Last Updated 29/3/10
PLEASE GO TO THE 2015 DPCD ADDRESS FOR PLANNING ISSUES: www.delwp.vic.gov.au
(10/10/09 - P) VC60 addresses a catch-all of issues including native veg and renewable energy, while VC58 changes residential subdivision requirements.
DPCD has announced the following Amendments to planning schemes in Victoria. These are changes made by the Minister for Planning (State government). You can check them out by clicking the links, or going to DPCD's website www.dpcd.vic.gov.au
Amendment VC60 introduced changes to the Victoria Planning Provisions and all planning schemes on 21 September 2009, including: renewable energy, maritime precinct policy, river health, broiler farms, native vegetation exemption clarification, subdivision of land in more than one zone and a number of minor matters including domestic animal enclosures. Advisory Note 22: Amendment VC60, September 2009 explains these changes.
Amendment VC60 Amends Clause 56.05-2 Residential Subdivision, Public Open Space to be consistent with the Precinct Structure Plan Guidelines to include new and amended existing public open space objectives, distribution and standards for active open space, local parks, open space links and linear parks.
(17/9/09 - P) This knee-jerk piece of political opportunism creates a dangerous future for rural Victorians
On the 10th of September 2009, the Brumby government placed a new provision (Clause 52.43) in all rural planning schemes that provides for so-called 'bushfire protection'. The provision is interim, and at this stage is due to expire on 31st August 2010. Changes have also been made to the Schedule of Clause 53 - the State provision that recognises the Upper Yarra Valley and Dandenongs Regional Strategy Plan, where the strength of those controls are undermined by the inclusion of Clause 52.43 exemptions.
And what do the new exemptions from needing a planning permit to clear vegetation allow?
Clearing (removal, destruction and lopping) not only of native, but all vegetation.
Clearing of all vegetation within 10 metres of a building used for accommodation, and of ground fuel within 30 metres.
Clearing of any vegetation for "a combined maximum width of 4 metres either side of a fence" on a boundary between properties in different ownership.
Fuel reduction burning on the roadside of an existing public road.
Removal of fallen wood for personal use from the roadside of existing public roads.
See also MRRA's article on the new community group, Living With The Bush.
MRRA Says:
One way to guarantee bushfires all over is to give people carte blanche to burn roadsides. There are hundreds of examples every year of land owners doing burns that get away. This latest effort should confuse things nicely - what price people will think they can burn anytime? Oh dear, another bummer idea.
And what better way to guarantee neighbour turns against neighbour than allowing one owner to remove vegetation on someone else's property? The wording of the control is confusing as well - is that 4 metres both sides of the fence, or 2 metres either side? Who knows!
Who is going to measure? Can half a plant be cleared?
As for clearing all vegetation, well - there go our water catchments, and what protects exotic trees, including prized street trees?
All up, this move has the hallmarks of what is increasingly becoming typical of decisions this government is making - impetuous, currying minority political favour, not thought through, heavily influenced by trying to gain short-term political brownie points, and with overtones of a complete mess just around the corner. Is it just us or what? Who in their right mind would say clear this much vegetation, and start fires as well!
Yep, we could say 'good one', but it's not, so we wouldn't mean it.
(18/9/09 - P) Another piece of the government's pro-development agenda falls into place
Notice was given yesterday of the introduction of an Activity Centre Zone into the Victoria Planning Provisions. At this stage it seems the zone is intended to be applied in the metropolitan area, but it pays to read the 'fine print' in a Practice Note produced to provide guidance on how and where the new zone CAN be applied. There don't seem to be any rock-hard guarantees. You can check out the zone, amendment, Practice Note and other details by following the links in advice received (below) from the Department of Planning and Community Development.
Amendment VC59 introduces the Activity Centre Zone to the Victoria Planning Provisions and the Manningham Planning Scheme. The Minister's Direction on the Form and Content of Planning Schemes is amended to introduce the schedule to the Activity Centre Zone. The practice note provides guidance. More information ...
