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THE ILLAWARRA ESCARPMENT - ISSUES
Wollongong is bounded by 4 environmentally sensitive boundaries - the Escarpment to the West, the Pacific Ocean to the East, the Royal National Park to the North and Lake Illawarra to the South
The Escarpment matters and for decades people had been trying to protect it - most of it was privately held land - Government, or the people did not own it
In July 1990 the Illawarra Escarpment Coalition was formed - of groups from Helensburgh to Dapto to protect the Escarpment and to get an Escarpment Park formed from the Royal National Park in the North down to the Morton National Park in the South - they advocated drawing a line above which no development could occur
Council soon formed the Escarpment Working Party and set about looking at what would be involved in protecting the Escarpment and forming an Escarpment Park - it consisted of a range of stakeholders - environmentalists and land owners - big & small
It was agreed that a line needed to be drawn to limit the boundary where no development could go on the Escarpment - the working party formed 3 sub groups to set about defining where this line should go from Helensburgh through to Dapto areas
There was no money readily available to acquire the privately owned Escarpment land - council looked at environment levies similar to that in Brisbane to acquire sensitive Bushland - this was torpedoed by Arkell Team councillors from the southern areas of the city - soon after one of the key opponents defected from the Arkell Team and joined the ALP (note - although his views on the Escarpment had undermined a potential means of protecting the Escarpment - political pragmatism won the day because having him in the ALP gave the ALP aldermen outright control of the council) - environment levies have never been revisited seriously ever since - especially as the levy would be rated on a percentage basis - so those who are already paying 2 to 4 times the average land rates would also have to pay 2 to 4 times the average escarpment levy
The concept of Fair Trading was introduced by David Winterbottom, Director of Planning back about 1990-91 - ie to encourage people to donate some of their environmentally sensitive escarpment land - give them some development rights on land nearby which is not so sensitive but still has some environmental qualities - normally they would not have had such rights to develop their land for any residential development
I acknowledge that this was support by then Alderman David Martin - I personally expressed concern to him that I was worried about the risks that this posed if the balance was wrong - ie allow too much development and you could find the land that you had been trying to protect had itself been prejudiced by this new extra development - at that stage David was optimistic that this concept of Fair Trading could work
Subsequently Council worked up the concept of Fair Trading which was adopted in 1992 - I would have to say that although I had concerns about it - nevertheless there didn't seem to be any other options available to protect the Escarpment in terms of acquisition
Within several years cracks were starting to develop in the Fair Trading policy and David Martin on his return to Council in 1995 became very concerned about this following critical comments on its implementation in the north
The community called Council to account at the outcomes of the Fair Trading Policy - but Council did not wish to account - this stand off continued for several years until finally the ALP councillors decided to support the call to account but on very limited terms and therefore decided that they wanted a Commission of Inquiry on these narrow terms and accused anyone who did not support their precise terms of reference as being totally opposed to a commission of inquiry - in fact some of their opponents wanted the proposed Inquiry's terms of reference to be broadened to examine the impact of nearby land on the integrity of the escarpment Ie to draw the line on the escarpment which limits development is fairly simplistic but recognising how important the significance of development on the other side of the line - ie further below has been the sticking point
So we had a Commission on Inquiry - the report is 150 pages long - but the summary of findings and recommendations is 6.5 pages long - very short compared with the volumes of material written on the Escarpment.
The Commissioner criticised Council's Fair Trading Policy - because of concerns that by allowing development on land just under the boundary line above which no development could go - that unfortunately that the impact of this extra development may have compromised the integrity of the land that was supposed to be protected. He recommended a moratorium on Fair Trading proposals until after a series of comprehensive studies had been completed - except in a very limited number of cases
Council, staff and some councillors were none too pleased with these findings - they had treated the Fair Trading Policy as the Eleventh Commandment
There was a period where councillors awaited a draft response to be prepared by council staff - it did not seem to be forthcoming - in the meantime I prepared a Notice of Motion addressing all issues raised by the Commissioner - this was supported unanimously - but presupposed the document which would be prepared by council staff
The document was prepared but consideration of it was deferred until a special workshop was held
After the workshop was held council voted to endorse a moratorium to only apply to new Fair Trading Proposals and not the old ones - this moratorium would apply until the set of comprehensive studies were completed - but some of the most sensitive land would not be subjected to the moratorium and that was the sticking point for me, although it could be argued that some of the properties might be okay to continue to be processed and assessed but for many, many environmentalists the moratorium recommended by the Commissioner should stand - and I have subsequently acknowledged and respected this - so we have been putting together an alternative response to the Minister for Planning and Urban Affairs
There is real concern that the studies recommended will either never be carried out or that they will be meaningless because decisions will already have been taken on the most sensitive land
Council's approach (refer December 99 report to council) encompasses the view that says that we won't know if the Fair Trading Policy will cause problems until we implement it and then if we do find problems then we should fix those up afterwards
This is contrary to the Precautionary Principle - ie development should not be allowed unless that it can be demonstrated that it will definitely not cause harm (in the past development was not allowed if it could be shown conclusively that it would cause harm)
There has been a counter argument internationally against the Precautionary Principle that it is too restrictive and that sometimes Governments do have to take leaps into the dark - but Wollongong Council has already taken its leap into the dark back in 1992 and this leap has been found to be wanting by a learned Commissioner - in fact the Head Commissioner - and he has recommended that we stop and do studies before we go any further in allowing development rights to be given
Subsequently those unhappy with the Commissioners findings have sought to discredit them - by saying that he was ill and didn't actually write them himself - that they are badly written - I asked one critic why he thought it was badly written - he was concerned because the commissioner recommended that all the studies to be done - but without recommendations on resourcing or strict timetabling - but this is in fact no different to the Helensburgh Commission of Inquiry, and the Heritage Estates Commission of Inquiry in the Shoalhaven - and it perhaps reflects what should be a general criticism of Commission of Inquiries rather than a critique of a specific COI - which is then used by developers to discredit the findings.
Individual landowners do have rights - but there are no rights without responsibilities - ie if you wish to take the right as an individual to develop environmentally sensitive land then you must also have the responsibility to ensure that the development will not degrade that land now or in the future - nor degrade other nearby land which maybe impacted upon by your activities - that is the crux of why the problem is so difficult - it is so simple to draw a line above which there should be no devlopment - but what buffers you have - how big they are and what you allow in them is the hard part - and looking to the lessons of the past - the proposed private residential development on beachfront land in Austinmer - which became the carpark area at the main Austinmer Beach following community action campaigns back in 1914-17 and also the outcomes of the development in Port Kembla which was supposed to be a disinfectant but instead since 1907 has been enveloped in controversy - the Port Kembla Copper Site (formerly ERS and then Southern Copper) - the decisions we take now we leave for generation after generation to come
We need to respect the rights of individuals in respect of their land - but they have responsibilities to ensure that what they do does not leave a situation where both we and our future generations are saddled with huge and almost insurmountable legacies which have to be cleaned up somehow. Because if there are remedial actions to be taken
- who will decide what has to be done
- how will they decide what has to be done
- who will actually do it
- how will it be done
- and how will it be paid for
LOOK TO THE LESSONS OF THE STORMS OF AUGUST 1998 & OCTOBER 1999!
Cr Kerrie Christian
January 7 2000
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