31 July - Ordinary

Linda Perren,

Who is

Our new Director of City Planning, and welcome Linda here to Council, to her first meeting tonight. So good luck, Linda I'll hand over to Mr Conroy. Yes.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Mayor. I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land, the Darug people, their elders past and present. Members of the public attending the meeting are advised that in the event of an emergency, you will be asked to proceed in an orderly manner to the nearest exit following the guidance of our warden. I would also like to advise members of the public that in accordance with Clause 6.3.1 of the Code of Meeting Practice, meetings of the Council are recorded. In the terms of the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act, this may involve the recording of personal information provided at the time of the meeting. The recordings are made to assist staff in compiling the minutes of the meeting and to enable the podcasting of Council meetings.

The provision of any information that is recorded is voluntary. If any person does not wish to be recorded, they should not address or request to address the meeting. The recordings may be made available to other persons where such access is in accordance with the relevant regulations, and the recordings are stored on Council's record management system. For the benefit of those persons who will be addressing the Council tonight, it is expected that you will refrain from making any insult, allegation or personal reflection against any person present or not at this meeting. This request relates both to your address to Council and any answers given in response to questions from Councillors. And finally, it is also requested that if any person in the Council chambers has a mobile phone, they either turn it off or turn it to silent.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Conroy. No apologies. Everybody is here. Declarations of interest?

Councillor Richards?

While we're waiting, Councillor Reynolds

Pecuniary interest, item 188.

Thank you. Councillor Wheeler? Pecuniary interest, item 186, and less than significant non-pecuniary interest, item 174. I have one for item 174, less than significant non-pecuniary interest. Councillor Richards? Item 180, less than significant non-pecuniary interest

Thank you.

We'll read those out at the time. Someone to move the minutes. Councillor Rasmussen, seconded Councillor Wheeler. All those in favour? Motion is carried. Councillor Wheeler.

Madam Mayor, I'd like to move an urgent motion.

Could you

Read the motion, Councillor Wheeler? I can. I've provided some words. Hopefully they'll be on the board.

If it's not very long, maybe you could read it out for anyone who can't see the board.

That Council acknowledge that the community donated $349.15 to buy a bale at Hawkesbury Fest and continues to donate via various groups and venues, and that Council investigate sending produce from Council's sewage treatment plant to drought-stricken areas to supplement feed stocks and, B, investigate other ways Council can assist, including liaising with Western Sydney University Hawkesbury Agricultural Students Group formed to do the same and implement any appropriate options.

Do you have a seconder? Seconder, Councillor Reynolds. I'm to give a ruling on the urgency motion, which is that it may proceed, which means Councillor Wheeler can address it and then we'll vote on it. Thank you.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. I think this is fairly self-explanatory. Ninety-nine percent of the state is now in drought. We've had some excellent news from the state government to fund a drought relief package, which also includes counselling and mental health. But the New South Wales Farmers Association has stated that the help needs to be easily accessible and it needs to be immediate. We still have rural pockets in this LGA who truly understand what it means to be drought affected. We have a number of groups that have already organised to make donations, both of goods, food, grocery vouchers, toiletries and money. There's a number of places that have got buy-a-bale collection points. I know Skibbereen's Fresh at Freeman's Reach.

There's a couple of venues at Wiseman's Ferry that have been brought to my attention. So the community is doing its bit. I think it's only fair for Council to help out as well. As a semi-rural area, we know exactly what drought looks like. We're in a position to help, and I think we should. So I'd appreciate your support. If we do give money, we need to use a registered charity to give you a bit of an idea of what funding pays for. A large bale of hay costs around $100. A small bale is about 20 bucks. You can fund a grocery box for $170 or a care package for $100. So you can see $349 doesn't last very long in communities where the whole community is in a state of collapse due to drought. So I hope you can support this.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. I'll put the vote. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. We'll now move on to our first item.

With speakers, which is item 173, we have one speaker, Stacey Jenkinson.

Good evening, Mayor, Councillors and everyone in the chamber. My name is Stacey Jenkinson, and I'm here on behalf of the Bowen Mountain Association. We represent people from Bowen Mountain, Grose Wold and Grose Vale area. We have a long history, and part of that history includes an arts festival that ran for 15 years. We had a temporary hiatus, unfortunately due to our previous coordinator suffering a stroke the day after the previous one. So now, in her honour, we are trying to revive our arts festival. We're giving it a different spin in line with Council's strategic objectives. We're including more of dramatic arts beyond just painted art. We're looking at outdoor sculptures and other things.

We do this in the aim of hopefully assisting economically with our local self-employed artists, many of whom live on the mountain or nearby, and of course throughout the Hawkesbury. In addition, we try and promote local businesses. We have several arts tuition facilitators that have come on board to give us prizes, and we'll promote them throughout the event. Local food and beverage providers, all sorts of local businesses are involved in what we're doing. So we really pride ourselves on the economic assistance we provide to the area through this event. We also sell art throughout the weekend, which of course is a direct benefit to our local artists. On top of that, we assist with tourism because we bring in people from far and wide.

We've had people visit from the South Coast, way up north, and of course out further west. So we pride ourselves on bringing people in and then keeping them in by promoting again our local businesses. Hopefully they'll stay a night or two. So those are our major objectives. Other than that, it's also community. We are a community organisation. This festival brings in about 500 people, of whom most are locals to the Hawkesbury, and more specifically to the Bowen Mountain, Grose Vale and Grose Wold area. Those are our three main objectives. Of course, we've got a bunch more which we let Council know, and of course they had to distil it down to the paperwork you see before you. And we would like to thank the staff for assisting with that.

They've done a wonderful job at their due diligence, in my opinion, and pushed us very hard to answer a lot of hard questions. So we'd like to thank them for their assistance as well. I'd also like to thank you all for the time and listening to me. Thank you. Thank you, Stacey.

Are you happy to take questions? Absolutely. Are there any questions, councillors? No questions. Thank you. Thank you. That was our final speaker on

That item. Moved

Councillor Rasmussen, seconded Councillor Conolly. Discussion?

Councillor Rasmussen.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Madam Mayor, I've been to a number of these, and they're great events. Certainly are communities oriented, yeah, certainly community oriented, and they draw a huge, huge crowd from all around that area, as was just mentioned, Grose Vale, Grose Wold, obviously the mountain, and areas beyond that. And they are great, great events. It's a family affair, and lots of people have lots of fun. And, yeah, we have supported, Council has supported this event in the past, and hopefully we can see our way to do it again. There's an awful lot of in-kind, obviously, support that comes out of the community to make this sort of event happen . It doesn't happen by itself, as I know. And, yeah, let's try and support them.

Thank you, Councillor Rasmussen. Further discussion? Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks , Madam Mayor. Just a comment more than anything. For both items 173 and 174, we seem to have the budget presented in a way that we're told that we can afford the expense, so in this case for $2,000 is possible within the budget, but we don't actually see what the full budget is. I think it would be easier for us to look at this more holistically if we had, because I know that the whole purposes of the— Of the events strategy is that we can fund, we've got a far less ad hoc approach to funding. So if we could see how much was left in the pot each time we looked at these events, I think it would make life a bit easier for us. Do you want to comment on that?

Thank you, Mr

Stewart. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Yes, we can do that. We can present the budget allocation and then each time we have a sponsorship agreement, we can show how much is left, and that would become easier if we do adopt the events strategy, because we'll have the two rounds of funding and then we can see exactly how much is available. Thank you.

Further discussion?

Right of reply, Councillor Rasmussen. Not

Necessary, Madam Mayor. Thank you.

I'll put the vote. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. Next item is item...

178. Just before we go to speakers, we received a request to table a document from the North Richmond and District Community Action Association, which was sent to Mr Conroy, and we will table that for this meeting. I believe all councillors received it via email and should have seen this document.

We'll move to our speaker now. We have one speaker on this item, and our speaker is Mr Glenn Falson.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I yesterday sent an email to the General Manager, which I have sent to each of you, and hopefully you have read it, as I don't propose to raise most of the matters that are contained within that again tonight. I've come to speak both in favour of parts of the report and to take issue with parts of it. Firstly , one of the things that was in my email is I bring to your attention publicly an error at page 13 of the officer's report where it indicates the proposal on behalf of my client, Mr Henry, at planning proposal number 14. The words — that's page 13 — planning proposal number 14, amended proposal received to be reported to Council. Now this is, of course, incorrect.

There is no amended proposal to be reported to Council. The proposal as amended, and as required by Gateway, and your staff, has already been presented to Council's meeting of the 27th of February 2018 . The recommendation by the staff to proceed with the making of the LEP amendment. It was deferred, as you know, at that meeting , pending receipt of the further studies in relation to Kurmond, Kurrajong investigation area. At that time, and for some years prior to this, the further studies referred to were for Traffic and Section 94. Yet here we have in the report before you no mention of Section 94, but further mention of 13 additional studies nominated that are to take place and where these also are not limited and may be added to.

If you take out the current planning proposals from the report, then what is left and recommended as a way forward is generally what should have happened eight years ago. Those of you who have been here long enough will know that I've been banging on about this process and its inadequacies for years. So, with the exception of further delay in the existing planning proposals, I support what is now proposed as a general concept for the way forward. However, as I've also said before, the inadequacies in the past process of identification of new housing land should not impact on those residents who have made applications in good faith with an adopted council process, and where that process has actively encouraged applications and where that process has also been accepted as adequate by the state government.

You are now being asked to adopt a process of moving forward to a better assessment of potential new housing land, and for the further processing, or perhaps delay and deferral, of a few existing applications. Yet again, you still don't know how long these studies will be. It was said in February at the time of deferral of Mr Henry's proposal that the studies would be some three to four months, and that period has come and gone. You still don't know how long you or the existing applicants will have to wait. For those with deferred planning proposals, there is no certainty for what is happening, and they've been hanging around for a long time, some of them for years. Or, if you are privy to the studies and where they are up to, then why not let the public know?

Especially those who have spent $26,000 on council fees. Mr Henry's proposal has been right through the process. It has been passed by the state government, it has been passed twice by council, it has been recommended by your staff as appropriate, and that the LEP should be altered accordingly. The only outstanding thing is the exhibition of the voluntary planning agreement, where this voluntary planning agreement has been signed off by council and the state government, and is a routine matter that has no bearing on the adequacy of the proposal. Adopt the recommended housing strategy process in the report by all means, and I encourage you to do so, as said it should have been done eight years ago.

But for moral and legal reasons, please allow Mr Henry's proposal to go through to Gazette, as previously recommended by staff, and do whatever you can to bring the other applicants up to speed with what is happening, because to date they have no idea, and they deserve to have proper ongoing advice, and they need to know how the report before you tonight will affect them. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Paulson. Are you happy to take questions? Yes, fine. Any questions from anyone? No questions. Thank you. Thank you.

That was our final speaker on that item.

Councillor Wheeler. I'll move the recommendation in the report with an additional point four, which I've sent through.

Do you have a seconder for that, Councillor Wheeler ?

Seconder, Councillor Garrow.

Discussion, Councillor Wheeler. Thanks, Madam Mayor. Mr Falson, would you like me to read it out? Yes, please . The first three are as in the business paper, and point four is that the approach adopted in relation to the Kurrajong-Kurmond Landscape Character Study, including the retail assessment of relevant centres, be applied to all rural areas of the LGA.

Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. So this isn't the end of the road for planning in this area. I think this is a really necessary consolidation and, in part, a new beginning for planning in this site. What we've seen in this area is really ad hoc development. We've been very reactive in our approach to development in the LGA.

This is a hugely important piece of work. Just the planning and design guidelines would be invaluable to the town centres working group, let alone the rest of planning that happens within this council. It would provide us with tools and topics to lobby the state government, for example, the recommendations on public transport, and allow us to protect and shape the future of the area in question. Point four really refers to the fact that the whole LGA deserves this treatment. And one of my concerns looking at this is that we don't create areas of haves and have-nots, areas where we've done really thorough investigations of planning in the Kurrajong-Kurmond area, and yet the increasing number of houses that we're required to put into the LGA don't get lumped into smaller or other town centres where studies like this haven't been done, where the character of those important areas hasn't been adequately protected through work like this.

So point four is an attempt to have this approach applied to the rest of the LGA. We need to have well-documented character

Assessments and landscape assessments of all our areas. We need to know what's valued and protected, and our residents deserve to live in towns where the quality of life is enhanced by forward thinking and proactive planning. For far too long we've reacted to the planning proposals that we've received, and that's slowly eroded our own planning legislation and protections and the very character of the Hawkesbury. This loss has been exacerbated by our loss of planning controls through the state government bringing in both planning panels and IHAPs. So this document really marks the time that this council takes a stand. We deserve better than a mishmash of planning proposals that favour developer profits. We deserve more than ad hoc traffic and environmental management. We need to stand up and say that we're not content to be the home of dormitory suburbs and great lines of traffic.

This study recognises that the Hawkesbury is rare, beautiful and valuable, and it's this Council's job to make sure that we protect that and that we're treated as such. It started with Kurrajong and Kurmond, and now I think it's time to extend it to the rest of the LGA. We've seen what a knife edge we sit on with both the corridors and the lack of consultation that went into those. Our planning documents are weak, and they're easy to take advantage of. This is a start to fixing that up. This is a start to giving the Hawkesbury back what it's told us it really wants.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. Further discussion?

