10/10/100: Planning for a better NSW?

by Roger Hanney

Gary Blashke is a plain-spoken brain-storming surfer with a fierce love of community, Sydney’s natural beauty, and the fair go.

For the last 22 years he and likeminded colleagues at the Disabled Surfing Association have literally immersed the most disabled people in Australia in a completely different world.

And he has watched as countless government departments and planning ministers mismanage Botany Bay according to political boundaries, while one of Sydney’s most unique ecological treasures ‘ the Kurnell Peninsula ‘ has been turned into a dysfunctional industrial impact zone.

When Blashke found out about the toxic plume travelling from an operation run by explosive manufacturer Orica toward Botany Bay, he pushed his way onto the Community Liaison Committee (CLC). There the idea for the 10/10/100 initiative was born.

Blashke proposes that to restore accountability, transparency, participation and public confidence in major developments, developers, politicians and communities across NSW need to adopt a radical but curative proposal, triggered whenever a development approval exceeds $50 million.

Under this process, to function credibly, the CLC must consist mostly of community representatives and NGOs, with remaining members coming from local government, state departments, the developer, and so on. The developer must set aside a 10 per cent bond for environmental impacts, a 10 per cent bond for social impacts, and ensure that $100,000 is available annually for the CLC to commission reports from independent experts of their own choosing.

Orica has only seen a partial implementation of the proposal ‘ rejecting the bond proposal, but providing substantial funding for independent research. As a result, says Blashke ‘[we] have a relatively experienced CLC that has a greater understanding of the processes and scientific findings for a program that may take more than 30 years to succeed’.

In practice, a broad adoption of Blashke’s 10/10/100 proposal would turn back excesses brought in under Frank Sartor’s infamous 3A regime. Yet, at the same time, it could speed major development through improved transparency, cooperation and accountability ‘ rather than adversarial to and fro in the Land and Environment Court.

Having considered the draft 10/10/100 proposition, NSW Greens MP and planning spokesperson Sylvia Hale gave in-principle endorsement with the proviso that certain detail and conditions would need refinement. Conversely, Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore felt the answer lies in rolling back state legislation and restoring lost power and responsibility to local government, rather than directly to community-based committees.

Blashke is hoping to meet with newly-minted Planning Minister Kristina Keneally in coming weeks to discuss his policy initiative.