State government decision confirms loss of appeal rights
Tasmanians have already lost the right to appeal developments in national parks as a result of councils adopting the State Planning Provisions. We had been relying on the review of the PWS Reserve Activity Assessment process (RAA) to reinstate appeal rights in some form but Parks Minister Nick Duigan’s statement on 18 September made it clear that the state government has no intention of reinstating them at all. This will facilitate major tourism and transmission line developments in national parks and reserves. The state-level legal action by TNPA, TWS and others against the proposed Lake Malbena tourism development would be impossible now.
The timing of this very significant announcement is a textbook example of a media strategy to ‘bury’ an unwanted news story by releasing it when the media is dominated by something else, in this case the proposed AFL Football Stadium in Hobart.
The opportunity to challenge a development approval in a planning appeal is crucial to holding the government to account over developments in national parks. Minister Nick Duigan’s announcement that the long running review of the RAA will not result in a new statutory process for the assessment of developments in national parks ensures that the current loss of appeal rights will remain.
The opportunity for the public to comment on a RAA will remain but without the right to appeal there is little obligation on the PWS to act on it.
A development in a national park requires both assessment by PWS via the RAA process and by council under the local government legislation (LUPAA).
The Reserve Activity Assessment (RAA) is the crucial part of the planning process for the assessment of development proposals in national parks because it is the process which checks compliance with the requirements of the park management plan (where there is one) but it is not statutory; it is only an internal PWS process and cannot therefore be subject to legal challenge or appeal. The TNPA has long argued that the RAA must be given a legal basis either in its own right or by a legally defined relationship with LUPAA so that its decisions can be challenged in a planning appeal.
Almost all Tasmanian councils have now adopted the State Planning Provisions under which any development in a national park which has been approved by PWS (via a RAA) is deemed ‘permitted’. This requires council to approve the development and removes any opportunity to challenge the development using the appeal provisions in the local government legislation. There may still be some scope to appeal on minor technicalities but we have effectively lost the ability to appeal development approvals in national parks and this decision shows that our pro-development state government has no intention of reinstating appeal rights. It is consistent with their broader agenda to minimise opportunities for public involvement in all planning decisions.
The Minister’s media statement attempts to justify the decision by stating that ‘There was strong support for retaining the existing provisions for assessment …’ amongst the 807 submissions. The reality was much more complicated and included widespread support for some reform of the current process, as demonstrated by the Department of Natural Resources and Environment’s own report on the submissions.
The TNPA collaborated with other Tasmanian environment groups to produce a joint statement on this issue which can be read or downloaded below.