Councillor Zamprogno.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. My contribution is brief. It's simply to flag that I still regard it as unacceptable that so many applicants who, in good faith, had begun a process within the framework of the rules as they stood have now had their applications pushed out to the never-never. And the form of words that's in the report before us says that a great deal of what's in the pipeline is on hold effectively permanently pending the receipt of other reports that have a bearing on the Kurrajong, Kurmond area. And I believe that they include the regional traffic study. What I would like to see is at least greater clarity for those applicants so that they have a realistic expectation of when those reports will be in hand or what a conclusion to the report gathering process looks like.

So that the goalposts are not continuously moved further and further over the horizon. So I am not, in saying this, stating a view about the merit of development in the Kurrajong-Kurmond area. What I am saying is that the people who began this process are entitled to a definition that will hold about what the end of this process looks like, so that when certain reports are in hand, they can say, finally, right, so will you now please make up your minds. I don't know how we can factor that in to this. One potential way would be to add another dot point that we define what those reports are and the time frame within which they are expected. I don't know if the mover of that motion is amenable to that.

If not, we could move it as an amendment.

Councillor Wheeler. Depending on what the list looks like, I'd be amenable to that. I might just seek some clarification first, Councillor Sanfronio, from Mr Conroy or Mr Kearns, regarding if that's something which would be easily inserted in along the lines that Councillor Sanfronio has raised.

In terms of the list of additional studies that are required, that's, I guess, essentially referring to the review of the residential land strategy. I guess I can't probably understate the amount of work that's involved in each of those component parts, and various parts of those have advanced to stages where different sections of that will be coming to Council in the near future. I guess in terms of the Clauston report that's attached to the business papers there and the recommendation, the recommendation was basically to take the planning and design guidelines that are part of the Clauston's report and then engage with each of those individual applicants as part of the process there, so that we can, I guess, plot a course forward in terms of those individual proposals.

Councillor Kotlash

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I'm going to agree with what Councillors Zamprogno has just said, that although I think the applicants that already had their applications in before we started this process should be dealt with, they should be dealt with now. And in terms of the—and according to the amendment that we made in November 2017, or '16, I think we should separate those applications. I don't think that they should have to go through this process. I think we have to think more clearly about what we're trying to get out of this process. And I'm a bit reticent —sorry, reticent— to endorse this draft report. I mean, at the moment, the Colston report is a draft report. We haven't really determined that what they're suggesting, what they're recommending, is really possibly what we want to do.

I have a few things , but I just wanted to make comment on that, separating the applications we already had. So I would like to make an amendment that we separate it from this next process.

So are you giving some words for that amendment? Yeah, I'm just trying

To think of that.

I'd like to amend the first point, and—well, I'd like to scrap the first point. I don't think we should be endorsing a draft report. And I'm mindful that the applicants that I've just spoke about are really needing to have their applications resolved.

So in saying that we don't endorse the draft report, I don't want to hold them up.

Point two, I think, does what we need to say, that we agree to proceed with the next steps and that we can then sort out the things in the Colston report that we may not agree with or we can fine tune.

I was

Also thinking that it'd be good if we detailed the sort of stakeholders that we want to work through the findings of this report with.

I think point four is jumping the gun to a certain extent. I think that's further down the track that we apply that. I suppose the principle of applying this sort of character study to all of the LGA, I mean, I suppose that could stay in, but I wouldn't apply this report in its draft form at this time.

And point five is that we immediately address the existing applications that we have, which were listed on

Page 13, I think it's page 12 and 13 in the business paper. Yeah, that would be good. I think we have delayed it too long. I think people really deserve some— Really deserve their applications to be treated promptly.

You're seconding the amendment, Councillor Conolly . Thank you. Did I get those words out, that we... yeah.

Councillor Kotlash, could I

If you put your light on

Councillor Richards . This isn't my speech, this is assisting with the wording. I've got your resolution in front of you— in front of me, sorry. Can I just confirm with staff, please, on page 6 and 7 of the report, there is this orange table here.

Conveniently, deliberately or by accident, I'm not sure, was left off that table the resolution of the 29th of November 2016, which I think is what Councillor Kotlash is referring to in terms of assessing the applications that were already in with Council. Can I get comment prior to assisting with wording on this amendment why that resolution has been left off this table? Which page is the table on?

Page 6 and

7. Mr Kearns.

Yeah, it's an omission, wasn't intentional.

I don't think we can even look at adopting this report or anything tonight if that very clear and important and currently pending, as far as I'm aware, unless anyone can correct me, resolution is not included in this report, because the whole reason that— I've got to open my phone up, sorry, because I've had to take a screenshot of the resolution because it's not in here. The whole reason this report has been tabled tonight on the 31st of July is because Part 5 of that said resolution says that Council not accept any further planning proposal applications within the Kurmond and Kurrajong investigation area until such time as the structure planning as outlined in this report is completed. Council receive a progress report on the structure planning prior— oh, that was 2 July 2017.

We are now at July 2018. We've got this further update. Then we've got point 6, which also needs to be part of this orange table. Council continue processing the planning proposals within the investigation area. that have received support via a council resolution to proceed to a Gateway determination and any planning proposals currently lodged with Council as at 29 November 2016. The fact that this very important, and can staff confirm currently sitting—this is a resolution that is currently endorsed. That has not been overridden, has it? No. So that resolution is probably the most important resolution that we've got sitting in terms of the Kurrajong-Kurmond investigation area, and it doesn't even form part of tonight's report.

So I don't know how we can proceed further on that unless Councillor Kotlash is happy to put up—use part of that in the amendment.

I'm just throwing a spanner at you, sorry. Councillor Kotlash. Thank you

Madam Mayor. I don't think that's necessary because we have our recommendation and, as far as I'm concerned, it still stands. That resolution.

Yeah. Yeah, so I want that resolu—what I'm saying is— All right. You want that to be part of your—this exact— that resolution needs to be part of your amendment, that point six.

No. No, it already exists, is what Councillor Kotlash said. Correct, but it's not in this report. So you want it included in the report.

Yes, we do need to do that. We need to say that there's a mistake in that table and we have to, I think, have that noted. It's a huge mistake. Yeah, it is quite significant.

Sorry, there's 12 councillors and the gallery

Needs to remain quiet

So we can debate this

Councillor Richards, I'm controlling the meeting, thank you. Please do so, please. Councillor Kotlash, did you wish to add anything to your amendment?

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Yes. I don't wish to reaffirm the resolution. I would like to put as point six, I think point five is still being typed, hopefully. As point six, that the omission to the table on page— the table on page seven.

Oh, okay, sorry. I'm confused. So you've scrapped— that's my amendment, right. Okay, good. I was happy to include Councillor Wheeler's amendment, point four. Is that in there? Oh, it'll get too messy if we do it that way, won't it? Okay.

Councillor Wheeler moved the motion in the business point with an additional point.

Yep. Okay. Give just one moment while I read that, if you may. If I may.

Okay.

Yep, okay.

The existing applications...

Point— drop that down to point five, and point four becomes that it is noted that the resolution of November 2016, which Councillor Richards just read out from her mobile phone, be included in

This resolution.

I'm sorry, I don't have the wording in front of me

Well, you've already read it out, so if they— I mean. Do we

Yeah, I never quite got why we had to reaffirm it, but anyway.

Councillor Kotlash, do you want to speak to it while the wording's coming up? Yes Yes

I have more to say about why I have suggested that we not endorse this draft report. There's a few things that I think we need to look at further, and one of them was in the section where it describes the methods of assessment of the views. Well, actually, the methods, the method statement in the whole report is only a few sentences, and I was a bit disappointed because I was quite hoping to find out how you actually assess views and vistas. So the method statement doesn't really go into that. It just says that there was an on-ground investigation as well as desktop studies done. And one of the reasons why I was wanting to find out how they did this assessment is on page 35— we have, or page 34 rather—we have a map that has some points which mark out key views that were considered to be important in this area. And when you go to the table that describes the assessment of this,

And the second last column says impact on land use planning, and it says, irrespective of whether the significance is low , medium or high, it says that we should retain and protect those views. So I thought, well, that means that it doesn't—so that significance of that vista doesn't really matter. We're just going to protect them all. So I thought that was—I would really like to know how the assessment of why those views were thought to be significant. I really— it was so subjective and so without, you know, criteria of how that was done, that I think we really have to sort of stop and think, is this really the way we want to do this? To me, you could possibly get the same—

You could probably get the same outcome if you just limited the lot sizes or had, you know, didn't have 2,000 square metre lot sizes, if we increased the lot sizes, that you could probably retain those views without actually having to go to this extent. So I was just a bit worried about that and seeing it was such a big part of the report, I thought I'd mention it. There's other things that I was a bit wary of, but anyway, I think I can leave it at that because I think I've made my point that I think we need to give this a lot more thought. And just one final point. There's something in the business paper that I was a bit concerned about, and it's on page four, where it says the recommendations are to support, in addition to the provision of relevant controls.

And the third point is, provide sufficient setbacks between vegetation and buildings to ensure fire safety. And I think that really needs to be rewritten. Ensuring fire safety is not something that I think we could even state. So I'll leave it at that because, as I said, there's a lot more to go to to get this right. And I hope you support my amendments. Thank you. Thank you.

Further discussion? Councillor Richards. Thank you. Can I just ask a question before I just ponder more before I speak of Councillor Kotlash? Your point as an amendment to point five. Point five says, which you've taken from the original motion, the approach adopted in that landscape character study be applied to all rural areas of the LGA. But just then you pointed out a number of errors that you have within the current report in front of us. I was wondering if you'd consider removing that point five.

Councillor Kotlash. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Yes, your point is valid. I sort of meant after we've finished getting this landscape study into the shape that we are all happy with, then we would follow that. So I suppose we could say once we finish doing all of these— Planning studies and all of the studies that are mentioned here, that we then are able to apply it to the rest of the LGA, and I think that's— so I suppose we could take 0.5 out.

So you're removing 0.5 now?

Yeah, I would be happy with

That. Who's your seconder? Councillor Conolly? Yes. Are you okay with the changes that are being made back and forth? Okay, thank you.

Councillor Kotlash? Yes . Further discussion. Councillor Conolly.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. I'm seconding this motion because I think it's— sorry, seconding the amendment because I think it's better than the motion. I'm still not overly enthused by this whole idea . During my time on council, this has always been a contentious issue in terms of development in this area. And over the course of that, I've heard Councillor Rasmussen and the Deputy Mayor, as well as other councillors to varying degrees, make comments that when is enough going to be enough? The traffic can't handle any more. This area is just not suitable for development. And we've heard that over and over again, and yet here we are pressing ahead with development in this area when I just don't think there's support for it.

Why is this council all of a sudden making it a big priority to develop Kurrajong-Kurmond? I don't think it is a big priority for this council to develop Kurrajong-Kurmond. I don't see why we're doing all these extra studies to go ahead and develop Kurmond-Kurrajong, when for so many years, people who are now looking like they're going to support this have been saying over and over again that we should be stopping. Enough is enough. Shut the gate. Why now is it our biggest priority in terms of development? This area is getting more attention now than in terms of development. I don't understand why. The cynic inside me would say we're doing this so we can put off the inevitable decision of all the applications in front of us.

We're just going to keep adding more and more and more layers of bureaucracy and planning and documents, so we never have to make a decision on the applications that are current. Because unless there's been a big change of mind in these people and all of a sudden they're very supportive of development in Kurrajong-Kurmond, I don't understand why we're going and spending all this ratepayer money on all these studies to enable us to have development in these areas. The council could quite easily say we're not going to have any development in Kurrajong-Kurmond. It's not economically feasible for council to be spending this money doing this planning to allow the development for only so few lots and the community doesn't support it anyway.

Council does not need to do this unless it is developing. We don't need a landscape character study if we just say no more development in this area. It's not required. It gets perfectly within council's power.

Can the gallery be quiet, please?

So I'm a little bit... I find it confusing that, like I said, this is now council's priority and now these people are supportive of development in this area. We heard at our briefing session, sorry, that the number of lots that might be able to be yielded from this process, and there was no concrete numbers given, but it was suggested that it might have come down from about 400 or 500 to about 100 to 200, somewhere in that range. And we're going to go and do all this extra work and all this money for 100 to 200 lots that some people have been arguing against for as long as they've been on council. It seems strange to me. I also had a question, Madam Mayor, about the report. In the section of financial implications, or whatever it's called— sorry, yeah, financial implications on page 17—that there are none.

I find that baffling, that we're going to be doing all this extra planning and there is no cost. If it's for free, why aren't we doing it everywhere? I would suggest if it's free planning, we get it done for the whole LGA. So, Madam Mayor, could I just ask that to be confirmed by Mr Conroy if it is in fact free? Mr Conroy? No, it's not free. It's within the budget. Thank you, Madam Mayor. I thank you, Mr Conroy, Madam Mayor.

In terms of the balance of the amendment, I mean, I almost couldn't be bothered, but it's my job, to go over once again point three: Council needs to address these existing applications. These people have applied under the rules that Council set for them. The organisation of Council was processing applications in a particular way. People dealing with Council in good faith had every right to expect Council would continue to do so until it said something about it. These people lodged an application well before Council said they were doing anything differently. They had every right to an expectation that the same process would continue. Even more so, they have every right to an expectation that some process will exist to assess their applications.

