no pressure; there are probably no houses going to be built out there; we really don't need it. So, they listened to the local council and took it out.

Yet if you look back at the statements made by the Premier: we can protect the unique identity and integrity of the Barossa Valley and food and wine are key icons of South Australia, if the Hill of Grace winery is not a key icon in the wine sector, I do not know what is, other than the minister's husband's great ability to make Grange. Henschke's Hill of Grace and Grange are probably the two iconic wines recognised all around the world as being some of the best in the world. Yet for whatever reason—

The Hon. R.L. Brokenshire: Eight dollars a bottle for my cleanskins. They're all right.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: The Hon. Robert Brokenshire is obviously moonlighting with his own production in his backyard. The joke about this is that we saw an iconic winery—and, as I said, I have been there. Back before you could measure liquids accurately, they weighed barrels, so there is a set of scales and that set of scales is still at the front door, used since about 1850 or 1860.

The Hon. R.L. Brokenshire: Could they weigh you?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: Sadly, it did not go up heavy enough to weigh me! It is an iconic part of our state's heritage and it is a tourism attraction, almost second to none. It beggars belief why that would be excluded, and then you start wondering what else has been excluded and what else has been overlooked. You start to be concerned about all of the unintended consequences. I have a letter from the minister saying that he is more than happy to put that back in, and I am pleased because I thought that was a crazy decision, if the intent is to protect and preserve those iconic regions. If it is another agenda, then fess up and be accurate about the agenda.

We now are faced with two pieces of legislation that are called the Character Preservation (Barossa Valley) Bill 2012 and the Character Preservation (McLaren Vale) Bill 2012. I have a number of pieces of correspondence that I will read into the record, not necessarily representing all of my views but I think it is worth putting them on the record to show the diversity of views. We have local government—both of the Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale, as well as Mid Murray and Light—and we also have a lot of individual landowners who have raised a number of concerns which I think are in key areas.

I will refer to the bills briefly, in particular to clause 5—Objects and clause 6—Character values of district. Clause 5 provides:

(1) The objects of this Act are—

(a) to recognise, protect, and enhance the special character of the district while at the same time providing for the economic, social and physical well being of the community; and

(b) to ensure that activities that are unacceptable in view of their adverse effects on the special character of the district are prevented from proceeding; and

(c) to ensure that future development does not detract from the special character of the district; and

(d) otherwise to ensure the preservation of the special character of the district.

(2) A person or body involved in the administration of an Act must, in exercising powers and functions in relation to the district, have regard to and seek to further the objects of this Act.

Clause 6 recognises the character values of the district as follows:

(1) The following character values of the district are recognised:

(a) the rural landscape and visual amenity of the district;

(b) the heritage attributes of the district;—

but we took Henschke's out, so I am not sure how we can leave them out if we are trying to recognise the heritage attributes—

(c) the built form of the townships as they relate to the district;

(d) the viticultural, agricultural and associated industries of the district;

(e) the scenic and tourism attributes of the district.

(2) The character values of the district are relevant to—

(a) assessing the special character of the district; and

(b) the policies to be developed and applied under the Planning Strategy and any Development Plan under the Development Act 1993 that relates to the district or a township under this Act.

I am no lawyer but, if you look at the objects and the character values, they are so open to interpretation. It is all in the eye of the beholder as to what is a visual amenity. The Hon. Robert Brokenshire has tabled an amendment to ban wind farms. We have a wind farm select committee, and I have been quite outspoken about wind farms. The people who have them on their property think they look fantastic; people who do not have them on their property and are affected by either the noise or the loss of visual amenity think they are the worst things out. So, often the visual amenity is not about—

The Hon. G.A. Kandelaars interjecting:

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: The Hon. Gerry Kandelaars says, 'How many of them are getting paid?' Maybe it is about how noisy it is; maybe it is about how much you are not being paid. It is very subjective; it is not a clearly defined—

The Hon. R.L. Brokenshire: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: Well, that is right. The Hon. Robert Brokenshire interjects that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and we all look at different things on different days for different reasons and come to different assessments of what we think is beautiful and attractive and what is nice. What I am concerned about with this legislation is that we have the objects and the character values which are particularly difficult to define. The minister opposite has by way of private members' business introduced a bill to legalise prostitution in this place.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: Bear with me.

The PRESIDENT: The honourable member might like to seek leave to conclude on one of the bills.

The Hon. J.M. Gazzola: You're confused.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: I am not confused. I seek leave to conclude my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.


[Sitting suspended from 13:01 to 14:17]


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