Page 1165 - Week 03 - Thursday, 31 March 2011
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That this bill be agreed to in principle.
I am pleased to present the Planning and Building Legislation Amendment Bill 2011 to the Assembly. This bill makes amendments to planning and building legislation under guidelines approved by the government and in addition to the government’s omnibus bill program. This omnibus bill, or PABLAB, deals with minor, non-controversial amendments; technical amendments to correct minor typographical or clerical errors, improve language, omit redundant provisions, include explanatory notes or otherwise update or improve the form of the legislation; and amendments that are a result of minor changes of policy that require approval from the Chief Minister.
It has been developed in response to the need for greater flexibility in drafting amendments of planning and building law for revision purposes and to minimise costs associated with keeping ACT planning and building legislation up to date. The ways of amending planning and building legislation have historically been seen as cumbersome and confusing for the community, the industry and government users of the legislation.
In recent legislative debate on a Planning and Development Act amendment, Assembly members commented that the bill contained a large number of fairly insignificant clauses to clarify areas of uncertainty or to make small improvements to the act. This omnibus bill, and others like it, enables more minor matters to be dealt with expediently.
It provides greater flexibility in drafting amendments and facilitates keeping laws as up to date as possible. It also consolidates amendments into one place making the amendment process more user-friendly and accessible for the community and industry.
The cumulative effect of the amendments made through this bill will have a significant impact on the overall quality of ACT planning and building laws and complements other steps we have taken since March 2008 to continue to improve the territory’s planning system.
In summary, this first PABLAB amends: the Building Act to finetune the requirements for what information must be shown in the plans when making an application for an exemption assessment notice—an exemption notice is a new non-mandatory process for persons to use so that they have a record that their development met development exemption criteria and no building approval was required; the Construction Occupations (Licensing) Act to make a code of practice a notifiable instrument, thereby making them publicly available to industry and the community; the Electricity Safety Act to include generator, such as might be used in a residential dwelling, as a type of thing covered by the act; the Surveyors Act, to clarify the wording of an existing offence provision; and the Gas Safety Act and regulation to allow codes of practice to apply current Australian Standards to industry.
The bill also amends the Planning and Development Act. These amendments: clarify the nature of notification for development applications; make amendments relating to recent EIS reforms and to the public availability of comments on technical
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