At the moment, there just is none. They're just sitting there for years and years and years without answer. This first came up in November 2016—well, on this term anyway— and Councillor Kotlash moved the motion that we stop accepting any more planning proposals in this area, and we deal with the ones we've got, and then we go ahead and we work out what we're going to do in this area going forward. It rolled around to May or February, I think it was, the first time we backtracked from that policy, February 2017. And I asked the question, well, if we're now going to be waiting for all these studies, how long are people going to be waiting? I said they're going to be waiting years. And I was told, no, it'll be, you know, we can get this done in the next three to four months, maybe six.

And here we are now, July 2018, and we're not even close to finished. We're starting more still before we're going to determine these applications. Councillor Zamprogno made an excellent point. I don't actually think we can properly detail it out right now, but people deserve to have an answer as to what is going to be required before we assess their applications, which studies are going to have to be finished. Because at the moment, we just keep adding more and more and more studies we're going to start before we assess their application. There's no certainty as to at what point we're done, or at what point we decide, you know, we'll go back and assess your application from years earlier now.

It's completely unfair. It's not acting in good faith. It's just, it just seems like because I don't understand, I really don't understand, if councillors are of a mind to refuse applications, it seems like there's a real desire not to have to do that. We'll just put them off forever and hope they go away. So like I said, I'm going to support the amendment on the basis that it's better than the motion. If both the amendment and the motion were to fail, I would foreshadow that I would move a motion that we in fact do not proceed to the next steps in the structure planning process. In fact, we just say we're not taking any more applications in this area. We'll assess the ones we've got, we'll reassess when we do our residential land strategy.

We may or may not continue with development in this area if the community support it or if we decide it's not economically feasible, and leave it at that. I don't understand, I really don't understand the big push for development in this area when it's not been identified in our current residential land strategy as a big priority. It was an area that was available for some development. It wasn't our big priority area. It's not, you know, I don't think, other than the applications that we're delaying, we haven't got huge interest from the community in developing this area. I don't understand where the development pressure is coming from for this part of the world. And I think council could easily say, look , we were taking them, we'll assess the ones we've got, we're not taking any more.

Councillor Richards . Thank you, Madam Mayor. I think that Councillor Conolly is spot on with what he has just said, and I was wondering if—I think tonight is a fantastic and a prime opportunity to get this motion right. I was wondering if Councillor Kotlash would be amenable to some more changes in this motion so we can get it right. Based on what Councillor Conolly has just said, that would be to basically scrap point one altogether. The next steps is an ambiguous point that puts no cap on spending and no cap on what relevant reports need to be obtained in that structure planning process. So I was wondering if Councillor Kotlash would be happy to scrap point one at this stage. I think that's okay; it's just a point for now.

Point two is council engaging with relevant stakeholders. I understand that these points were taken from the original motion, but engage with relevant stakeholders, again open-ended. Who are the stakeholders? They need to be listed. To work through the findings of this landscape character study that we've just said is lacking in so many fundamental ways. So I think that that's a difficult point to include. Basically, what Councillor Conolly has said is, in leaving in point three addresses the resolution of the 29th of November and point four, pointing out the fact that that very important and currently standing resolution is not even part of the report tonight. So I was wondering if you, Councillor Kotlash, would be interested in scrapping or at least amending points one and two so we can really get this motion right.

Councillor Kotlash. Thank you, Madam Mayor.

I don't think I want to scrap this process. We could.

I think we could say that we proceed, but not with the next steps. I think we have to get this step right. And we have gone down this road of the Kurmond-Kurrajong investigation area this far. Whether that was ill-conceived, I don't know, but we're, I mean, we've committed to it and we have this report. And it's, whilst I think this has lots of fundamental omissions, or it's not very comprehensive , I think that it's a start. So I would agree to changing point one to council agree to proceed in

The structure planning process , not the next steps. I think we have to, maybe we could put something we could review and proceed.

Yeah, I think if you remove the words next

Steps. Yeah, I think the next steps, that would do, because that's too open-ended. Yes, that gives us some room to proceed in the

Structure planning process,

Yeah, to get this right. I didn't actually understand what council engaging with relevant stakeholders to work through the findings meant, actually. I didn't quite understand that process. I wouldn't have thought we were up to the stage of identifying those stakeholders, let alone working through the character study, but that may be able to be explained. I don't think we need it there.

All right, so it's going. Point two is going, just trying to move it along a bit. Point two is

Going.

I'm sorry, I'm being thoughtful

Which is fine. I think we can take point two out. So we've got Council agreed

So point one, we'll take to the next steps out.

Point two, take out entirely.

I don't think that's a very crucial part of it anyway. We can proceed later on that one. I think the most important point we've got, which is we immediately address our existing applications, and we note that we left out a major amendment. I think that will do. Thank you.

May I proceed, please? Councillor Richards. Thank you. I think this motion now, this amendment, sorry, is spot on. So I'm very, very happy to support this amendment. Leaving out that resolution of the 29th of November is so fundamentally—I hear it was an omission and was a mistake—but unfortunately, the sceptical part of me shows that the part on page 7 where it's the 30th of May 2017, Council reaffirm its previous resolution, which is referring to the 29th of November resolution that's not even in the report, to the new planning proposals within the investigation area, which reads as follows: Council not accept any further planning proposals. So it's taken a part of that November resolution that one could assume the majority of, or some part of Council wanted, and then left out the other bits.

So to me, that's extremely confusing for anyone reading that report. I think it's confusing for the people who have current applications in the system. And I don't think that—I'm glad that it's been highlighted in the amendment because I think that's a very significant fundamental error, and it shows that you can't pick and choose which parts of a resolution you want to put into a report. You need to put the whole resolution because it's the entire part of that resolution that makes sense, that is now forming part of the amendment. The structure planning itself, which was point five of that 29th of November amendment, still , as much as we need to do it, and I'm glad it's up there, it still bothers me to an extent because it doesn't put a cap on what sort of reports we need or how much money this council is going to spend on these reports, and what for.

We already know that at the end of the day, there isn't an appetite in this chamber or even in the community to do these sorts of things. Why are we spending this money? I think that we need to come to some sort of agreement moving forward as to what these reports are going to be, because when they list those next steps, which we've thankfully taken out of this amendment, on page 16, they're listed there, and also again on page 17 and 18. I mean, I'm not a planning professional, clearly. None of us have planning qualifications around this chamber that's elected, that I know of. So we need to be told what reports we need and how much they are going to cost. We've just been put through, the residents have just received in their letterboxes last week their rates notices, a 9.5% increase in their rates this year, and we are just going to sit in here and willy-nilly spend money on reports that we don't even know how much they're costing or what we're actually buying or getting for the community.

And to what end? To what purpose? Just to end up saying no? So I think that this council really owes its ratepayers the decency of making sure we are spending their money properly and just throwing around X amount of dollars for such reports. I mean, even this one here. I don't know how much it costs. I don't know if that's something that wants to be put on the public record tonight. But essentially what that just says is that there is a value on a view. Well, I think we all know there's a value on a view. And so I'm really hesitant to be spending any more money on those sorts of things. So we really need to make sure that we are limiting what we are going to be spending on this. I'm glad that we are putting point two up.

We need to immediately address those existing applications. We could sit here all night rehashing what we've said over the last two years, but it is not fair to those people that had applications in the system who then were left not knowing what to do. They've invested money into this process and, again, in good faith, we should be making sure that those are assessed properly. And then we have, as we've always said, drawn that line in the sand. No more from that point. I believe that this has been the wrong approach. Doing this has been the wrong approach to planning. And this trend of spending money needs to stop now. This mentality of stopping development everywhere, and let's not confuse development concerning a backyard shed or a swimming pool as development, is shutting down the Hawkesbury.

I'm talking about development concerning growth. We are closed for business. I can't tell you how many people come up to me in the street. Other people might have other people saying, You are doing a fantastic job, but so many people are coming up to me in the street and saying, What is going on with the state of things in this area? They have no certainty as to what they can do. We're throwing around the fact that we are going to redo the residential land strategy later. People are sitting there wondering, Well, what are we going to be able to do next time? We won't develop on the floodplain, but then the council won't also agree to raising the dam wall. We won't support development west of the river, but then we want to go and spend a truckload of money on reports, hundreds of thousands of dollars, I would say, on reports, just to come to the conclusion we know this chamber is already going to agree on.

Where are the over 1,150 targeted new homes by 2021 going to go? And that's part of the Greater Sydney Region Plan. Where are we going to put them? I know that when we sit down and do our residential land strategy, that's part of what we're going to do, but that's an estimated 13,000 people in the Hawkesbury by 2021. And when we look at that residential land strategy, we need to place where those people are going to go. But seriously, I'm not going to sit here and agree to spend money on reports that really aren't even going to achieve that end of what we're actually looking to do regionally. So I'll definitely be supporting this amendment tonight. In my opinion on this issue, it remains the same.

We need to follow that point six, which has now become point two of this resolution, and us as councillors need to do further consultation between ourselves as to how we're spending this money now that we are sitting in a 9. 5 per cent rate rise before we go forward.

Further discussion, Councillor Tree. Thank you. I won't be supporting this tonight because I think that we're about to embark on a— Sorry, the amendment or the motion? Any of it. We're about to embark on a residential strategy revision, or the revision of that, and I think that we need to make sure that people know what they want us— what we want them to do. I mean, if you don't want to have development in the area, we can address that through the residential strategy, and we can sit down and have a look at the LGA as a holistic picture and decide where we're going to put things. I mean, that's the most sensible way forward. I agree with Councillor Richards, it's absolutely pointless going through the process of spending money to investigate areas such as Kermon and Kurrajong in isolation at this point, because it's not as though within the last two years we've seen any luck or joy for the people who met the criteria of that investigation strategy that was existing, you know, two years down the track.

So I don't think there's any point in spending all that money at this juncture. But I think, as has been said tonight by Councillor Kotlash and Councillors Imbrogno and Councillor Richards, that the people who have already got existing applications in, they should be dealt with. And we can't pretend that they're not there. We can't pretend that they didn't meet the existing criteria. We need to get rid of them. We need to get a clean slate. We need to look at the residential strategy. And if you don't want growth here, just make sure that everybody knows and that the goalposts never change from one person to another, and that we know what's happening. I don't care if there's no growth here.

I just want the goalposts to be very clear and very set so that people have that surety of investment. This is one of the worst areas in terms of development applications processing, and the timeframes and the holding up. There are so many things that are in Council at the moment, right across the board, that's not being met the way it should be dealt with. So I think there are big problems with that sort of area, so we've got a little way to go with that. But as I said, if you want, this is not the way forward if you're not going to— To genuinely look at each individual case and say, Oh yes, we can have this, or No, we prefer not to have that. It's not the way forward for this council. It's a waste of money and we shouldn't be doing it.

Further discussion.

Councillor Rasmussen. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Well, I'm very pleased to hear that there are a few councillors who can only pick on the negatives of what this council is doing, given that there are many, many good things and positive things that council is doing and is about to embark on now that we have some funding to actually achieve some of those long-term objectives that this council, over many years that I've been on council, would like to have done but never had the money to do it. So yes , I mean, we can all destroy and pull down and we can all throw negatives around, and I don't think that's going to help anybody. I think what we've got to do is really focus on what is important for the area and what is important for the Hawkesbury.

And to say that development in this area is shut down and there's no certainty, well, if you've got a block of land that is bigger than the zoning allows for, then you can proceed and put in a DA and get your development through the process. There's no problem with that. That's well known. Lots of people can do that if they wish to, right? What we're talking about is carving up an area that is not within the zoning permissible size of lots and people want to do planning proposals. Yes, of course they do. Of course they do. But there's no right to do that. There's no right to do that. And yes, you can take your chances and you can put it in and you may or may not proceed, may not be approved depending on what council says.

Or what council decides to do. Now, council can obviously defer, as we've done many times, can defer applications. There's nothing wrong with that. That's what we're here to do. But to say that it's all shut down and nothing's happening, I mean, how many planning proposals in the Kurmond, Kurrajong area have been approved in the last three or four years? I mean, I can think of at least 15 , maybe more, planning proposals have been approved, some by this council, some by IHAPs, some by the planning panels. Now, we know that we no longer have very much control over who gets to develop in that area. We know that because the IHAP process has taken that over. The planning panels have taken that over.

Recently, we were chided by the IHAP panel because we hadn't got our studies in order. We had taken far too long, and I would agree with that, far too long to get this Kurmond, Kurrajong study area sorted. Far too long. And we were absolutely hammered for it. Now, what we don't have is a process, an overall process of how we can protect, how we can keep what people moved to the Hawkesbury for. Right? They don't move here to repeat Kellyville. They don't move here to, you know, repeat inner city development. They move here for the landscape, for the views, the rural settings. I mean, how many times have we heard that in our studies and our surveys, and, and, and. This goes on and on and on. So, I think what this study does, what the —what is it?—the Clouston Associate study, what that landscape study does, in fact, it highlights the things that are of significance in this area and that we need to keep in place so that the Hawkesbury doesn't turn into something we don't want, that the residents of this area don't want.

Now, the Hawkesbury Residential Land Strategy that I sat through over some time, what happened was it came to council. It was a very professional group of people who developed that study for us, or strategy for us, and when it came into this chamber, guess what? It was cherry-picked. It was cherry-picked. Oh , no, no, no, we don't like this bit. We don't like that bit. And what we'll do, in fact, we'll do bloop, we'll do this. And what was blooped? This, the Kurmond, Kurrajong investigation area. Not this council. Not this council didn't do that. The previous council did it, dominated and controlled by Liberal councillors who wanted, obviously, to develop that area.

