Page 989 - Week 04 - Thursday, 18 June 1992
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BUILDINGS (DESIGN AND SITING) (AMENDMENT) BILL 1992
MR WOOD (Minister for Education and Training, Minister for the Arts and Minister for the Environment, Land and Planning) (10.50): Madam Speaker, I present the Buildings (Design and Siting) (Amendment) Bill 1992.
Title read by Clerk.
MR WOOD: Madam Speaker, I move:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
This Bill amends the Buildings (Design and Siting) Act 1964 to provide the Minister with the power to determine fees to be charged for the administration of applications for proposals relating to the external design and siting of buildings. The Design and Siting Act dates back some 28 years to a time when processing design and siting applications was a relatively simple matter and no attempt was made by the Commonwealth to identify and charge for the service and the number of applications was relatively small.
Over the years the numbers of applications have risen steadily and the ACT Planning Authority now processes more than 12,000 applications annually. Four full-time staff are needed to deal with standard residential applications, and a number of other staff spend significant amounts of time dealing with commercial, industrial and medium density housing applications. The cost of administering this essential part of the development process is now quite substantial, being in the order of $450,000 to $500,000 annually. This cost will possibly rise, depending on the number of objections and third-party appeals generated by the Land (Planning and Environment) Act 1991. Despite the fact that some people say that we have done a worse job on third-party appeals, we have actually very extensively expanded them.
Madam Speaker, it is important to the protection of the urban design of the city and to the protection of the amenity of all landholders that proper standards and controls are maintained over the design of buildings and their location, particularly in relation to the property of others. It is only appropriate that people wanting to develop their property should pay the administrative costs involved.
The proposed scale of fees will be quite modest, representing roughly between half a per cent and one per cent of the project cost. The lower level of fees is for projects that comply with the quantitative standards for residential developments, or the development conditions for industrial and commercial projects. The higher level applies when the developer is seeking increased development rights beyond what is permitted by either the quantitative standards or the development conditions applying to a particular block of land. In these cases public notification is required and any decision of the Planning Authority cases would be subject to appeal by applicants and by third parties objecting to the application. I present the explanatory memorandum for the Bill.
Debate (on motion by Mr Kaine) adjourned.
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