Fence fight: Bass Coast farm fencing permit battle turns political

Farmers have won the battle to stop Labor forcing them to get permits for fences in one of Victoria’s most marginal seats, though confusion remains.

It’s an error: Labor’s Bass MP Jordan Crugnale says her government’s farm fence permit proposal was a “drafting error”, with Planning Minister Richard Wynne.

The battle over forcing Bass Coast farmers to gain a permit to build a post and wire fence has degenerated into a political battle between local Labor MP and her Liberal rival.

Labor member for Bass Jordan Crugnale has dismissed her own government’s controversial fencing permit proposal as a “drafting error” by the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning.

Views of the Bass Coast such as this were the subject of the battle.

Ms Crugnale told The Weekly Times that at a meeting she organised on April 14 with local farmers, DEWLP had stated the fencing permit proposal was just a “drafting error”.

But Victorian Farmers Federation Bass Coast branch members, Faye Tuchtan and Peter Miller, who attended the DELWP 30 minute online meeting, said there was no mention by the bureaucrats that the fencing permit proposal was a drafting error.

Ms Tuchtan said DELWP people on the zoom meeting “gave a snigger” when asked about the fencing rule and said “these things are open for review, put in a submission.”

As of this week DELWP’s Draft Bass Coast Statement of Planning Policy was still sitting on the Victorian Government’s engage website, without amendment, stating six times that: “a permit is required to construct a fence, except for a post and rail fence up to 1.8 metres in height”.

The document even calls for farmers to gain permits to clear “exotic tree rows or shelterbelts” to “protect the valued scenic, rural vistas and the coastal landscape of the Phillip Island Swan Bay Coast and Churchill Island from development detrimental to the much-valued landscape attributes”.

Ms Crugnale holds the seat of Bass on a margin of just 2.39 per cent, faces a major battle to fend off Liberal candidate Aaron Brown, the son of former Liberal Leader Alan Brown, at November’s state election.

Mr Brown, who also attended the April 14 meeting said he heard no mention of drafting errors.

“The reality is, I’m sure, this (planning) document would have been triple checked by multiple people before it was released,” Mr Brown said.

The Weekly Times asked Planning Minister Richard Wynne this week if the fencing permit proposal was a drafting error, after outlining Ms Crugnale’s position.

Mr Wynne’s office did not answer the question, but said “the draft statement of planning policy will allow post and wire fences up to 1.8 metres in height to continue to be exempt from requiring a planning permit”.