I did. I didn't vote for it. I didn't vote for it. I didn't vote for it. You know I didn't vote for it, Councillor Conolly. So at that point, you sitting there saying I did, I have never voted for it. Why? Because we don't have the infrastructure. We don't have the roads. We don't have the bridges. We don't have all the necessaries. What we do have are two-hour-long traffic jams to get from one side of the river to the other. That's what we've got. That's what we've got. And we want more of that? No, we don't. No, we don't. No, nothing to do with that. What that will do is help us to understand what we have, and we need to treasure it, and we need to understand it. We need to justify it. We need to, yeah, get a handle on what it is we've got and make it scientific.

Now, is it —can it be done better? Perhaps it could be done better. I think these people have done—the associates have done a great job, and I remember sitting in a council meeting—sorry, a council briefing. And I can't remember who was there, but there was a reasonable number of us, and most of us thought that this was the greatest thing since sliced bread. I can remember several councillors saying , Wow, isn't this a breath of fresh air? Wow, isn't this great? I can remember somebody saying that out loud, in fact. And then all of a sudden, oh no, oh no, oh gosh, no. Maybe obviously something has occurred between now and then, and that's fine. That's fine. But to cherry-pick this study to not go through tonight, and for councillors again to cherry-pick a professional group of people's study, we're going to end up exactly back where we were with the residential land strategy.

Council is doing it. We've just, you know, several councillors said, Well, we're not planners, we're not planners, we don't have planning qualifications, and that's true. But no, but we're going to do it anyway. We're going to do what the last council did. We're going to do it anyway. We're going to take it back. We're going to all sit here and, councillors, pick it apart, put our own little bits in, and guess what? We're going to end up back where we were before. Councillors, I think we're just wasting our time on this. I really do. The resolution on the 28th of May of 2016, I don't know how many times it's been raised in this council, how many times it's been debated, how many times it's been up in lights, how many times we've argued about it.

I don't know how many times it's been there. Oh, but now it's the most important thing that's been left out. All of us know it. Most of us know it, like Shakespeare. We can recite it. All of us know it. Yeah , well, maybe not Shakespeare, Councillor O'Connelly, but I'm sure you did a little bit of that once upon a time. But I'm sure we could all recite it. We should all have it burned in our brains. So I'm sorry that—yeah, I'm sorry that I'm being thorough. Really am. And perhaps boring some of these councillors. But look, we don't have the control. You know, the fact of the matter is, people can put in an application, a planning proposal, and unless we have some serious studies that we can justify to say, no, this should not happen, then it will happen.

We know that because we've been through that process. So councillors, please do not support the amendment.

Thank you, Councillor Rasmussen and Councillor O'Connelly.

Thanks. I'd like to speak to the motion, Madam Mayor I wasn't going to speak again, but just in relation to that address , I wasn't suggesting Councillor Rasmussen had voted for the residential land strategy. I wasn't even on council when that was adopted. That was more than last term ago. What I was suggesting is that right now, Councillor Rasmussen, after years of saying you're not in favour of development in Kurrajong-Kurmond area, you're about to proceed with further planning to allow the development of the Kurrajong-Kurmond area. That is the only purpose of this study. If you think there's another purpose, I'd love to hear what it is. Why would we be doing planning for residential development in Kurrajong-Kurmond for any other reason?

To say it's so we know what to protect, that's— I mean, if a state government said that to you, you'd laugh them out of town, that we're just planning for this area not so we know what we can develop, just so we know what we can protect. I mean, no. You only do it if you're going to develop. There is no reason to do otherwise. It's within council's power just to say we're not developing at all. If that was council's intention, they could do that. It's no use going on about two-hour-long traffic jams and not having the infrastructure, and on the same night go ahead and vote for this, which is to proceed with planning for development, residential development in this area. And in the briefing session, I think—I'm not sure who you were referring to, but I remember in the briefing session I said pretty much exactly that, and a few other people were shutting me down, and Councillor Rasmussen said, Oh hang on, I actually like the idea of that.

Why can't we just say no more? So, you know, I'm not going to hold you to your very first thought. I don't know why you're doing it to other people, but that's certainly something that you said in the meeting. I just wanted to clarify the reason for speaking was to clarify. I didn't say you voted for the residential land strategy, but if you think you're going to get away with going on and on about traffic jams and infrastructure whilst at the same time you being the one to push through this development in this area, it's not going to happen on our watch. We're not going to let that stand in the community. To me, there's been lots of consultation on this. I actually don't think there's, in terms of the community of this area, some of the consultation suggests that some people might be in favour of this development.

But from a financial point of view, it doesn't make sense to go ahead and do all these plans for such a small number of lots. You could get the same number of lots by addressing the current applications. You could get no lots by addressing the current applications if you just went ahead and dealt with them. If that was your intention. But I don't think that Councillors here can expect to get away with saying that they're not in favour of this development whilst at the same time being the ones to ram through this Council further planning and further spending of ratepayers' money on ensuring this development can happen.

Councillor Zamprogno.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I'm now speaking in favour of the amendment, and because we've been here before, and afterwards it appeared that what a motion meant was otherwise than what some of us thought it meant at the time, I just want to put it on the record that point two of this amendment shortcuts the way in which this discussion has gone around and around and around for the last nearly two years, which is to say that to hold up the existing applications on the basis that further reports are needed without specifying exactly how many of those reports there will be or when they are due, I want to make it clear that if we pass this amendment tonight, my understanding of point two is that those will no longer be impediments to the finalisation of the applicants that are already in the system.

And if after this amendment, if it passes, other councillors wish to put a different construction on it, I want it known that that was said in the chamber at this point. I'm in favour of the amendment.

Thank you, Councillor Zamprogno. Further discussion? Councillor Ross.

Thank you, Mayor. I cannot support the amendment. I think there are a number of factors.

One of them is respect for the folk who already reside in this area,

And as to what might be coming down the track to meet them.

Another one is that if you care to add up the number of allotments shown on pages 33, 34 of the report, I believe you get a figure of 197, bordering on 200.

By permitting the

Progression of those planning proposals, etcetera,

The die is being cast. You might as well not have undertaken this process.

And it represents potentially a disrespect for the residents and ratepayers who already reside in those areas or adjacent thereto. And it also, it may affect their amenity, and it may depreciate the quality of the area in its future guise. I feel that those are Grove disadvantages, apart from

The other constraints that we know of and may come to hit us. There is already some unwelcome development going to be progressing through this area, decided by

IHAPs. It may

Also come to pass that the state government may not have put down their pens and paper on future corridor proposals. We don't know what that might hold for us either.

And we've seen the impact of that, and we're going to be dealing with that later tonight. I just think the position of the amendment is too conflicted to support.

We can go back to the standard arguments, and I ask you to bear those in the background and be considered as being in part relevant. But I also think that these other aspects

Place a great onus on us as councillors to get this type of strategic planning and understanding of the areas and understanding what constitutes. High , medium and low visual amenity, if you like, or opportunities. And I think, despite my colleagues' quizzing and quizzical response to these gradings, I think there is some degree of understanding that can be obtained by looking at the pictorial representation of what the, shall I say, what the consultant has brought forward as being of high value and what they consider to be of lesser value. To me, the high value

Contains or permits, shall we say, vistas beyond the immediate environs , more extensive, more variation in topographical features at the end of those viewings. The lower gradings seem to represent what you might call fairly standard paddocks, or fairly standard paddocks with some flora attached to it, but within itself fairly unremarkable. But we know, simply traversing Bells Line of Road or some of the other roadways. There are areas of great spectacular value and an ability for the viewer to see well into the distance, many kilometres in some cases. Those things are particularly appealing, obviously, to the consultant and, I must say to myself, in terms of traversing those areas. They represent some of the great joys of the landscape.

And for us to blithely go ahead with 197 proposals, which may or may not impact upon this area in a very direct visual sense, I think is a travesty that we would be bringing upon our existing ratepayers and residents, and I'm sorry, but I cannot have a part of that. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Ross. If you could just turn your light off. Thank you.

Well, maybe a question, if you'll allow me, or otherwise a point of misrepresentation. Councillor Ross, is Councillor Ross including in his calculation all those proposals that have already been withdrawn?

Councillor Ross, question from Councillor Conolly. Are you including in your number that you're giving, are you including the proposals that have been withdrawn?

Yes

Just

For the record, Madam Mayor, the number of current proposals is 104, and there's no suggestion that they would all be approved.

Thank you, Councillor Connelly.

Any further discussion? Councillor Reynolds.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. First of all, a question, I think, for Mr Conroy, I think. On page 47 of the report, point 8.0, it has next steps. It says, engage stakeholders in urban design upgrade concepts for the two villages.

Does this include residents and business owners?

For the stakeholders, Mr Conroy.

So it would be people who live or have an interest in those two centres. So there are people that come there to drop children off to and from school. There are people that live there. There are people that shop there. So the stakeholders are intended to capture all of those interested parties.

Would the people who currently have planning proposals either before us or deferred be included as stakeholders?

Mr Conroy.

So, Madam Mayor, that point relates to the concepts for the two villages. So you'll recall that during the presentation, the retail analysis indicated that there was no need for any additional population increase to support the existing retail operations. And it was more a matter of fine-tuning with what was termed a light touch the amenity of those two centres. So this is about working through with People who use those centres for various reasons about what enhancements could or should be made to those centres. The

Other consideration in one of the earlier recommendations was engaging with stakeholders. That's where you would engage with the applicants that are involved in each of those applications. We do need to go back and speak to those applicants and establish a direction forward.

So, in speaking to the applicants, that would be with a view to considering their application

In relation to the guidelines or suggestions outlined in the proposal?

That's correct. The officer's recommendation is to engage with relevant stakeholders, so that includes applicants as well as other interested parties in working our way through the current, as it's been termed, draft study and applying that to each of those individual sites to get a direction moving forward.

And do we have a time frame, or could you give us a rough time frame for those next steps to occur?

It wouldn't happen in the terms of the amendment, that we wouldn't be able to speak to all of those parties by the next council meeting and get a report to council. No. So the time frame is likely to be, if we get a direction tonight, we'll start slotting in those meetings. Depending on availability, we'll have them as quickly as we can, and then we can report the results back to council. But it's really, the timing will be determined by the availability of the other parties and when they can meet with us.

Okay, and one final one. Is there a time frame for the completion of the Kurrajong Kurmond residential study?

So we don't have a specific time frame at the moment. Okay. What we do need to do is speak to those individual applicants, and that will inform the time frame to a degree, because we need to work out how we're going to move forward with each of those applicants. And we do need to complete the details of the study that's been outlined. There's quite a detailed table in the study on pages 39 to 47, I think it is, or something like that, 39 to 43 , and that identifies a whole range of considerations and a direction in relation to each of those considerations. And again, we need to refine those, and then we need to get that into the appropriate format for a planning proposal, where we have the background studies in place, where it will go to Council, and then if Council supports it, it goes to the Department of Planning, and it has to satisfy all their criteria.

Thank you, Mr Conroy. Madam Mayor, in that case, I'm speaking against the amendment. I find the amendment a little bit bizarre and something resembling word soup, in that most of us attended a briefing by the consultants, and as far as reviews and VISTA issues, their explanations were quite detailed in how they were determined and how the values were attributed. I remember a couple of people who are speaking against the document tonight being quite taken with it and wishing that it could be applied in other areas. So I find this whole debate slightly bizarre.

People say we're anti-development and saying you're anti-development and you don't want development, so why bother with the report? The development of this report proves that we're not anti-development. We're pro-development in a sustainable and proper way. The Hawkesbury is a remarkable area. It's a beautiful area, and we get one shot really at getting it right before stuff is built. And once it's built, that's it. We end up with a Redbank. And I know that there are some people who support the idea of Redbanks across the escarpment, and that's fair enough. But we were elected on platforms to make sure that that wouldn't happen.

And we made commitments at the council elections, and those commitments are being kept.

I remember when the then planning director, Mr Owens, I think, reported back from one of the first Greater Sydney Commission meetings he attended. He said that the staff and he were embarrassed because we had no planning documents. Well, they're all out of date. Everybody had theirs all up to date and ready to go. We had nothing. And here we are, starting to develop a planning document for an area, and we've got people saying that it's a waste of money and we should throw it away. I mean, it's mind-bogglingly bizarre. I mean, you're complaining that there's no certainty for developers, and that's because the planning documents are ancient. In irrelevant, or they don't even exist. So it's, I've just been listening here and just trying to put together your argument and just find that it's literally just word soup.

You know, we're about developing documents and policies that will give certainty to landowners and to developers so that when they come into an area, they know exactly what can be done, what can't be done, what can be done on a certain lot, depending on the views and vistas, whatever, as was perhaps, as was suggested during the briefing. And again, you know, there were people speaking against that who loved the idea and wanted it moved to other areas. And I find the concept behind this something of a revelation compared to the documents we have now. I think it has great insight. It's only the beginning. Yes, it takes time, but we're prepared to work with those people who have planning proposals before us and involve them in the process.

And I don't think you can be better than that as a council, to involve those people in the process. But to just say it's a waste of money, throw it away, and then sit there and whinge because we don't have any documents and any policies, it's just completely bizarre, completely bizarre.