(17/9/09 - P) Get off!
Another ridiculous but typical move by a State government seemingly hurtling out of control: this time it's the idea of making residents pay to object to ghastly development or development that affects other people. You can read more about it in the following Age stories.
Age editorial
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/editorial/fasttrack-planning-takes-an-undemocratic-turn-20090910-fjbg.html?skin=text-only
Premier gets cold feet:
http://www.theage.com.au/national/planning-objector-fee-not-on-agenda-20090910-fje2.html
Justin, nice guy, really:
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/stone-the-crows-the-ministers-unavailable-20090910-fjbo.html?page=-1
MRRA Says:
The government really should try listening to all of the people who vote, not just those who pay massive amounts to influence the government's thinking, and in particular to eliminate all "obstacles" to doing anything those people want.
Can anyone tell us when, precisely, did Victoria become a dictatorship?
(30/5/09 - P) "Tick box" planning approvals, with Councils and community left out in the cold, finally begin to kill off the notion that Victoria is a democracy with a strategically-based planning system
Last Thursday, by Ministerial amendment VC56 and without public consultation, the Victorian government introduced new planning provisions into all planning schemes in Victoria. The amendment also forced radical new processes for decision-making on the State, without changing legislation to enable those processes to occur.
Amendment VC56 consists of two new Particular Provisions, Clauses 52.40 Government Funded Education Facilities, and 52.41 Government Funded Social Housing. In addition, two new Advisory Notes (which don't carry any statutory or legal weight - i.e. they are not mandatory) set out new approvals processes that give building surveyors authority to approve development without planning permits (for education facilities), and the Minister for Planning final (and sole) control of approvals. Councils' powers to make planning decisions are removed, and residents have no third-party rights to know about, object to and appeal against development applications. New buildings and works can be approved in any zone, anywhere in the State. The public will not be consulted.
Click here to see the key features of the new provisions, Advisory Notes and processes.
The government justifies making these sweeping changes by claiming they are needed to ensure Federal funding, recently allocated in the Federal budget for education facilities and social housing development, is spent within the short time frames set by the Federal government. It is also claimed the funding will create jobs (in the construction industry).
Under the new provisions/processes for education facilities:
The provisions/processes for social housing are even more contentious.
It's not clear for either provision whether applications are to be referred to referral authorities, or who will do refer them (although it wouldn't be a surprise to learn applicants instead of Councils refer proposals); all that is required - and only where land is affected by an overlay - is written consent / approval.
There is no specific reference to rural, coastal, environmentally sensitive and fireprone areas, but these provisions apply to all. The standards to be met by development - if they can be called standards - appear to be anaemic, 'tick box' variations of ResCode.
Rushed job? Seems it might be. For example, the Advisory Note for 'schools' sets out a Building the Education Revolution [BER] certification process that fails to include what is said to be a key step - compliance with new Clause 52.40, and referral of non-compliant proposals to the Minister. And both Advisory Notes refer to a Wildlife Management overlay, which if applied to where the building is proposed, triggers having to get an approval from the relevant management authority. Problem is, there is no Wildlife Management Overlay in the Victoria Planning Provisions (it should be Wildfire Management), but in either case, just who exactly is the relevant management authority?
Click the link to see the approved Amendment VC56 documentation, including Clauses 52.40 and 52.41:
http://www.dse.vic.gov.au/Shared/ats.nsf/WebViewUniqueID/0f266f54d4b38217ca2575bd007a3690?OpenDocument&V&Victoria%20Planning%20Provisions&Victoria%20Planning%20Provisions&Click=CA256DC800080C18.476caac79d318ee2ca256dee001434f7/$Body/0.2A7E
Click the link to go to the Clause 52.40 and 52.41 Advisory Notes:
http://www.dse.vic.gov.au/DSE/nrenpl.nsf/LinkView/A43412BBE06AAD9BCA25733800838956F6AD6161A7CF8626CA2572FF00260672#Advisory
MRRA Says:
The real import of the government's actions in arbitrarily suspending democracy and converting 'planning' into 'development and jobs delivery', this time under the guise of spending Federal funding, is that it is part of a broader takeover agenda that is currently in train.
