Government cracks down on planning appeals
The state government will ban third-party appeals against council planning decisions, fulfilling a 2014 election promise. Here’s why.
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The state government will ban third-party appeals against council planning decisions, fulfilling a 2014 election promise.
Minister for Housing, Planning, and Consumer Affairs Felix Ellis said too many projects had been held up in Tasmania because of people who “relentlessly oppose sensible, appropriate developments for the sake of stalling progress”.
He said the planned reforms would mean only a person aggrieved by a planning decision would be able to lodge an appeal to the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
Around one per cent of development applications are subject to appeal and 80 per cent of those are resolved by mediation, government figures show.
The change announced by Mr Ellis is expected to affect up to five of more than 5000 development applications lodged in the state each year.
“This legislation will mean that appeals can only be lodged by someone who is directly and adversely impacted by the planning decision – not well-funded activist groups and anti-everything organisations set up to oppose Tasmania moving forward,” Mr Ellis said.
A government briefing note produced in September last year said the reform was last considered in 2018-19 but notes “the proportion of appeals did not warrant any change to the requirements for third party appeals”.
“The scale of the problem created by third-party appeal at that time was not evident by the data,” it said.
The briefing note was prepared for then Housing Minister for Housing and Planning Micheal Ferguson ahead of a meeting with then CEO of the South Arm Irrigation Scheme Mary Massina who was advocating for change on September last year.
It said reforms already introduced had already reduced avenues for third-party appeals, including the 2016 State Planning Provisions overseen by the Tasmanian Planning Reform Taskforce that Ms Massina chaired.
“Latest appeal data is similar to that from 2018-19, with only around one per cent of applications being appealed and with a significant proportion resolved through
mediation,” it said.
Greens spokeswoman Helen Burnet said she had questions about “what the government is trying to deliver for developer mates”.
“Developers have a role to play in planning, but they shouldn’t be calling the tune,” she said.
And Tasmanian Conservation Trust CEO Peter McGlone said it “looks like developers have got to Felix Ellis.
He said the announcement seemed like the minister looking for a fight to distract from the govenrment’s failures in the housing crisis.
“This government has made its intention clear that it wants to almost entirely remove the community’s right to planning appeals,” he said.
“This is almost entirely gutting the appeals process in Tasmania. This is a shocking decision.”
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