Thank you, Councillor Reynolds. Councillor Calvert.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I wish to speak in favour of the amendment, and I'd like to thank Councillor Kotlash and Councillor Conolly for putting it forward. This matter was raised at a briefing session, and I remember asking the consultant, how does one determine a significant view or vista in an objective manner? And his answer was, Yes, it's difficult, isn't it? The report does not, to my satisfaction, explain how you can objectively say a view is significant. It depends on your context and where you come from, what your background is. I mean, if you move to Hawkesbury from the inner city, just seeing two trees in a row might be a very significant vista for you. It's all totally subjective, and so that subjectivity is the central plank of this study.

I can't see how we can proceed using this instrument when it's actually so vague and subjective. So that is my big worry with this, and I've mentioned that a few times. What we're doing with ourselves is moving—we're planning to move forward with an instrument which will actually allow things like Redbank and Pitt Town to be happening, because it'll just be subjective as to what is a good view and what isn't.

That motion that we talked about in November 2016, I think it also mentioned something about a traffic study, and it also mentioned something about the existing applications that were already being considered. Those two points, I think Councillor Richards mentioned, are not mentioned in the report. Even where it does say we ratified it in May, what is written there as being ratified is not the same as the original motion. So even that point is incorrect, I believe.

What I'm finding interesting is that those people who in the past have spoken out against development in the Kurrajong and Kurmond area, those who've spoken the loudest and the longest, seem to be bent on supporting a path which allows the Kurrajong-Kurmond area to be further developed. Surely these people who have fought so hard over all the years, and I'm hearing that across the table, and I've been one of them, surely they should take the opportunity to say, taking this amendment will protect that area. It will protect the area against willy-nilly development in the future. Because what we are also developing is the residential land strategy, which looks at the whole city, and we need to look at the whole city in context.

In the past, when we've looked at areas by themselves, and I'll pick two particular areas, Redbank and Pitt Town, look at the disastrous results. We singled out an area, and we used certain criteria, and lo and behold, you suddenly have Kellyville, Rouse Hill stuck in an area that doesn't deserve it. That is my other worry about us proceeding with this study on its own, in isolation. It needs to be part of the residential land strategy for the whole city.

Also, as I said before, I'm just, I think it's quite simple at this point. If you would like to support further housing development in Kurrajong and Kurmond. Then you should vote for the motion. If you would like, if you're against development in Kurrajong and Kurmond, then you should vote for the amendment. At this point in our planning, I think it is as simple as that. Surely down the track we will look at Kurmond and Kurrajong in context, and we'll look at it in a much better way. But as I said originally, to go forward now based on an instrument which is vague and subjective, I think would be a big mistake.

Thank you, Councillor Calvert. I'll speak in favour of the motion and thus against the amendment because they're fairly contrary. Just firstly, with regard to what Councillor Calvert just said, the aim and the objective of doing this in the first place was to give us some information to inform the land strategy when we do it. Because essentially, this whole entire debacle has emerged from having a land strategy which never carried out the studies that should have been done to support it. So in 2011, when the land strategy was adopted, it should have had these studies done back then so that we weren't faced with these ongoing issues associated with it. So there's applications listed here that have been there since 2013.

So that wasn't this council. And when I was on council then, there were issues surrounding it because nobody knew what to do with it because there weren't the studies. And it wasn't because the minority had any power to stop anything or change anything. It was because nobody seemed to know how to deal with these applications, because what was lacking were the parameters of how to properly plan for that area, how to constrain development in an area which had issues with water, slope and various other things. So there were a series of amendments and Mayoral minutes at the time back then and now, and it's all been heading towards wanting to have some form of a document, which isn't an instrument, it's a document, which would— You know, be put into a document that is an actual strategy

Which is what we're working towards, which is our land strategy. So we had nothing to go by, and at the last couple of meetings, we had Councillor Zambrano wanting this at the briefing to inform the rest of the local government area, which was a good idea. But he doesn't want to support to do that now, which is unfortunate because a lot of this work would give us a template to move on and do other areas, such as the additional point that Councillor Wheeler put on, I think it was. I can't see her motion. So what we're doing is driving to deliver that certainty and consistency that hasn't been there. It has been unfortunate for some of the landowners who put in their applications, but we mustn't forget these were speculative applications, not statutory applications, and there's a huge difference.

If it were a statutory application that had laws that specified what development could proceed, then we would have definitely dealt with that by now. But because these were speculative and we had no existing criteria, we had no framework to assess those applications in, we've moved towards coming up with something as a starting point, which I believe this document is. And I think that the way it's been framed is perfect for a starting document that we can build off. Mr Kearns, and then confirmed by Mr Conroy, has said that we will now deal and meet individually with each of these people with a planning proposal to see if their proposals can fit the criteria or if they wanted to perhaps adjust something or to try and fit it so that we are driving to get the best outcome we can get in that area.

So if they all come back next week per the amendment, they may all be refused. So that is just what may happen, I would imagine. However, we can work for a better result because that's what we've been driving at. We want to be able to have people do things, but do it with proper parameters. I just think that the lack of that up until now has been so stark that we've ended up with things that are really blights upon our landscape there, and we should not have allowed that to happen. I think that we can do much better, and we should do much better. And we're now sitting with some up- Upper layer documents from the various strategic documents from the Greater Sydney Commission and the Western City District Plan, which we've been asked to consider in our planning going forward.

So we are to refer to them and their targets and their visions, and that's what we should be doing. So I see this as a perfect opportunity that we can work forward and to be able to get the development that we want and that people want, that the applicants want, and we can all do that together. And I think Councillor Reynolds summed it up very well when he just gave his speech of what it's about. We can work for a better outcome, and we can do it in a positive sense. I think it's unfortunate that no councillors raised the emissions in the report prior to the meeting, and to bring it up tonight I think is a little unfair on staff. We've had the— somebody could have said that that was missing, and we could have amended it so that it was there for this meeting.

I think that would have been preferable. And with regard to the same old anti-development stance, I think I have meetings with people all the time. There are many people wanting to do various sorts of developments and so on, and I think this area is moving forward in many ways. Councillor Richards said, We won't develop on the floodplain, but Council won't agree to raising the dam wall, and yet we've been told by Infrastructure New South Wales that there's no connection between the two. So that's a very interesting statement to hear.

I think that with regard to the expenditure of the money for it, Mr Conroy has confirmed it's already in the budget. We have to do strategic planning. It's part of what we do. We would have to be doing some form of strategic planning, and we have to do the various studies that are mentioned there. Otherwise, we will never move forward with any planning into the future, and we will never have the certainty and consistency that people are seeking. So I'll be supporting the motion, and I'll be looking forward to the outcomes from meetings with those applicants to see how their proposals can come back to Council and be dealt with, which is what we promised to do. And I think that it's a very well done report, and I think it's refreshing, as everyone did agree in the meeting, that it was refreshing to see something taken from the aspect of looking at the character of the area and then moving forward to actually frame that into some planning controls in the future.

Councillor Wheeler. Thanks, Madam Mayor. I'm speaking against the amendment. And it's a little bit hard to know where to start, really, because I'm finding it really difficult to tease out some of these arguments and therefore answer them. Because it seems on one hand we're pro-development, and on the other hand we're closed for business, and I'm not quite sure how we can do both, but clearly we are multi-talented. Apparently this document shows that we're pressing ahead with development, and I wonder, in that case, has everyone actually read this report? Because what it says is that we've got developments in this area with block sizes that are smaller than our planning controls allow for. This isn't pro-development; it's pro-controlled, sensitive and necessary development.

We're already getting development in this area, and I'll note that the recent IHAP decision to allow 37 lots smaller than the recommended size on one of the sites highlighted in this report, 37 under 200 square metres—so under 2,000 square metres, I'm sorry. So to say that it's this council that's pushing development, really that's stretching the friendship. I find it really ironic, in fact, that we're being lectured about development by members of a former council who repeatedly voted for developments that were not consistent with our planning controls. This is a mess of your making, not ours. We had a briefing on this matter. Now, I go to briefings to learn stuff and to discuss things. I don't go for the free dinner.

Why did none of this come up then? Ratepayers are owed the courtesy of having councillors that turn up, ask questions and get informed before meetings. What we've got in this motion, in this amendment—

Point of order, Madam Mayor. I think that's totally out of order, completely out of order. What is

Your point of order, Councillor Conolly?

It's not a point of order. I'm asking you to rule those comments out of order and ask that Councillor Wheeler retract them. There's no need to attack people individually because they disagree with the council.

I didn't hear Councillor Wheeler mention anyone by name.

I don't think it matters if you've mentioned people by name, Madam Mayor. We've all spoken on how we supported this motion. I think it's totally inappropriate. It would be better if you just raised the standard of debate above mudslinging. Councillor Conolly

Point of order overruled. Continue, Councillor Wheeler.

It's disappointing, Madam Mayor.

Sorry. We can't put a blanket block on any further development in the Kurrajong, Kurmond area. That's fanciful. This council does not completely control planning in this area anymore, thanks to the decisions of the state government. We control our planning documents, and that's what this seeks to do, to improve our planning documents.

We've got resolutions on the table to update the DCP. We've got a state government requirement to audit and update the LEP. Why are we spending this money? Because our planning controls are weak, because they should be based on evidence and information. What will we base the residential land strategy on if it's not studies? Will we just make that up? That's what the original motion passed by this council calls for. So one minute we're pro development, and the next minute we're closed for business. This is about getting this right for the 18,000 people we are required to put into this LGA in the next 20 years.

Point two, whilst being, as we've heard from the general manager, impossible to deliver by the next meeting,

Actually probably isn't the end of the world. I'm happy to have all of those development applications come back to, all of those planning applications come back to council. Let's have them. Let's vote on them, and let's get through them. But there's still no traffic improvements.

There's still been nothing that will make those developments any more viable, any more attractive, any more reasonable for the people who are stuck in traffic gridlock in underserviced areas now, unless you count a proposed study, which aims to shove more traffic through. Our second flagship town, just like we're about to see happening to Windsor. And as for the question of views, this isn't all about views. And yes, views are subjective. But as we saw in the last council meeting, you can have a covenant about views and still have a development happen on the site. Pages 39 to 43 are about a whole lot more than views. There are strong guidelines here for what Council should be doing with respect to access for public transport, private vehicles, cycling and walking, for residential, commercial, transport and public domain land use, for care and protection of the natural environment, for character and identity, and for built form and layout.

That's a bit more than views. So to just throw this out because you don't like a supposedly subjective measure, I think is foolish. And the only other point I want to cover is the attribution of politicised motives to the actions of council staff. Attribute whatever political motives you like to us. Do not politicise the actions of hardworking staff who may have made an error in their work. You don't need to pull that face, Councillor Conolly. You either dispute that they're hardworking.

Point of order, Madam Mayor. Point of order,

Councillor Conolly, what is it?

Oh, I thought it was obvious, Madam Mayor, but perhaps you could hold Councillor Wheeler to the same standard as you hold everybody else.

I do hold Councillor Wheeler to the highest

Well then why are those comments allowed to go, Madam Mayor?

Well, Councillor Conolly, you make them as well. I'll call on it. Withdrawn it, she's

Withdrawn it.

I don't withdraw the point about politicising the motives of the staff, however. That was clear and intentional. The table in question lists , makes reference to the reaffirmation of Council's decision. It's either, it looks very much like an honest mistake, and I don't think it needs to be— I don't think we need to use words like conveniently or intentionally when talking about the motives of staff. That is simply not good enough.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. Further discussion? Councillor Reynolds.

Yeah, just briefly, Madam Mayor, I'm speaking in favour of the motion because I spoke against—yeah, speaking in favour of the motion. Just regarding

The proposition that all of a sudden we're pro-development after being anti-development in the Kurrajong-Kurmond area.

As we know, the infrastructure—or sorry, the infrastructure is lacking, but apparently infrastructure may be coming that way. And if that's the case, then, you know, documents that can cater for some sort of development west of the river should be in place, and that's partially what this is. But the main reason we need this document, and Councillor Wheeler touched on it, is that the development's happening whether we like it or not. And it's happening because we don't have the documents in place. There were 37 lots approved , a lot of them sub-2,000 square metres, and that's because we didn't have this document. So to throw this document away because it's— Pro development. It's crazy when the development now is basically taken out of our hands, and the decision's being made without any real input from us as representatives of the community.

And we don't have the safeguards by having proper documents. So I find that argument, again, totally bizarre.

Councillor Kotlash. I'm speaking against the motion. But before I do, could I just ask a question about the — how do you plan to protect the view?

Who are you asking? Through me to Mr Conroy. Mr Conroy.

So the documentation that's been presented to date identifies significant views, and the idea is that development wouldn't impose on those significant views. So the idea would be to either ensure that development was not within the view shed, or that was sitting behind vegetation, for example, in the view shed. But what you're trying to do is to maintain the key elements of the view, and they're often vegetation , landforms, you know, valleys or ridges or something like that. And it's about protecting those views that give the area the character, that rural character, that landscape quality that has been identified in the current rural controls as being a significant element in that rural area.

So if I could just follow through, Madam Mayor. So if you were proposing to— Reforest a patch of land that you owned, would that, and that would alter, possibly alter one of those views that was considered significant.

How do you deal with that because you're changing the character of that view ? So that's what—I'm not actually trying to poo-poo this. I'm just trying to understand how we are going to use this as a planning tool or instrument or just a planning guide. I just don't get that yet. I don't think there's enough information in this. I'm not saying that we can everything. That was—you misrepresent me if you think that's what I said. I just want more information about how that might be applied. Mr Conroy.

