Australian Democrats Sustainable Development Release

	News Release
		2001 News Releases index
Mike Elliott Leader Australian Democrats Member of the Legislative Council		Environment News Urban Development News

Thursday 20^th December 2001

STOP BUILDING SANDCASTLES IN THE SKY

Democrats Pledge Sustainable Development

The Australian Democrats have pledged to change the Environmental Impact Assessment process to encourage sustainable development and stop environmental disasters.

In launching the Democrats’ Sustainable Development Election Platform at Glenelg, Mike Elliott said today: "Holdfast Shores is a sandcastle in the sky that has an ongoing cost to South Australians of up to $2 million each year in sand movement costs.

"Our election commitment to the South Australian community is to introduce sustainable development processes that will prevent this sort of environmental and economic disaster occurring again.

"As the Democrats seek to take balance of power in both houses of Parliament at the upcoming election, it is important that we detail how we will use this responsibility to encourage sustainable development in South Australia."

The platform document (see attached) highlights the importance of ecologically sustainable practices for planning and development. In particular, it identifies that the current limitations within Environmental Impact Statement processes result in environmental issues not being properly scrutinised.

Amongst the platform’s other priorities are innovative ways to manage urban sprawl, better community consultation practices in development approvals and giving local government more say over the location of phone towers.

"If proper EIS processes had been in place, then the Holdfast Shores project would never have gone ahead in its current form and South Australians would be saved from this huge environmental and economic cost," said Mr Elliott.

"We are left with tough choices – either move about 274 cubic metres of sand each day of the year or reduce or remove the West Beach groynes to allow better sand movement.

"Situations must not occur where the State Government can be both joint venturers in a project and responsible for approving environmental impact statements. In such situations there is a real potential for a conflict of interest.

"Any EIS statement prepared within a Government agency must involve independent scrutiny, more proactively engage the public and be more scientifically vigorous."

The Platform:

Urban form: Innovative urban consolidation should be promoted to prevent the further spread of urban living into the fragile hills environment or important farmland to the north and south of Adelaide. Transferable development rights should be used to encourage development in preferred areas and remove development from inappropriate areas.

Urban greenspace: Greenspace should be increased for the conservation of native species as well as providing a recreational role. Each local community should have access to open space for recreational purposes and the sale of public school ovals for housing should be resisted.

Development controls: The Development Act must be used to boost community participation at the development assessment stage for applications involving activities that require a licence under the Environment Protection Act.

Environmental Protection Authority: The EPA requires an immediate boost in monitoring and inspection staff, greater community participation in decision-making, and ready access to environmental monitoring data.

ERD Court: The ERD Court should be SA’s major environmental court with full powers under the EP Act to bring down specialist rulings. We will seek to remove an existing legislative loophole that can prevent environmental vandals from being held fully accountable for their actions.

Environmental Impact Assessment: This process lacks independence, transparency and scientific rigour to ensure that protecting the environment is the foremost concern of any EIS. The EIS should be prepared within a government agency and should more proactively engage the public.

Marinas: Marinas or other structures should not be placed in areas of active sand movement due to sand drift.
Telecommunication towers: Planning powers for phone towers should be given to local government.

Zones: We should encourage special zones for industries with the potential for dangerous or unpleasant pollution emissions.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION: Mike Elliott

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