Page 3272 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 21 August 2019
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If it takes a year to get a DA processed, that time and money needs to be made up somewhere else. It is an easy conclusion, a fair correlation to draw, that there are often unnecessary and unreasonable rushes being put on construction projects because there is a need to finish a project by a certain deadline and the government has drawn it out longer than it should have, excessively.
We are also seeing—I am hearing this from a number of people I speak to who are still in the industry—a lack of consistency and an inability to go from one project to the next, as would normally happen. You would send your civil works into one project; as they finish that, they can start the next. Then the formwork carries through and so on. That is not able to happen on many projects at the moment. Staff are being let go. At this minister’s hands, people are losing their jobs. He is unable to administer his directorate and his ministerial responsibilities appropriately.
Madam Assistant Speaker, I seek leave to move an amendment to Mr Parton’s motion.
Leave granted.
MR WALL: Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I move:
Insert new paragraphs (2)(d)(v) to (ix):
“(v) total cost to process DAs for the quarter;
(vi) average cost to process DAs in the quarter;
(vii) the number of DAs processed within prescribed timeframes;
(viii) number of DAs processed beyond prescribed timeframes; and
(ix) number of DAs still waiting to be processed that have exceeded prescribed processing times;”.
The amendment seeks to expand on the reporting that the directorate is required to undertake on a quarterly basis. It is in the public interest to know the cost to the ratepayer in the delays to process applications. That is what is called for through the first two items in my amendment. That is the total cost to process applications in that quarter, both as a whole and on an application-by-application basis. It is also time that there were far better accountability measures for the time it takes.
For a merit, impact or code application, there are statutory stipulated time frames in which the decision must be made. I am well aware that the assessors have that time to come up with some very creative ways of stopping the clock and having it then restart in the way that they deal with the applicant in asking for additional information to circumvent those statutory time frames, but there needs to be clearer reporting of the actual delays and the extent to which they exist. We are calling for the number of DAs that were processed within the prescribed time frames to be reported on a quarterly basis; likewise, the number of applications that were approved beyond their statutory processing time and the number of applications that have exceeded their statutory time period that are still awaiting a decision.
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