Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to speak about the ongoing erosion of private property rights in Australia due to an increase in the amount of environmental legislation and associated legislation affecting the rights of property owners. In particular, I want to raise this concern in relation to my electorate, which is an outer metropolitan electorate in Sydney, where property owners are being subjected to many plans from all layers, and often overlapping layers, of government that ensure the ability of property owners to use their land in a productive way is reduced.

I want to note that, this week, Queensland’s Labor government have introduced a new environmental property credential in their legislation that requires anyone selling their home to complete a 56-point questionnaire detailing the property’s environmental credentials. This gives effect to the fact that, before being able to offer a property for sale, homeowners must fill out forms describing the home’s energy and water efficiency, including whether or not it has solar power, a gas cooktop, insulation, water-saving shower heads and a rainwater tank. I want to record that this is just the latest intrusion upon a property owner’s rights, considering that, if anybody were seeking to purchase the property, of course they would be seeking to understand all of its facilities and whether or not these were good quality improvements. This is a piece of mindless bureaucracy.

However, I particularly want to speak about the Native Vegetation Conservation Act in New South Wales that has completely removed the ability of a property owner to clear their land. The Native Vegetation Conservation Act requires that all landowners have approval before they clear their land, regardless of what they are clearing—whether it is weeds or forests. The act covers anything that may be classed as a plant. This legislation came into effect on 1 January 1998 under the Carr Labor government, ostensibly to manage land clearing in New South Wales. The government says that land clearing is now better managed than at any other point in the state’s history. I suspect that is not the view of farmers whom I have spoken to around the state of New South Wales. I have been to different parts of New South Wales. Just this week I was in Cooma at a large property where land clearing is an issue for people wanting to productively use the land. The extent of land that is at risk from salination is certainly recognised; however, the ability of a landowner to interpret what use is best for the land has been removed by this legislation. I regard farmers as the best people to manage the land and the best people to productively use the land and care for it and they have historically done so, but they have been removed from the equation and replaced by government—and that is something which I reject.

Further, I want to record something that is symptomatic of this ongoing assault on property rights and ownership. In Parramatta, near my electorate of Mitchell, we saw the famous High Court case relating to the Civic Place redevelopment by Parramatta City Council. The High Court ruled 5-0 in favour of the landowners that the council did not have a case to take away their property or to acquire their property compulsorily without their consent. What we then saw was a disgraceful move by the New South Wales government to change the law after a citizen took their right to travel to the High Court and receive a 5-0 verdict in favour of landowners and against the council. The New South Wales state Labor government simply changed the law and allowed for the compulsory acquisition of that property. The amendment to the Land Acquisition (Just Terms Compensation) Act, which clarified, according to the government, the original intention of the act, once again eroded the capacity of a person in this country to use their property in the way that they wanted.

On behalf of those property owners in my electorate who had their ability to rezone or redevelop their property restricted by over 37 plans in some cases—REPs, LEPs, local development controls—I want to record that this trend that government has more and more control and the landowner has less and less say over property in Australia needs to be resisted and needs to be changed. Certainly I reject the idea that the government, on whatever basis, be it environmental or on the basis that it knows better than a landowner what it ought to achieve from a piece of property, is not one that I accept. So in defence of those people in Queensland who now have 56-point questionnaires in relation to their property and in defence of the people in Parramatta, I reject this idea. (Time expired)