That agenda is embedded in proposals to change planning law in the recent Planning and Environment Act review Discussion Paper.
There, the agenda and the undemocratic tools intended to implement it loomed large. Deregulation features prominently - 'speeding' planning up by getting rid of rules and standards developers find tiresome, and along with them throwing out democracy, transparency and accountability. Filching selective pieces of legislation from other jurisdictions and popping them into Victorian legislation. Stripping processes down to rubber stamping, a technical 'tick box' compliance. Eliminating checks and balances, focussing not on planning principles but wish-lists of pet players of the day. Putting foxes in charge of hen houses. Assumed, automatic 'no-brainer' approval that side-steps the need to measure planning applications strategically against whether they should proceed, by going straight to dickering around with how they will happen. Shutting out any who may object to their property or street or town being done over by developers. We know, because MRRA made a submission on the Planning and Environment Act review Discussion Paper.
This corrosive agenda is also embedded in legislation currently going through parliament to create Development Assessment Committees [DACs] to take planning off Councils, and the community. It has, unsurprisingly, been passed by the Labor-majority lower house, but still has to tackle the upper house and this is scheduled to happen in the first week of June.
All this talk of legislation brings us back to an issue we have with the introduction of Clauses 52.40 and 52.41. Where's the legislation for the changes to planning processes in this amendment? Can a Minister for Planning change planning processes in Victoria by Ministerial amendment, without changing the Planning and Environment Act?
The Minister has authority under the Planning and Environment Act to make amendments to change planning schemes, without consultation. It's a power that should be used thoughtfully and judiciously, and solely in furthering planning principles. On this occasion, however, a Ministerial amendment has been used not only to change planning schemes but to introduce a new way of operating, for which there is no enabling provision in the Planning and Environment Act.
As we said, decision-making processes similar to those that come with VC56 are also proposed in the Planning and Environment Act review Discussion Paper. In the review at least, there is recognition that the Act would need to be changed to authorize and enable such processes - why didn't their introduction last week need legislative change and parliamentary endorsement as well? For example, which part of the Planning and Environment Act authorizes a Building Surveyor to make planning decisions?
Instead, we have a situation where the Act is silent on these processes, and as we have seen with Development Plan Overlays, when an Act is silent there are no legally binding processes and no rights. Process is just left to be picked over or made up on the run.
For VC56, support for and explanation of the changed processes comes not from legislation but non-binding, non-mandatory Advisory Notes. It's potentially a legislative nightmare, because at the same time, VC56 processes also seem to conflict with and over-ride processes that are addressed and enabled by the Act.
We can understand the government's political imperative to avoid at all costs having to change the Act at this stage because it would entail presenting the changes to parliament, and approval might not be forthcoming from the Upper House. Our question is, does the introduction of these new processes - and do the processes themselves - have legal standing?
A clear pattern is emerging, and VC56 can be added to the list already populated by the government's initial attempts to deprive residents of their rights in the new Residential zones, the ramrod Development Assessment Committee legislation, attempts to gag Councillors and candidates with draconian draft proposals for declaring conflicts of interest where pretty much anything was a conflict, farcical Environmental Effects Statement [EES] processes undertaken for the bay dredging, north-south pipeline and desal plant, an apparent ability to change law via Ministerial amendment without changing the law, and the prospect of having the horrors proposed in the Planning and Environment Act review Discussion Paper forced down our throats in the future.
There's more than a whiff of naked ambition to root out and shut out "troublemakers" like the community and now Councils, to set up 'exclusive' (and we don't mean 'top shelf') processes for whipping approvals through and not many questions asked, and for constructing a planning system so devoid of connection to the true concept of planning, so undemocratic, so lacking in accountability and transparency it tends to render rubber stamping a complicated process.
