Councils say they’re sick of being scapegoated for the housing crisis, and have called for an urgent sit-down with the NSW Premier, key ministers and planning bureaucrats according to local government peak bodies.
Local Government NSW (LGNSW) president Darriea Turley said councils had consistently sought to take a collaborative and positive approach to working with the Government to help ease the housing crisis, but enough was enough.
While Western Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (WSROC) president Cr Barry Calvert has also rejected suggestions that councils are responsible for a slowdown in housing development applications and has called on the NSW Government to improve the overall performance of the state planning system.
“Making councils the whipping boy is disingenuous and it has to stop,” Cr Turley said.
“The Premier, Planning Minister Paul Scully and Housing Minister Rose Jackson well know that: councils are approving 97 per cent of all DAs; councils have met 2022/23 state housing targets by approving more than 85,095 dwellings; far more development applications are being approved than builds commencing – the figures for the last two financial years show 103,460 DAs determined but only 83,419 construction certificates lodged; even fewer homes are being completed – over that 24-month period only 70,886 occupation certificates were requested.
“These are the government’s own figures, and the rhetoric being bandied about in State Parliament and in the media is nothing more than convenient fiction.”
Councillor Calvert said these figures show clearly that councils are fully and actively engaged in processing housing approvals.
“The state’s housing crisis is a complex issue with multiple contributing factors and blaming councils trivialises the problem,” Cr Calvert said.
“The housing crisis in NSW has not been caused by councils but is influenced by factors including shortages of construction materials and labour, rising interest rates, and now falling housing prices.
“Successive failures by NSW governments to consult with local councils are complicating the housing approval process.
“For example, the NSW Government’s e-planning portal through which home-builders prepare, lodge and track development applications was created with very little local government consultation and has been a disaster for local government and home-builders.
“The e-portal has layers of complexity for home-builders, has increased the administrative burden on local government and is plagued by substantial performance deficiencies.
“The e-portal is more like an outdated document management system than a sophisticated and comprehensive e-planning tool.”
Cr Turley said the significant disparity between approved DAs and construction certificates showed the failure of private developers to build the homes that had already been approved.
“Land banking is a massive problem – some developers have no intention of developing and selling the number of homes required to meet demand, because this would simply drive down the cost of homes and therefore their profits.
“All you hear from the development industry is the need for less regulation and faster approvals.”
Cr Turley said it was time to end the blame game, and proposed a roundtable involving the local government sector, state government ministers, senior planning bureaucrats and developers.
“We are all stakeholders, and we all want to find a solution to the housing crisis,” she said.
“Councils and their communities want liveable homes rather than cheap, easy developments thrown up without any scrutiny.
“Communities want housing growth and lower prices, supported by critical local infrastructure such as roads, public transport, parks, public schools and hospitals.
“Developers want to be able to plan and build homes with some certainty as to the process, and they have a right to a fair profit for doing so.
“The State Government wants all of these things, so let’s stop the pointless and misleading sniping and focus on working together to develop and implement sensible, workable solutions in the best interest of all.”
WSROC backed the need for need for a “more comprehensive and cooperative approach to addressing the NSW housing crisis”.
The group has proposed a range of actions the government could take to address the housing and homelessness crisis, including investing in public and social housing, incentivising owners to return housing stock to the rental market, working closely with councils and communities to plan density effectively, and addressing industry and market barriers to housing supply.
“Solving the housing crisis will require the cooperation of all levels of government rather than finger-pointing, and local government is ready to play its role in addressing the issue,” said Cr Calvert.
