Paul Scully will go to war on inner city councils who refuse to increase housing density

He will streamline the planning system. In return, Paul Scully says Sydney’s inner-city councils must take on their fair share of housing developments. And he’ll play hardball with those who don’t increase housing density.

Tale of two Sydneys: Paul Scully, left, says rich inner city NIMBY councils like Woollahra, and Mosman with their mansions, and harbour views, need to take up some deveopment slack to deal with the housing crisis, rather than pushing more people west and far from their jobs. Pictures: News Corp

New planning minister Paul Scully has vowed to go to war on NIMBY inner city councils who refuse to take on their fair share of housing developments.

And he also intends to trial the use of artificial intelligence to speed up approvals in NSW’s moribund planning system.

In an exclusive interview with The Daily Telegraph Mr Scully said “if we need to we will” go to war on local councils who do not increase housing density.

“There is a shared responsibility to deal with the housing situation we’ve got,” he said. “With the previous government taking its eye off the ball the task now is too big”.

He is delivering on Premier Chris Minns’ promise to made at The Daily Telegraph Future Western Sydney event to make all councils share the housing load.

New NSW planning minister Paul Scully has vowed to go to war on NIMBY councils. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

Mr Minns said that over the next 20 years Parramatta would take 127,000 people compared to Mosman which would take just 425.

“We cannot have a situation where the communities that have brand new public transport infrastructure are having to accept the lowest levels of

population growth,” he said.

Development application processing times have gone from 69 days in 2020 to 260 days in March, with approvals at the lowest level since 2014 and completions nose diving.

Mr Scully is also driving the plan to get more housing in taller buildings around stations and transport hubs, sourcing government land that can be developed and revitalising Landcom to fulfil its original mandate as the state government’s own developer.

He said the state’s “confused and chaotic” planning has seen development application processing times go from 69 days in 2020 to 260 days in March, with approvals at the lowest level since 2014 and completions nose diving.

“Sydney became the second most expensive city on the planet. And now we‘re faced with a situation where key workers are living on the urban fringes,” he said.

The son of a truck driver and cleaner from Wollongong wants everyone to have a home and a choice of where it is.

New NSW planning minister Paul Scully at his office, in Martin Place, Sydney. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

“Why shouldn‘t health workers, teachers, firefighters, truck drivers, cleaners, hospitality workers, be able to live closer to where they work rather than spending hours and hours in the car getting to and from work?” he asked.

Mr Scully said there is “no silver bullet” to increasing housing availability and affordability but that a new-look slimmed down planning system would deliver a range of measures to make it happen.

“We‘ve collapsed, the agencies that were across five different ministers under one minister, the planning minister,” he said.

The Greater Cities Commission, which has come up with a plan to deliver just 180,000 of the 315,000 homes required over the next five years, is also being stripped of much of its power.

“Every other industry is looking at Artificial Intelligence at the moment,” Mr Scully said. “We‘d be mad not to trial it.”

He said Brisbane, Singapore and Seattle were already working on ways artificial intelligence could speed up development processing times and “the NSW Planning System cannot be immune from … the next productivity revolution.”

Although there is an emphasis on build to rent and social housing he concedes that most of the new homes will come from private developers and they need quicker answers from planning officers.

To facilitate that he is giving 64 regional and rural NSW Councils $25,000 each to pay the next generation of young planning officers under The Strong Start Cadetship program.

“Councils and communities are crying out for a new generation of skilled young planners to replace those who are retiring at a rapid rate,” he said.

“Some positions in regional areas have remained vacant for years and there are some cases where more than 80 per cent of jobs aren’t filled in the planning team,” he said. “It’s clear we need to take a look at the planning system through a fresh lens.”