Urban Taskforce Chief Executive, Tom Forrest, today said it was disappointing that it took a GIPA application from the Urban Taskforce to deliver a solitary (one) Build to Rent (BTR) apartment consent through the State Significant Development planning pathway – two years after the reform was announced*.
Worse – that approval was signed off on the very last day before the writs were issued for the NSW election and the Government moved into caretaker mode.
One may be forgiven for thinking this last-minute single consent is nothing more than a cynical bid to stave off public criticism of the tragically slow and cumbersome State Significant Development assessment process undertaken by the NSW Department of Planning, for Build to Rent applications.
If DPE are this slow in assessing matters that are a priority of the Premier and their Minister, even for applications which fit into the special “State Significant” planning pathway – it is no wonder the vast bulk of normal housing development applications are bogged down in the system and we have a housing supply crisis.
Urban Taskforce formally sought advice from the Department of Planning on the number of consents that have been received through the SSD pathway for BTR. We go no reply. We then made a formal Freedom of Information application (GIPA) and were only then advised (GIPA response from DPE attached):
- 9 applications for the Secretary’s Environmental Assessment Requirements (SEARs) to prepare a State Significant Development Application (incorporating a total of 2,941 BTR dwellings)
- 4 State Significant Development applications lodged (incorporating 1,823 dwellings of the total)
- 0 consents (as of 22 February 2023).
The SSD BTR pathway was announced with great fanfare by the Government in February 2021 to supplement amendments to the taxation treatment of BTR announced in the 2020 State Budget. It was an initiative that enjoyed the strong backing of industry as well as the Premier, who was the Treasurer at the time.
Despite there being a housing supply crisis; despite the strong support of Urban Taskforce and the wider property industry; notwithstanding the backing of the Treasurer, now Premier; the dead hand of the NSW Planning system has failed to deliver.
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