Page 931 - Week 03 - Thursday, 10 April 2014
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This proposal, therefore, is to address these issues by amending the act so that it applies to the University of Canberra lease. An amendment of this kind has supported in principle by the university.
Clause 14 therefore amends the Planning and Development Act to provide that it applies to the University of Canberra lease. This means there is now a practical way for the territory to enforce the lease provisions and for the lessee to apply for lease variations.
Clause 28 of the bill amends section 17 of the Unit Titles Act to remove a requirement to superimpose dual occupancy developments. In September 2009 changes to the Unit Titles Act came into effect which restricted unit titling of some dual occupancy development.
The amendments meant that dual occupancy developments were only permitted to be unit titled where one unit was wholly or partly superimposed on the other unit. The superimposing requirement had the practical effect of ensuring that the original and succeeding building owners were fully aware of the unit titling scheme applying to the buildings.
Experience has suggested that this change resulted in a significant decline in dual occupancy development in the ACT. In hindsight, the superimposing requirement imposed an artificial and arbitrary constraint on this type of development. Because of these consequences the bill removes the requirement to superimpose the units.
Development proponents can now unit title a parcel of land into two units without the need to superimpose them. This amendment, I should make clear, does not open the floodgates for unit titling in relation to this type of development. Unit titling will still only be available in areas presently permitted by the territory plan.
The bill also makes a number of minor policy amendments to the Planning and Development Regulation. Clause 18 limits the ability for a development proponent to modify a development which is under construction without the need for an application to amend the approved plans.
This clause omits sections 35(2), (3) and (4) of the regulation. Section 35 of the regulation sets out circumstances in which the proponent may deviate from the development approval without needing to apply for an amendment. Section 35(2) allowed a development to deviate from the approval in circumstances where the change would not, in itself, require development approval.
Section 35(3) allowed a development to deviate from the approval if the change consisted of adding an exempt development. Section 35(4) provided that a development could not be modified under sections 35(2) and (3) if the aggregate development would result in more than one single residence on the block, multiple dwellings or would include more than two exempt class 10 buildings within 1.5 metres of a side or rear boundary.
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