Page 303 - Week 01 - Thursday, 16 February 2012
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I found very interesting the reasons that Mr Corbell gave for exempting this area from third-party appeals. He said it was a rapidly changing, high value area. I think this is rather wonderful because it is the first time that I am aware of—certainly it is the first time while I have been in the Assembly—where we have sought to reduce legal rights on the grounds that an area was wealthy and of high value. You normally seem to find there are fewer legal rights in poorer areas.
I guess I can commend the government for its equal handedness in terms of disadvantaging the rich in this case, but the Greens’ view is that everyone should have a right to third-party appeals. Where you live and the amenity of where you live are important. It is an important part of having a harmonious society to have certainty and rights about the area in which you live, not just for residents but for community groups that are interested in the future of the area. In this area I note the Walter Burley Griffin Society, the inner south community council, other residents groups and of course, as we have seen in the paper in the last few months, various arts, being both music and non-musical groups. These are all people who have legitimate rights to their views on what development should happen in the area. It is quite reasonable that people should have access to appeals, and potentially access to ACAT for that.
On that note I would also like to point out that merely getting rid of ACAT appeals does not stop appeals in an area. All it actually does is make them more expensive. ACAT was designed to be, in effect, a person’s court. The idea was that you would not need a lawyer to go to ACAT. Unfortunately, things seem to have changed and it does seem that generally you do need a lawyer if you want to win in ACAT. Nonetheless, ACAT is a less expensive venue for appeals than the Supreme Court. Certainly ACAT, with its mediation provisions, gives more chance of having a better outcome from a planning point of view. That is what we should be talking about here—better outcomes from a planning point of view.
But if ACAT is not available then those appellants who have enough money will go to the Supreme Court. I understand this is likely to happen in at least one of the appeals which have been caught up in this disallowance. I understand this is quite likely to happen with respect to the Quayside development. All that we are really doing in getting rid of third-party appeals is giving more money to the legal profession and making appeals more expensive. It is not going to stop them where it is a commercial issue. It will, I agree, almost certainly stop them where it is not a commercial issue because residents and community groups simply will not have the money to go to the Supreme Court. I do not think this is really where we should be going as a matter of public policy—that the only people who can appeal are the people who have a lot of money; that is, the commercial interests.
Just talking a bit more widely about third-party appeals, this is something that, as I have said, the Greens have always been in favour of, but we do recognise that they can cause some issues in terms of timely and cost-efficient development. I note that there are provisions for ACAT to block vexatious appeals. ACAT should probably look more closely and stringently at that to see if there are times when it would be appropriate for them to block an appeal on the basis that it is vexatious.
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