So I think that's additional information that we can provide. But again, it's a bit like—I'll use another analogy. If you've got a heritage building and it's an 18th century heritage building, you wouldn't necessarily augment that with a contemporary Australian landscape garden. You'd probably use a type of garden that was consistent with the curtilage of that building. And likewise, if you're introducing a landscape element that's consistent with the area, so it's an Australian bushland setting, and you're introducing an Australian bushland landscape element, then that's probably consistent with the outcome. But if you were going to introduce perhaps windrows of cypress trees or something like that, that may be more jarring and you wouldn't necessarily pursue that.

So I think that's where we've talked about this evening the fact that we've identified the key planning considerations and we've identified the direction that we want to head with those. And if there's agreement on that, then we'll expand that and flesh that out in greater detail. And that's what we'd be proposing to do.

Councillor Richards.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. This time I'm speaking against— oh, sorry

No , Councillor Richards, I called you to speak. Your light was on.

Thank you. I'm speaking against the motion. Last time I spoke for the amendment. Before I do, I would just like to put forward a question. Can, through you, Madam Mayor, to the General Manager, can you please, when we're talking about this structure planning, the biggest, I think, document or study that we're doing is the traffic study. Can you please give a current estimate of the total of what the traffic study is right now, considering we were told and passed a motion that it would be $100,000?

Mr Conroy.

Lied. Sorry about that. My colleague to the right has probably got a better appreciation of the details of that budget.

Mr Orgen. Through you, Madam Mayor and through the General Manager, the original first stage was approximately $60,000, of which $30,000 was spent.

Second stage is approximately $130,000. So the total cost is around $190,000.

Can you confirm, because my memory is failing me, have we endorsed that extra spend? Mr Orgen.

Yes, that was confirmed through the manual budget.

Thank you. Excellent. I think it's interesting, though, because we did vote on approving that traffic study, and with that cost in mind, and yes, again, then it's been through the budget. But it highlights to me the fear of cost blowing out and money being spent. If that's one particular study that we've given the tick off, and we're opening the door to a whole bunch of other studies that we don't even have a list for, I'm just going to be continuously holding this council to account in how it spends ratepayers' money. We are the custodians of that money, and we can't be spending it on planning reports that we don't have a specific purpose for. To give a broad umbrella that it is part of the structure planning isn't good enough.

I'd like our planning department, or through the Department of Planning with the state government, to actually give us a list of what those structure planning documents need to be to encompass the final product. I just want to also touch base quickly on the amendment in front of us because— On further reflection, I spoke quite in detail about what I've just stressed, the uncertainty of how many reports and the cost. But point one actually says that Council agree to proceed in the structure planning process, but we're agreeing to something again that we haven't actually put a cap on. So I don't know if we can tweak that one a little bit because, like I said, I think it's important to get it right.

Including preparation of a planning proposal to amend relevant planning controls of what? Of the whole LEP and DCP, or just concerning specifically to this proposal? I don't know if there was any appetite to tighten that.

Were you speaking on the motion, Councillor Richards? Yes

But highlighting the amendment.

You've gone on to the amendment.

I think it's important this is actually done right. And further—

Yeah, you've spoken on the amendment, but continue . I'm

Glad I have your permission

Thank you so much for granting that to me.

The other things that— Point of order, Madam Mayor. Point of order, Councillor Wheeler. From you? The Mayor. From what you said about me? Councillor Conolly

Okay. And another point of order . Point of order, Madam Mayor. Councillor Wheeler,

What is the point of order?

I was under the impression that the Mayor gives permission for people to speak. I do, and Councillor

Richards is speaking for the motion, as she has already spoken on the amendment

And I believe I exercised my manners by thanking her for that. I would just like to wrap up, I guess, and say that I think since being elected, and the way this has just consistently come up in this chamber, and the time we devote to this topic and these applications and moving forward, and whether we're looking at it in isolation of Kurrajong and Comleroy, or whether we're looking at it as a whole part of our planning moving forward in terms of the residential land strategy, I think we could have handled this better. I don't think that the whole thing has been quite professional as a whole, looking over the last couple of years. And I really hope that come September 20, the community has learned a lesson about this far-left experiment and actually make sure that they vote to put some proper way forward at the next elections.

September 20. We got a meeting on then? Oh, 2020. Thank you, Councillor Richards, for clarifying. Councillor Ross.

Mayor, would it be in order to make inquiries, please?

Certainly, Councillor Ross, a question.

Yes, if you don't mind. The recommendation at point one, the word endorse.

Council resolutions normally

Receive reports.

I'm not sure what an endorsement means. It seems sort of embryonic. Is this report a final report? So you're asking for— What happens if we don't like it? You're asking for a

Clarification on what the word endorse means in this

Circumstance. Yes, and I'm nervous about it, frankly. Okay

All right. Mr Conroy. So

What point one of the officer's recommendation reads is, endorses the Kermon Kurrajong Landscape Character Study prepared by Clauston and Associates. So we are saying that that's a reasonable approach. So we're endorsing that, and then point two is agree to proceed to the next steps of the structure planning process. So if we're happy with it, we're endorsing it, then we proceed to the next steps and develop that greater detail, flesh those points out and develop the planning proposal and then bring that back to Council. So it's just giving us some direction to move on.

Make it a bit clearer, Councillor Ross.

Mayor, I have to say no

Okay.

How can we assist you? Is there a word that you think is more appropriate there, or is that what your issue is with the word

I would have thought receipt of the report would be sufficient, and if we're dealing in other points in relation to that report in terms of action, those action statements will either affirm or disagree with the report that has been received.

Would you like to ask Councillor Wheeler if she would like to change that word to receive the report? I'm happy with that. Councillor Wheeler is happy with that. Your seconder, happy with that? Thank you, Councillor Ross.

Thank you for your guidance, Mayor.

Further discussion?

Councillor Calvert.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I just want to speak against the motion. I totally agree with Councillor Ross that we shouldn't be endorsing that report; we should be receiving it. Indeed, that report, to me, is not something we should be basing our future studies upon. It's something we can add to the collection of studies we've got. My point was that the amendment and the motion are very similar if you look at them. The amendment is that we still proceed. But basically we proceed, in my opinion, on a city-wide basis and we don't base all our decisions on this one report and endorse it. That's what I was on about. And yet I received a tirade of information about whether I'm pro or anti development, which I thought was totally unnecessary.

I am on about us getting the right tools and instruments in place, and I have serious reservations that this tool , or whatever you want to call it, is good enough for us to proceed. I think it is one tool we put in our toolkit along with other things. Yet the recommendation tends to say that, yippee, we've got this great report, let's bound ahead using that report. I just wanted to get us away from that mindset. That's why I'm supporting the amendment.

Thank you. Further discussion? Right of reply, Councillor Wheeler.

Oh, sorry, the amendment. I know, right of reply

Thanks, Madam Mayor. I don't think much is necessary.

On Councillor Calvert's point, I don't think that the motion and the amendment are similar. In fact, that's why the debate has been so rigorous. Point two states that we proceed to the next steps in the structure planning process, not that we put everything behind the landscape character study, but that the landscape character study really essentially goes into a suite of documents, some of which we have, some of which we're still working on, to amend planning controls for further consideration by Council. This isn't the end point. This is one of the steps along the way, and I think— We can recognise it as such. I find it a very useful and inspiring document. I was really heartened to sit in the briefing and listen to someone talk about how remarkable our area is.

For someone to finally consider that this was more than an open space that was worthy of a corridor or another housing development, particularly coming hot on the heels of the corridors proposal, I think had the rest of the community been able to see that presentation, they too would have been both inspired and relieved by the passion with which the consultant spoke about the area and how important it is not only to us but to Greater Sydney. And that's what this document seeks to do. It seeks to note value and then work with what is special and important about that place. And what Point Four seeks to do is to spread that treatment to the rest of the LGA, because one of my great fears with stopping at this document is that we end up with towns that are haves and towns that are have-nots, towns that are recognised for being beautiful and scenic and worthy, and other areas that are considered to be just places that we can roll out more of the northwest growth sector or another corridor because they don't actually count.

That's what this is for. And that's why Point Four seeks to extend this to the rest of the LGA, because this place is important and it deserves to be valued.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. I'll put the amendment. It's a planning item, so vote with our buttons. All those in favour. It's Councillor Kotlash's amendment, which is the one currently up on the board. I'll put the amendment vote on the count of three. One, two, three.

For the amendment, Councillor Calvert, Councillor Kotlash, Councillor Zambrano, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Tree and Councillor Richards. Against the amendment, Councillor Ross, Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Garrow, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Zambrano, Councillor Lyons-Buckett. On the casting vote, the amendment is lost. I'll now put the motion . Vote on the count of three. One, two, three.

It was too good to be true. One, two, three .

Try one more time. Give it a minute. On the count of three. One, two, three. For the amendment, Councillor Ross, Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Garrow, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Zambrano, Councillor Lyons-Buckett. Against the motion— sorry, Councillor Calvert, Councillor Kotlash, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Tree, Councillor Richards. The motion is carried.

Our next item with speakers is item...

Sorry. I

Hope you feel better, Councillor Tree.

How rude. Point

Of order, Madam.

Point of order, Councillor Ross.

I felt the remark made by the councillor was inappropriate. It

Was. Anyway, never mind, I’ll move. Moving on to Mayoral Minute. I move the Mayoral Minute. It’s something we’ve gone over before,

But I think we need to move to actually meet with the Minister for Local Government and the Treasurer, with a delegation comprising councillors and community representatives, to discuss the issue of the pensioner rebates. It’s been on the cards for so long. It’s been at every Local Government conference I’ve been to, and it’s way back since 1989, since it was actually changed. So it’s high time that we took the action to actually have these meetings and make it very clear how much this is impacting in our council area and across all council areas, actually. And also with regard to the sullage, a couple of issues. There is the issue there also of the rebate for pensioners who have sullage collection, which, with our sullage, if we have an increasing ageing population, we are going to be up for more money.

This is fully funded by council, this rebate, the 50% rebate of the sullage, and that will be a growing— Yeah, thank you, Councillor Russ. A growing expense that we have to bear. And also, while we're working along on that, we really should be moving towards what we are going to do in the future with the sullage collection. We simply cannot sustain an area that has trucks driving around picking up sullage. It's becoming increasingly dangerous. We have to move to look at what other opportunities and what other— I understand there are complexities with that because anything we do will impact on the remaining people having sullage and so on. But I think we just really need to have some sort of a time frame of what possible solutions there are and how we can move towards that, whether that's retrofitting places, whether that's introducing microsystems in some areas.

But we have to start having the conversation because we simply cannot continue on as it is into the future. So I'll open the floor for discussion, but I submit that it's reasonably straightforward what we're calling upon. Councillor Kotlash Thank

You, Madam Mayor. I'm speaking in favour of the Mayoral Minute, with one possible change, if you wouldn't mind, in point 2 . I'll start with a question. Why do we have to prepare a time frame? Can't we just get on with the investigations? I didn't quite understand why we needed a time frame.

Well, just because I'm aware of the complexities that are involved in it, because we need to look not just at what we can do, but what the impacts will be on all the other people. And it doesn't have to have a time frame. I just want a time frame, really, because I'd like to see it going forward. It just

Reads like we just wanted a time frame and then we'll look at it further.

Well, I'm imagining it'll be a quite long-term—I think it'll be a quite long-term project to find a solution for. Even though technically I think it would be easy to just find a solution, but it's the impacts that emerge out of it which are problematic. So I'm happy if people want to remove preparing a time frame, but I thought holding it within a time frame was more for a positive moving forward than a negative. I

Suppose if we just call for the investigation to commence, then maybe that the staff— The time frame would be part of the… Yeah, the staff would be able to tell us what that is. I just thought, oh, I just quite didn't quite get that.

Thank you. Good. I'm happy to include—I will move it, though, and put including a time frame, because it's something I don't want to get lost once, if it's passed. I don't want it to get lost and not to go ahead. The other thing I should have said, there was a typographical error in paragraph 2 where it says the net cost to council of funding rates and domestic waste rebates should read 379,000 annually, not 339,000. That was just a mistake in the typing.

Any further discussion? Councillor Zamprogno.

Yes, Madam Mayor, thank you. Just a point of clarification. Whenever a suggestion like this comes before us, proposing a delegation of councillors, could I just get an undertaking through you that at that point, if an invitation for a meeting is accepted, that all councillors will be informed and will be able to nominate whether they would like to be a part of that delegation?

You certainly can. I was going to call and ask if it was passed to see if there was anyone who wanted to put their name forward tonight, but I'm happy to leave that to do that once a meeting date is arranged.

I think that would be wise, Madam Mayor, because the availability of councillors may be highly dependent on the date that's proposed. It

May indeed.

Councillor Richards.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I'm going to support this Mayoral Minute tonight. I think the basis of it is spot on. I think that we need to definitely meet with our local member and look into issues about pensioner rebates on a whole. I do believe that the fact it hasn't been looked at for quite a number of years in terms of the whole state of New South Wales and how rates are calculated is definitely important. And I do recall that at a community meeting, it may have been last year, that our state member, this issue was brought specifically to his attention, and he did say that he would be happy to look into this. So I think bringing this Mayoral Minute forward to sit down with him and bring that issue to the forefront is important.

However, let's not forget that right now, as important as this issue is, and as much as I support it, the intent, the timing is quite significant of this notice of motion. It's a clear case of diversion politics , trying to look conciliatory to the community at the exact time that the rates notices have been delivered to people's letterboxes. So when we've had a rate rise. So I could go on and on and on about the rate rise, but I think you all know my opinion on that. So I'm going to leave it, but I did want to highlight that I think the timing is extremely interesting for this notice of motion to come forward, and specifically the fact that this Mayoral Minute also actually is in the same business paper as a notice of motion brought by another councillor on the same similar topic, even though it's targeted at self-funded retirees.

