2024-11-15
The NSW Government has announced a new Housing Development Authority that will cut local councils and communities out of the planning process and provide a fast track approval process for residential developers.
Greens MP and spokesperson for planning Sue Higginson said “The Minns Labor Government is preferring private developers and riding roughshod over community consultation and social licence, which is the opposite of what we need to address the housing crisis,”
“We cannot expect that fast tracked approvals, without input from Councils, will achieve the best outcomes for communities, the environment, and it’s foolish to think that it will overcome the actual barriers to increasing housing supply. We know the actual barriers to new houses getting built are the shortages and high costs of labour and the inflated cost of land. There are many development approvals out there with no action happening on sites because of these constraints,”
“This move is the latest in a series of decisions where Premier Minns is dropping genuine and critical community consultation and good process from the planning system - it’s a recipe for disaster,”
“It’s clear the Premier is spending too much time listening to developers if he thinks cutting communities and councils out of the planning process and providing a special concierge service to corporations will solve the housing crisis. He needs to address the explosion in insecure and unaffordable housing and the continued decline of the health of our environment that is in part being driven by fast tracked and irresponsible development decisions,”
“Everyone in the NSW Parliament is concerned about people not being able to find housing, but the Government’s approach so far has preferenced big developers at every turn, and diminished participation by Councils and communities and it is not delivering outcomes,”
“Something is clearly going wrong for the Premier that once again he has made a big announcement about changes to the planning system that will further disempower the people and councils in favour of developers under the guise that he is somehow dealing with the housing crisis and the supply of new homes. He should stop doing it, it’s not how planning works, it is eroding trust and will hurt all of us in the long run,” Ms Higginson said.