16 December 2011
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On 18 December 2010, the Assistant Treasurer announced that the Productivity Commission would undertake an inquiry into the economic structure and performance of the Australian retail industry.
The Productivity Commission was asked to report on a number of matters including other regulatory or policy issues which impact on the structural change in the sector, such as planning regulation. The final report was released on 9 December 2011 and includes a number of very interesting findings with respect to the impact that planning regulation has on the retail industry. For instance the report highlights that: ¢ there should be broader business zones to remove the artificial distortions created by the current planning and zoning system both within retail (general retail and bulky goods) and between retail and other businesses (such as commercial and light industrial); ¢ State, territory and local governments should (where responsible) broaden business zoning and significantly reduce prescriptive planning requirements to allow the location of all retail formats in existing business zones to ensure that competition is not needlessly restricted; ¢ the extent to which planning regulations should be used to restrict new businesses entering markets, or even to preserve existing activity centres, is increasingly problematic. ¢ to prevent developments that are perhaps more closely matched to evolving market requirements may undermine the ability of retailers to respond to consumer preferences and thus accelerate the decline of existing centres; ¢ Governments should not consider the viability of existing businesses at any stage of planning, rezoning or development assessment processes. Impacts of possible future retail locations on existing activity centre viability (but not specific businesses) should only be considered during strategic plan preparation or major review ” not for site specific rezoning or individual development applications. The Productivity Commission report can be accessed from here. |
