Overview of Petitions - Moore River

Extract from Hansard
[COUNCIL — Wednesday, 23 November 2011]
p9634e-9635a
Hon Lynn MacLaren

Standing Committee on Environment and Public Affairs —
Twenty-second Report — “Overview of Petitions”— Motion

Resumed from an earlier stage of the sitting.

Hon LYNN MacLAREN: I wish to start my remarks this evening by acknowledging the presence in the public
gallery of the Friends of Moore River Estuary. This group of people has been working for years to try to preserve
the environment around Guilderton that so many of us enjoy. They are in the public gallery today because of a
petition that they filed once this government was elected, because they were concerned about the decision that
was made to permit development south of Moore River. When the committee considered this petition, which is
in this overview report before us, I could not agree with my colleagues that this matter was a closed matter. In
fact it was my minority opinion that the land south of Moore River adjoining the Wilbinga Conservation Park
should be considered for acquisition by the state government at a fair price. Therefore, I filed a minority report
and I wish now to speak to the case made out by many people throughout Perth for many years to put in a buffer
for urban development.

The Moore River time line of events goes back to March 1995. At that time the land was zoned for urban
development. Some members may recall that it went in and out of the planning process for 14 years in an attempt
to hold back housing in this beautiful area. I do have some sympathy for the developer who perhaps thought that
it was a good idea at one time to develop that area. But time has passed and we have learnt that Perth has
sprawled north along the coast to the point now, with the opening of Indian Ocean Drive, that Moore River is an
hour and a half’s drive away. That sort of condensing of the urban footprint has meant that pressures on that
fragile ecosystem are increasing. Our planning department has to take changes like that into consideration and
say, “No; no longer is it appropriate to have urban development south of the river.” Unfortunately, it was some
nine months after the Barnett government took the reins that it gave birth to the Moore River urban development
zone. After 14 years of campaigning against this development and with the support, I must say, of the planning
ministers in previous governments, at long last the issue appears to be closed. I know that the Shire of Gingin
considered it at its meeting last Tuesday. It has looked at the town planning scheme and, indeed, it looks as
though urban development is continuing.

I want to make the case that it is appropriate to keep this small coastal town at a small scale. Right now, 2 000
homes, which is a scaled-down version of the original proposal, are permitted to be built in an area that has been
kept free from development. That will increase pressure to build a bridge from the south of Guilderton to the
north of Guilderton and create what is perceived to be a sustainable town site. The Greens have long held that
urban sprawl is contrary to the direction we want to go in. We want to save some of our environment. We want
to be able to enjoy the land that we have come to live on. We want to have places we can visit that are small and
slow and where we can relax. Unfortunately, this decision will turn a very quiet area into a suburb like any other
suburb. That is our fear. But, even more than that, if we are to deliver the high densities that are called for in the
Directions 2031 plan, we have to draw the line around that sprawl. We have to say that people cannot sprawl into
this area to increase development pressure inside that zone. Piecemeal decisions such as these that are taken
without that big picture in mind mean that Perth is developing the way it is—sprawling north and sprawling
south.

I commend the Friends of Moore River Estuary for the work it has done over many years to try to hold this
development back. I note that it continues to maintain a positive and constructive role in the debate. The Friends
fundamental goal remains to see all land south of Moore River included in a regional park for the benefit of all
Western Australians now and into the future. In its submission to the town planning scheme, it is constructive in
saying that a special control area is needed around the river itself, so that at least part of the environment can be
retained and the health of the river assured.

I know that many members in the chamber would have heard about all these issues for years. I must say that the
Standing Committee on Environment and Public Affairs took careful and lengthy deliberation over this petition.

We had the Department of Planning in to talk to us and explain the multitude of layers of bureaucracy that had
gone through since the original zoning in 1995. We carefully considered whether the process had been followed
and whether environmental factors that were beyond the scope of the planning department needed to be taken
into consideration. In the end, my colleagues felt that all those boxes had been ticked.

However, fundamentally, it is a role of government in leadership to make decisions to change direction. It is my
belief and the belief of the Greens that, instead of pulling the case out of the State Administrative Tribunal and
negotiating with the developer to scale down the development, we should have made the decision to say, “Right;
we’re going to bite the bullet, compensate the developer for his losses and retain this environment as an urban
buffer zone.” That would have been true leadership that this government could have shown. That is really the
point I make in the minority report. Urban sprawl cannot continue. These are the tough decisions that have to be
made and sometimes the price will have to be paid. If we do not make those decisions, we fear that we will go
down the road of losing the beautiful environment and the important biodiversity that we would hope to give as a
gift to future generations. Instead of doing that, this government made a compromise decision. We hope that that
compromise will not see this environment lost forever and that maybe somehow, miraculously, the developer
will change his mind and decide not to develop on the south side of Moore River. Certainly, the Greens would
support that decision.

Question put and passed.