Planning reforms to unlock urban housing supply across Queensland

6 minute read 16.10.2023 Alex Skilling, Leanne Weekes, Anamique Linney

The 2023 Housing Availability and Affordability Bill aims to modify Queensland's planning framework to address the housing crisis.

Key takeouts

The Bill seeks to introduce a State facilitated application process to streamline development applications for matters of priority to the State in urban areas, e.g. affordable housing.

A new 'Urban Investigation Zone' would allow local governments to pause development in order to finalise land use and infrastructure planning in growth areas.

The State will have powers to acquire land and create easements for critical development infrastructure.

The Queensland Government has introduced the Housing Availability and Affordability (Planning and Other Legislation Amendment) Bill 2023 (The Bill). The Bill is informed by recent structure planning and reviews of underutilised urban footprint sites in southeast Queensland. It aims to deliver on the Government's commitments on housing growth made in response to the Housing Summit and National Planning Reform Blueprint, and comes as the Government finalises its ShapingSEQ 2023 plan.

Through a number of 'growth area tools', the Bill seeks to optimise the planning framework's response to the housing supply crisis and unlock critical urban development. It also makes a number of operational amendments to reduce inefficiencies in the planning process.

A summary of the key amendments and their implications is below.

Growth area tools

State facilitated development

The Bill inserts into the Planning Act 2016 (Qld) (Planning Act) a reserve power for the Planning Minister to declare that a development application is a 'state facilitated application', and subject to a streamlined assessment, if it:

is considered a 'priority' to the State. This is not defined;
is for an urban purpose (land used in cities and towns for residential, industrial, sporting, recreational or commercial purposes); and
meets certain criteria under the Planning Regulation 2017 (Planning Regulation). These are yet to be determined.

The explanatory notes to the Bill refer only to affordable housing when giving examples of the types of priority urban uses that may be the subject of this declaration. However, the drafting leaves the door open for broader ancillary uses that facilitate housing supply, as well as other emerging issues.

The declaration can be made in relation to applications that have already been decided, are underway, or are proposed, including change applications. When the declaration is made, any existing decision on the application stops having effect. The chief executive will then step in to assess and decide (or re-assess and re-decide) the application, in the place of the local government or other assessment manager. Of particular note, the assessment will not be subject to local government planning schemes or the State Development Assessment Provisions. Decisions in relation to a state facilitated application will not be capable of appeal. After the decision is made, responsibility for managing change applications will return to the relevant assessment manager.

These changes will bolster the amendments made to the Planning Regulation in 2022, which allowed Ministerial infrastructure designations to be made in relation to government-funded social or affordable housing. This process has the potential to expand streamlining to a wider array of private sector development for urban purposes, and to overcome planning scheme or State interest barriers to housing supply. However, unlike development authorised under a Ministerial infrastructure designation, local governments may still levy infrastructure charges on state facilitated development approvals. What remains to be seen is how the delivery of infrastructure will be facilitated for developments of any substantial size using the 'state facilitated application' process, where coordination with the local government (e.g. via infrastructure agreements) is usually necessitated and noting that ancillary approvals (i.e. operational works) will also be required to implement the proposed development.

State acquisition of land powers

Under the existing Planning Act, local governments may acquire land and create easements for development infrastructure. A review of 75 underutilised urban sites in southeast Queensland indicated that local governments had not utilised these powers, and that a lack of development infrastructure was a critical barrier to development. To allow for State intervention, the Bill proposes to extend these acquisition powers to the State.

The State's power to take the land will apply even if the taking will confer rights and interests in the land to a private entity who may benefit from the taking (unlike the limits on the Coordinator-General's acquisition powers under the State Development and Public Works Organisation Act 1971 (Qld)).

Urban Investigation Zones

The Bill proposes to introduce a new 'Urban Investigation Zone'. The zone is intended to allow local governments to plan and 'catch-up' with development where the government is struggling to service multiple growth areas. The zone will put development in a holding pattern by prohibiting most development applications, in an attempt to prevent development which is inconsistent with land use and infrastructure planning which has yet to be finalised.

Local governments will need to follow the Minister's Guidelines and Rules and demonstrate that all other options have been considered before including land in the zone. The zone will need to be reviewed every 5 years. Landowners in the zone will be notified about proposed zoning and have the ability to make submissions about the rezoning of the land.

State facilitated development applications may still be made and granted in an Urban Investigation Zone.

Other operational amendments

The Bill makes other amendments to address operational issues and inefficiencies in the Planning Act. For example:

to address urgent and emergent needs, it introduces a process to declare that a particular material change of use of a premises is a temporary accepted development for a stated period and does not require development approval;
to address delays in aligning local government planning schemes with State interests, it introduces a power for the Planning Minister to direct a local government to amend a local planning scheme to reflect a State interest or matter in the Planning Regulation;
strengthens existing urban encroachment provisions to protect certain registered businesses from nuisance proceedings;
removes the requirement for publishing public notices in hard copy newspapers; and
removes duplicated assessment of heritage places, by prescribing that a local planning scheme cannot include assessment benchmarks about the impact of development on cultural heritage significance of a local heritage place that is also a Queensland heritage place.

Key opportunities and next steps

The Bill will progress through a Committee process and related public hearings. Much of the detail around the amendments remains to be seen through the development of amended regulations, the Minister's Guidelines and Rules and Development Assessment Rules. Consultation on these draft instruments is expected to be carried out in tandem with the Committee process.

These changes represent a significant opportunity for the housing sector to obtain fast-tracked approvals and to call on additional regulatory levers to overcome barriers that are slowing down housing supply. However, the use of Urban Investigation Zones will potentially halt that progress in certain areas, while structure planning progresses.

If you have any queries or would like to discuss how your developments may be impacted by these amendments, please do not hesitate to get in touch.