No surprise then that VC56 not only extinguishes residents' rights but Councils, that building surveyors have been handed more say than either, or that 'permit-less' development can occur regardless of zoning - in the Rural Conservation, Farming, Special Use or Industrial zones - as long as it has Federal funding. It's such a small step from applying this process to Federal funding, to applying it to everything.
Yet think back, if you will, to some of what this State government said its values were before it was elected in 1999 (Planning for the future - Labor's position paper on planning policy. Prepared by Mr. John Brumby, MP, Leader of the Opposition and Mr. Demetri Dollis MP, Shadow Minister for Planning. August 1998):
"The Minister for Planning has interfered in planning processes on an unprecedented scale too often in ways that appear to be inequitable and favour some people over others" P1
"... the community must have confidence in the ability of the planning system to deliver efficient and certain outcomes". P1 nbsp;"Unfortunately, the Kennett government has eroded the community's respect for the planning system." P1 "We must resolve this crisis in confidence and create partnerships between all those involved. This task requires leadership and vision and a strategic plan..." P1
"New partnerships between State and local government, the building industry and communities should provide the framework in which genuine strategic planning can enable socially just, economically and environmentally sustainable results. In this way we can ensure that our particular way of life not only evolves into the twenty-first century, but that what we value most about our society is preserved". P2
"Victoria's planning system is in crisis. The Kennett government has mismanaged fundamental planning and development issues. Urgent action is needed to restore the system to what it should be - accountable, efficient, cost effective and able to deliver economic benefits while protecting our built and natural environment." P4
"Labor will create partnerships between local government, industry and local communities and undertake a number of initiatives to rebuild community confidence in the planning system." P4
"A planning framework is required that guarantees strong third party rights, accessible avenues of appeal, proper disclosure of information about development decisions, transparent decision making and certainty for all participants in the planning process." P5
Life seems to have come full circle, doesn't it? It's so very hard to reconcile this thinking with the reality of a government now pushing to intervene in planning matters in an almost unlimited way, of a Minister for Planning publicly stating that anything that creates a job will get planning approval, of a campaign to strip planning of transparency and accountability, of hearing developers are wearing a hard-earth track to Spring Street while communities and Councils are progressively pushed out of the system.
Regardless of any 'good works' inherent in improving education facilities and social housing, concurrent efforts to cynically and deceptively dismantle Victoria's democracy and planning system to get there just aren't on. The end does not - cannot - justify the means.
The government is increasingly seen as an arm of the development industry acting for development interests, not the public interest, and using smoke, mirrors and spin to do it. The problem the government faces is that there is increasing loss of public confidence in both the government and the planning system, and historically, loss of public confidence leads to loss at the ballot box.
New Advisory Note Details Changes To Amendment Processes And Approvals
(28/3/07 - SG) "Reducing Amendment Timeframes": the question is, will "quicker" produce better planning outcomes?
The Department of Sustainability and Environment has just released a new Advisory Note addressing performance targets for amendment processes, DSE actions to reduce amendment timeframes, and future changes to streamline amendments. You can check it out at www.dse.vic.gov.au/planning
MRRA Says:
A promise of greater quality control and consistency would perhaps be more welcome than 'faster'. It would also be a great help to communities and less of a waste of ratepayers' time and funds if the government made it clear to all Councillors and developers that changing the planning scheme at whim, for no better reason than someone wants to do something the existing zone doesn't allow, won't be entertained.
Macedon Ranges' experiences with amendments in recent times varies from the painfully slow Amendment C21/C48 (which reportedly 'sat' on the Minister's and/or DSE's desk for a year) to the disasters of the abandoned C8 (Residential and Industrial Land) amendment, the failed C9 (Eppalock catchment) amendment, the nonsensical C47 and C49 amendments and the substantially incomplete C52 amendment Council moved forward last year to facilitate the Macedon House development in Gisborne.
We aren't quite at the 'anything would be better than what we've got' stage, but it's close...