So, in my humble opinion, great teamwork. Well

Thank you for that, Councillor Richards. If I could just point out, I was unaware of Councillor Wheeler's notice of motion, and we did consider combining them, but as they were submitted, we just left them as they were. So I do rebut your accusation that it is somehow politically motivated. It simply is not. I was sitting in my list of Mayoral Minutes to get in for some time. In fact, I raised it at the Local Government Conference last year and have been following up on it after. So to suggest that is really quite... is your opinion. Yes. Councillor Wheeler

Thanks, Madam Mayor . I recall we discussed this last year prior to the Local Government Conference, and a potential motion that Council submit to the Local Government Conference that this rebate be increased, and we decided not to submit it because it was already a resolution on the table for local government and has been a longstanding resolution, in fact. So this isn't politically motivated. This is councils all over New South Wales saying that a $250 fee that was set as 50% of the average New South Wales rate in 1989 is no longer adequate. Now that's not a political statement, that's simply a statement of fact. It's now less than 25% of the average rate and falling. And yet the New South Wales Government continues to boast about its fabulous financial management and castigate councils about their supposedly poor financial management, so poor in fact that it thought that it should amalgamate a whole lot of councils.

So if you want to bring up politics, we can go down that path. But this isn't just Greens, Labor, block-dominated councils or Greens independent councils or councils of any particular leftish stripe. This is councils right across New South Wales saying this subsidy is not adequate to meet the needs of communities and local governments, and the State Government needs to do something about it. That's all this is. Point two, I think, is timely. Actually, point two is well overdue. It's 2018. The days of going around and sucking people's poo into a truck and then driving it about the LGA should be long past. This is just silly. We have the technology to do something much, much better than this.

We are no longer constrained by block sizes. We're no longer constrained by soil types. We are no longer constrained by having to send, to spread the resultant septic effluent out along grand alleyways with a few, and hope that the grass grows on top of them. If this can be done on a 120 square metre block in Chippendale successfully for 15 years, it can be done on 2,000 square metres or 650 square metres at Ebenezer or Bowen Mountain perfectly successfully. And if it takes this council to show the rest of New South Wales that this can be done and can be done economically, then so be it. Because currently, it's not economical. People are paying in excess of $2,000 a year to have their poo carted off.

Now, come on.

They could pay for a state-of-the-art on-site treatment system within five years at those prices. And this council needs to explore means of doing that equitably for these residents. And if it means that we have to use our purchasing power, or the rates notices, or something to do that, SSR Rock is doing this with solar. I can't see any reason why we can't do this with effluent treatment. It's time we got on with it.

Okay, Councillor Wheeler. Further discussion?

No further discussion. I don't need a right of reply. I'll put the Mayoral minute, all those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. Someone to move items on block. Move Councillor Rasmussen.

188. We have three speakers. The first speaker is Harry Terry.

Madam Mayor, I have a— Oh,

Sorry, Councillor Reynolds, please read your interest and then leave.

It's a pecuniary interest, and it's because our home is partially gazetted as state road corridor. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Reynolds. We'll call you back in at the end. Thank you, Mr Terry.

Mayor, Councillors, members of staff, gallery, it is a real pleasure to support this notice of motion. It is one of those occasions where all councillors can vote unanimously to support it. To make it crystal clear to the gallery, the purpose of this notice of motion is not a stunt aimed to delay the Windsor Bridge replacement project.

I mean, how could it?

It's not about party politics. It's not attacking the Liberal government by a Greens-Labor conspiracy. What is it about? The call for a Royal Commission is about the concerns by a growing number of groups across the state regarding the operation of the Transport for New South Wales, which of course encompasses the RMS. Every councillor must be concerned about the functioning of these bodies. In fact, all councillors work tirelessly to overturn the plans of Transport for New South Wales in regards to the two corridor draft plans, and quite rightly so. Almost every week there is another example of cost blowouts in projects governed by these bodies. Only on Wednesday of last week it was revealed Transport for New South Wales IT group blew out its operational budget of about $30 million by more than $80 million in the last financial year.

That followed a $40 million blowout in the previous financial year. The large IT projects designed to centralise systems across agencies have already experienced revolving doors for senior managers. The $425 million Making It Work for You project alone has had eight program directors over the past five years. The agencies upon which the government depends to provide accurate, prompt and expert information and advice must be trustworthy, independent, knowledgeable, skillful and above all, ethical. No government of whatever political persuasion can make appropriate decisions if the ones called public service is in a state of turmoil and provides the government with fake information, unimaginable cost blowouts and badly managed public relations.

The government of the day cannot be totally blamed for the very poor performance of these agencies. Governments can only be blamed if they do not recognise there are issues to be resolved, do not identify those problems and do not take steps to rectify them. As an example of symptoms, consider the RMS's performance as regards to the Windsor Bridge replacement project. There is something wrong with the RMS, an engineering organisation, when one of its claims for the project was for it to provide a one in five flood immunity. As you know, a one in five flood immunity in Windsor Bridge is over 11 metres, and the lowest span of the bridge is 9.8 metres. That claim was still being made in a ministerial briefing in December 2016 and in the expert panel recommendations and project team response to the final business case.

There is something wrong with the RMS when it kept affirming the claim the approach roads would be closed in a flood before the bridge would have to be closed, yet in the written response to a question on notice for the portfolio number 5 inquiry, the RMS confirmed if the intervention height, that means when the bridge would be closed in a flood, is half a metre below the minimum soffit level, then that height would equate to 7.5 AHD . The only road that would be closed at that time would be McGraths Hill flats. What is wrong with the RMS? In December 2016, it said the use of three lanes would bust the traffic problems through Thompson Square. However, in response to a question on notice, the question is how will the traffic from Macquarie Street wishing to travel north be affected by this project?

The RMS replied, the updated traffic study showed the traffic out of Macquarie Street, western approach travelling north to Bridge Street, is unlikely to be adversely affected by this project, and that is after spending $137 million. What is wrong with the RMS? I could go on, but the time is going to beat me.

There is something inherently wrong with infrastructure for New South Wales and the RMS. Only a royal commission has the power to peel away the various protective layers to reveal the core of the problem and to allow for the necessary restructuring. If you do not vote in favour of this motion, you are voting to protect a dysfunctional organisation, and I suspect we should ask why. I recommend the notice of motion.

Thank you, Mr Terry. Are you happy to take questions?

Surely. Councillor Richards. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you, Mr Terry, for your speech. You did mention in that discussion there that this isn't a political notice of motion, and you went on to talk quite a bit about the Windsor Bridge replacement project, of which you hold a senior position with Corb. If it's not political, can you please give clarification as to why in the vicinity of the protest site there is a continued CFMEU flag?

Mr Terry, your light, please. Thank you.

I'm not sure that question's in order because I don't think it's anything got to do with the notice of motion, but I will answer it in that there is that— Pardon?

There is a difference between a political and party political, but secondly, Corb has nothing to do with the group of people who are sitting down at the wharf area and looking after what's happening in that area. That is not a Corb part of the process of its organisation, so that is totally inherently wrong to imply that it is.

Thank you, Mr Terry. Any further questions? No further questions. Thank you. Our second speaker is Bill Sneddon.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, Councillors and Gallery. I feel like a lightweight following Harry Terry. However, I'm very decidedly speaking in favour of this notice of motion. Transport for New South Wales is adversely affecting not only Hawkesbury residents, as we've witnessed by the recent debacle and the failed consultation process for transport corridors M9, etcetera, Yarramundi up to Castle Ray and up into Gross Vale to Kurrajong in the Hawkesbury. But this is also affecting others out outside of the Hawkesbury area, across Sydney and statewide. And, for example, just in the last few days, the debacle that's coming up with the Bankstown rail corridor densification, etcetera, that's getting really adverse commentary.

I commend to you the items of the notice of motion. The Thompson Square and Windsor Bridge replacement project with RMS are but a tip of the iceberg. In this case, we're now heading towards an estimated cost of $200 million plus. I'm told on the information line only the other day, $137 million at the moment. We've spent 30 plus million dollars on archaeology. That's the one good thing about that. We now actually know seriously what's in the ground, in part. But however, nine years ago there was a tight budget of around $50 million. So where is the fiscal rectitude that others, including this council, are expected to observe in the— In our operations, there seem to be a double standard here with RMS and Department of Transport be able to do what we can't get away with.

Also, now traffic volumes and housing details for the planning are changed, and we seem to be having the same breach. Failure of appropriate community consultation and observation of environmental processes are also most evident in the recent actions on the transport corridors, leading to very upset Nangarri State citizens and voters. This New South Wales Government department appears to be set on a growth at all cost agenda, in spite of what affected voters want or expect in genuine and open consultation processes that can radically affect them, their land and lifestyles. Further, Transport for New South Wales appears set on a development agenda similar to what appears also coming from New South Wales Department of Planning in my recent experiences.

I'm deeply concerned at what appears to be to myself and others as an agenda of growth despite any citizen objections, especially in our Sydney food bowl. What's happened to our food bowl? We are having more and more population, et cetera, shoved into this area. The attitude appear from the authorities, including this particular agency, appears to mirror that of the Spanish Inquisition, and I quote, You're either for us or against us. The citizens on this basis have nil grounds for a differing opinion, let alone to express an objection. This is not the democracy I was told Australians and New South Wales citizens are told that we vote for now, nor when I was taught civics in what was called social studies in high school in the 1960s.

We also appear at state level to be regarding infrastructure spending as a near-cural mantra, with cost cutting also from existing services to local government and other state departments. And I instance particularly another notice of motion tonight that's from Councillor Reynolds, including cost cutting to libraries. We're affected here by that. In yesterday's Sydney Morning Herald, I hold up an article. There was the economic columnist Ross Gittins reviews some of the now apparent drivers of this development mantra. Whilst the economic multipliers of at least three to one on spending for infrastructure look wonderful, they're great for the economy, but prudence and rational business case justifications are needed when we're spending on infrastructure.

Also, Mr Gittins notes that a big new project is good political news when announced, and five years or so later, a big political windfall of good news when the project opens with a further opportunity for a big photo session. I actually commend this article to you. There's a whole lot more subtleties involved. I learned about this stuff in economics in the 60s. I'm really concerned, as I've said about this lot, I'm having to explain to citizens what Department of Transport and Development in this area appear to be doing, and I don't know the inside drivers. So I heartily recommend this notice of motion to all you councillors. Irrespective of your partisan beliefs, all your electors have been affected, many highly adversely and deeply emotionally.

Thank you very much for your time.

Thank you, Mr Snedden. Are you happy to take

Questions? Yes, Madam Mayor.

Any questions for Mr Snedden? No questions,

Thank you.

Our third speaker is Kate Mackinnis.

Good evening, and thank you for the opportunity to speak in support of this important motion. New South Wales 2018. Even the most cursory scan of headlines confirms our state has a transport problem. Headlines like Fixing New South Wales transport is an issue that won't go away, Travellers stranded as Transport New South Wales fails in a big way, Protesters march through Sydney in rally against New South Wales transport plans, and so it goes on. We are talking about big problems here with big dollars attached. The cost of delivering transport infrastructure in New South Wales today is massive. Infrastructure expenditure in the New South Wales budget papers reveals that last financial year the transport capital works budget was a little under $9 billion.

This financial year it is just over $6 billion. To get that into perspective, the education capital works budget last financial year was around $810 million, increasing this year to a little over $1.6 billion. Last year the health capital works budget was in the order of $1.5 billion, and this year is over $2 billion. In other words, this year the transport allocation was three times the funding available for health infrastructure, and last financial year the education capital works budget was less than a ninth of the budget for transport infrastructure. These are all eye-wateringly large numbers, and it's easy to fall into the trap of acting as if there is an inexhaustible supply of public funding.

The zeros disappear, the numbers visually contract, and complacency becomes commonplace. Budget overruns become acceptable, estimating procedures constantly inflate budgets, contingency becomes enormous and is seen as a legitimate hollow log to fund variations . Procurement practices become sloppy, expertise is eroded, processes become increasingly secretive, legislation is misused.

This is not hypothetical. It

Is possible to identify these issues in publicly available documents today. And let's not forget, a budget is an end point, ideally the culmination of rigorous processes designed to ensure these vast amounts of public money are spent wisely. Effective and efficient use of public funds is delivered through sound research, a detailed understanding of opportunities and constraints, impartial assessment of competing priorities, untainted by vested interests, and carried out by objective, unbiased and appropriately qualified professionals. However, before agencies can even think about planning programs of works which identify individual projects, good governance requires an additional layer of research, which, in the case of transport infrastructure, looks at available and predicted technologies and measures the costs, consequences and impacts of transport modes, as well as exploring non-transport solutions and alternatives.

Now, I knew I was going to get caught. Sorry.

Transport infrastructure consumes public funds, our money, at an alarming rate. We have no benchmarks to reassure ourselves this expenditure is delivering value for money. We have little or no evidence. Plans represent outcomes which have been comprehensively tested and found to be the optimum outcome for the community's concern whilst meeting the objectives of the community and demonstrating optimised use of public funds. The fact communities protest against plans prepared by the government and resist ferociously their implementation is symptomatic of the increasing chasm which separates the government and the communities it is charged with serving. So , should the Hawkesbury care about these matters? Three significant transport matters in the Hawkesbury create a

Context for considering the question.

