Chris Minns declares war on NIMBYs in fight against housing crisis

NSW Premier Chris Minns has declared war on NIMBYs, warning councils he will turn to the nuclear option if the state’s ambitious housing targets are not met.

In an address to a NSW Property Council lunch on Wednesday, Minns said his government would move away from demonising developers to praising innovative buildings as a method of expediting housing supply.

Premier Chris Minns says he will use the extraordinary powers available to his government if housing supply targets are not met.Credit: AAP

Asked if he would look to the “nuclear option”, Minns said he was not going to “rule anything out” if councils fell short of the 76,000 yearly dwellings required to be constructed under the National Housing Accord.

Minns said the powers were already available to the government and did not require legislative changes to planning laws or negotiation with the upper house.

“We’ve got the powers inside the NSW government ... to enact reform, to pursue housing targets and completions in various parts of the state,” he said.

“We don’t need any enabling legislation to make that happen. And there’s a balancing act if we don’t intervene; if councils, in particular, don’t meet their challenges.

“In fact, we’ve been creating, I’ve been creating, a political space to make those reform changes by the end of the year.”

The possible tools at Minns’ disposal included taking away planning consent from chronically underperforming councils and handing it to the Department of Planning secretary.

A spokeswoman for Minns declined to say what powers the premier was alluding to in his speech.

NSW needs to construct 76,000 new homes each year for five years – twice as many as the state is forecast to deliver, and more than has ever been built – just to meet the federal government’s housing target of 378,000 new homes.

Chris Minns says his government supports “density done well”.Credit: Dominic Lorrimer

Minns said the consequence of failing to build housing supply was the continued loss of the state’s “best and brightest” young people to other states and territories, noting the 200,000 who had already left NSW.

“Traditionally, we’ve had interstate migration, but it’s often been people who have retired ... Now our best and brightest young people that we want to invest and grow and start businesses in NSW are leaving in unprecedented ways, and it’s not sustainable,” he said.

The premier said the housing crisis had shifted the politics of development in favour of higher density.

“The politics of this is changing rapidly in favour of more density,” he said.

“And the leading reason for that is that renters make up 2 million voters in NSW. That’s a massive chunk of the voting base that’s up for grabs.”

Minns said he was clear-eyed that half of those opposed to development were unchangeable, but he believed the other half could be won over with good projects that ensured young people could get into the property market.

“About half the NIMBYs we’re never going to get back. They’re just allergic to change, and they don’t want to change their views. And about half are up for grabs,” he said.

Minns said previous governmental attitude towards developers would be overturned from a position of suspicion and mistrust, to encouraging companies who engaged in positive, well-constructed properties.

“I want to make it clear to everyone in this room that this government will be doing the opposite to that kind of rhetoric and commentary,” he said.

“We’ll be highlighting density done well, we’ll get behind innovative and creative developers and builders and laud their work. We will work hard to build public confidence as the work you do is crucial for our city and for our state.”

NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman said Minns had resorted to threats rather than offering incentives for councils to address the nation’s housing crisis.

“Chris Minns should spend more time getting his budget in order, and less time picking fights with local communities, in order to deliver meaningful solutions to the housing crisis,” he said.

Greens housing spokeswoman Jenny Leong accused Minns of “pandering” to developers and shifting the blame for the crisis to local communities.

“The idea that these communities are merely ‘allergic to change’ is deeply insulting,” she said. “If the premier is so keen on increasing supply, why didn’t the recent budget include funds for a massive investment in the building of affordable, social and public housing?”

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