They are the Bells Line of Road corridor debacle. The Windsor Bridge disaster and the allocation of funds to plan a third river crossing at an unspecified location. With the effective and efficient use of public funds, there is more to go around. Funds are directed to genuine need, delivering genuine solutions untainted by vested interests. The Hawkesbury has been neglected for far too long, and in the absence of evidence to the contrary, appears to be the victim of unbelievably poor transport planning, and we are entitled to know why. The Hawkesbury needs train timetables that work and modern trains that run on time. If those things cannot be delivered, we are entitled to know why. The Hawkesbury demands plans that do not destroy heritage assets and which deliver genuine improvement, and if the plans don't deliver, we are entitled to know why.

Supporting the call for a Royal Commission into transport planning and infrastructure delivery is in the best interests of New South Wales and in the very best interests of the Hawkesbury. I commend Councillor Ross for this motion and anticipate the support of all councillors. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms McInnes. Are you happy to take questions? Certainly am. Are there any questions, councillors?

Councillor Rasmussen. Oh, no, sorry. Thank you. No questions. Thank you. That was our final speaker, Councillor Ross.

Thank you, Mayor.

Wish to move your motion.

I wish to move the motion.

A seconder for Councillor Ross? Seconder, Councillor Wheeler.

Thank you.

Councillor Ross. Speaking to the motion, I think there have been eloquent addresses by the three folk who have addressed us this evening, and it is truly a statewide concern, as can be seen from the supporting information put before you tonight. There are up to 24 and possibly even a greater number of community groups who feel that such a call is warranted in view of the less than reasonable access they've had to either consultation or decision-making in the current processes that are being rolled out. It's even possibly—it's even more severe

Than that when you simply consider even the rail network. We've apparently got new

Electric

Trains that have been ordered from overseas to service the Blue Mountains area up to Lithgow. Neither the tunnels nor the station platforms are suitable, and it appears at the moment, on my last knowing, that the new rolling stock will only be used to Valley Heights.

You can't possibly get to Lithgow, which seems to be a complete failure of the intention of the procurement. Similarly, the Northwest Rail project and its extensions are achieving what the first builders of our nation did in the

Late 1800s in the rail network:

Broken gauges. No, the gauges aren't broken, but the rolling stock on the Northwest Rail is not compatible with the rolling stock in the rest of the system.

Very, very strange and odd planning and delivery, one would think, which may be extraordinarily expensive at some later time to remedy.

Then coming closer to home, of course, we've all experienced the great angst that occurred with the rollout of the corridor proposals on March 26. Dear oh me, a very severe blow to everyone who was affected, and the element of distrust now in amongst the community as a result of that is still quite apparent, and it will remain so until— There is something done about these supposed corridors,

Which all points to the fact that there is no overarching planning

In these matters. And the road corridor situation is eminently visible within this local government area. We're currently talking about a bypass for Pitt Town, which is subject to its own vagaries. Told it's going to go ahead, and now it looks like that's wafted off into the future somewhere with a preliminary budget of nine million for planning and possibly some geotechnical works or such like. But nine million for a bypass of Pitt Town township.

And then, of course, we've got the well-known situation of the Windsor Bridge replacement project. And then we've got the unknown project of a new crossing of the Hawkesbury River at Richmond , so to speak, about which I don't know that our parliamentary representatives have been sufficiently polite to afford us their knowledge, even though it has been requested by the council with due regard and respect.

Those three elements alone

Show that things are being looked at as if they're in some sort of strange silo arrangements. Surely the rest of this area has to connect with adjacent and adjoining areas, whether they be north or to the east or what. It just doesn't seem to be occurring. It just doesn't seem to be even raising the thought that these things are extraordinarily important. Once a piece of infrastructure goes in, it's got to have a significant life.

They're being built, obviously, to withstand at least 50 years of utilisation, if not longer. And for these projects to be going ahead without any coherent and understood basis of how this all links in together has, in fact,

Drawn Council, this Council, into the expenditure of a substantial amount of money, as was information about which was sought by Councillor Richards earlier in the evening.

A transport study, even for this area, the government doesn't have one. And here are we, the local council, supposedly looking after our ratepayers and residents and knowing what the devil is going on.

We'll possibly end up with more transport information and traffic information than the government agency responsible for it. Talk about cost shifting and obligation shifting. And then, as was noted in the earlier debate, this new proposed crossing of the river seeks to funnel road traffic directly into our fellow neighbouring historic township. Oh , how wonderful for amenity. How wonderful for the respect of our local residents and ratepayers. How wonderful for the valuation of their properties. Goodness gracious. And we call this planning, and we call this fair and open government and whatever. I'm sorry, but it's not. And this is just illustrative of what has been going on closer to the CBD areas, as we all have heard.

Some of the projects there are absolutely deplorable, and the outcomes that are allegedly going to be achieved are not being achieved, and that the mode of transport in some cases being adopted and implemented are quite likely the incorrect means by which to achieve mass transit. And in that regard, I refer to the light rail project. It possibly should have been an underground heavy rail project. It certainly couldn't have cost any more, and it may have had greater connectivity with the rest of the network. I mean, all of these things should have been thought about 10 and 15 years ago and been planned with the community's knowledge and debate. And, okay, we're not all going to agree. I quite concede that.

But at least everyone would have some indication as to where these things are heading and what the actual plan is. The difficulty we have with this particular regime at the moment is that

The large increase of population is having to be housed. But

The planning techniques and modus operandi seems to be that we just keep on progressing urban spread. That surely is quite ludicrous when you consider the northwest growth area at Vineyard with which we've been lumbered. How ridiculous to house people out in distant areas like this, 50 to 60 kilometres away from the CBD of a major capital city, when There are other techniques available for that not to occur. But it's easier to simply just look for paddocks that aren't occupied with humans, and we'll go ahead and build and approve residential areas with disgracefully small lot sizes and disgraceful infrastructure in them, which are going to be the creation, potentially, of more social. And physical isolation

These are

All

Matters relating to transport. Thank you

Just relevance, Madam Mayor. The motion is about Transport for New South Wales and the RMS, and we're now talking about urban sprawl and lot sizes in residential development.

Yes, I think Councillor Ross was just winding up.

Yes, that's true . Yes. The

Necessity of doing that, Ann, of course, Councillor, is that mass transportation of people through the facilities provided by the State Government and Transport for New South Wales are an integral part of, unfortunately, the urban spread, and it is an inadequate response, inadequate. And I'd be very much appreciative of my fellow councillors supporting the call for a Royal Commission to try and get a break on this whole disastrous

Movement that we've got going at the moment, and frankly it's going to have a very deleterious impact on this local government area amongst

All the others. Thank you, Councillor Ross. Call for further discussion. Further discussion? Councillor Zamprogno.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Councillor Ross has dilated at length on a number of issues, not all of which are relevant to transport planning in New South Wales. There may well be issues with the lot sizes of urban developments, but that has nothing to do with transport planning. Councillor Ross. has spent our time diagnosing the wrong problem and then suggesting the wrong remedy. To the degree that there are issues with transport planning in New South Wales, I point out for the Council's benefit that there are any number of instruments for the investigation if there is any suggestion of corruption, malfeasance or maladministration. If there was an issue with developers gaining inappropriate knowledge of areas that were about to be zoned for a road corridor, both the corporate regulator and the Independent Commission Against Corruption would take an interest, respectively, about the behaviour of that developer or a government instrumentality that was leaking the information in an inappropriate way.

A royal commission is not the appropriate remedy for issues relating to transport planning in New South Wales. A royal commission exercises some of the functions of the judiciary, of a court, with one important exception: they do not exercise the function of judicial power, which is deciding or determining something. They neither decide nor determine anything. They gather their evidence, they collate it, and they make findings or recommendations, but nothing that affects the legal standing of a person or an organisation. I think it's the wrong remedy if there is something to be said about the way that transport planning is done in this state. Councillor Ross mentions as a case in point the Pitt Town bypass.

Councillor Ross, I presume, was present in the room when we were given a briefing on the subject, and we were told that the environmental assessment process and the detailed planning work was well underway, and that there ought to be shovels in the ground for what ultimately will be between a $35 and $40 million project before the end of next year . The figure that has been quoted by him to advance that work, of course, is not the complete amount. So that is also irrelevant. I would be very interested to know in what the Labor Party's position on a royal commission is. Has the Labor Party given an undertaking that they would support this royal commission? I would ask the Labor candidate for Hawkesbury, except he is not in the room at the moment .

Maybe other members of the Labor Party would be prepared to weigh in with their knowledge of whether the Labor Party has given an undertaking to support this royal commission. But I can't support this notice of motion tonight.

Councillor Conolly. Thanks, Madam Mayor.

This is very clearly a political campaign, Madam Mayor. I mean, there's no mistake about this. Councillor Ross, this is his number one issue. He heads up the organisation that's down at Windsor Bridge protesting all the time . It's exactly what it is. It's a political campaign. A royal commission . So let's just unpack this motion for a second. There's some uncertainty about the budget for a third crossing of the Hawkesbury River, and that's a reason for a royal commission? How ridiculous. How ridiculous. The reason for the royal commission is for the impact of the headline. That's the reason we're calling for a royal commission, because you would never call for a royal commission to find out, get some more certainty around the budget for a third crossing, as is indicated in Councillor Ross's notice of motion in point one.

And I think it goes to the very heart of the issue here, is that there's no willingness to work in good faith with anyone in a Liberal government. The Liberal government has delivered funding for the comprehensive planning work of a third river crossing that this council has been calling on forever, that this community has been calling for forever . There is some uncertainty around exactly where it's going to be because it's the start of the planning process. The announcement wasn't as clear as it could have been, I agree with that. And council then went ahead and resolved to go and seek some clarification, as would be the proper course of action. The proper course of action when you get a historic announcement of funding that you've been desperately crying out for is not to then call for a Royal Commission and to find out what exactly is going on with it.

How ridiculous. I mean, it's just ridiculous. I can't even believe we're talking about this, but I can because this is what Councillor Ross is here for. He's an independent, but he's not independent of the political process. He might as well be in one of these parties, Madam Mayor, because this is the sort of thing that keeps coming up. Sorry, Councillor, I couldn't hear Councillor Wheeler's interjection

Continue, Councillor. I didn't hear anything.

Okay. I didn't want to be rude and keep talking while she was talking, that's all.

I can't hear her talking.

She's not now. She was. I

Didn't hear anything,

Sorry. Continue . Just find where I was up to, Madam Mayor.

You were— Royal Commission.

Royal Commission . You know, let's say that these problems do exist. Let's say they exist. As Councillor Zamprogno quite correctly pointed out, nothing in Councillor Ross's address, his very long address, not one minute of it was dedicated to why a Royal Commission is the correct answer to this problem . Not one minute of it was subject to that, because of course the Royal Commission is just to grab the headline . To talk about the Bells Line of Road corridor, if we look at what happened in that instance, the government went out in 2015 and said, We’re going to look at a corridor. This is going to be our consultation process. And then they came back in 2018 and didn’t follow that process. And the community were rightly very angry that the government had put out a process and then didn’t follow it.

And they seemed to be making a decision unilaterally; that was the fear, the suspicion. And a corridor was put on exhibition. And at that point , let’s review what happened from then on and decide if we need a Royal Commission. So the corridor gets put on exhibition. The department then holds public meetings, holds meetings individually with landholders , extends the submission period. Upon getting the feedback, this is a no-go, dumps it immediately. Now, it would have been much better if no one had to go through that. Absolutely, much better. But is that process, is that warrant a Royal Commission? Really, that process? How ridiculous. It’s just political. And this council, which is supposed to be made up of independents, and we’ve already seen one independent become a Labor candidate and maybe Councillor Ross is next, because this is

Yes.

I hear a couple of wobblers behind me, Madam Mayor. The wobblers’ Facebook page has recently been calling for the election of Bill Shorten and not hiding its party politics very well recently, similar to Councillor Reynolds not hiding his party politics very well. He forgot so much he was an independent, became a Labor candidate, Madam Mayor.

Quiet in the gallery, please.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I know that was hard for you.

Councillor Conolly, that’s uncalled for. It’s not hard for me. I told them to be quiet.

It just took a long time. That’s what I meant, sorry. You know, I'm not going to—I think we're wasting Council's time, so I won't go on.

This is clearly just a very, very politically motivated stunt. It's the same organisation as always. Had a rally, hardly anyone went there, as usual, but it will be reported there was thousands. Madam Mayor, this is just a waste of time. I can't believe this Council, if it's legitimately wanting to work with the government, is going to consider supporting a motion like this.

Thank you, Councillor Conolly. Further discussion? Councillor Rasmussen.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I just want to remind a couple of councillors, one in particular, that there are lots of government agencies and so on who have extensive powers to deal with financial institutions and banks and so on. But that didn't quite work. So what did work was a Royal Commission into financial services and banking. That got the cat stirred up and that got the logs out and that got all the little worms and the squirms out. But none of the other big agencies, who have lots of resources, lots of legislative power to deal with banks and financial institutions and financial advisers and so on, and that whole process was fought and fought and fought and fought. Now one particular councillor says, Well, no, no, no, there's plenty of other avenues to deal with this. Well, maybe there isn't.

Thank you, Councillor Rasmussen. Further discussion? Councillor Richards

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I don't intend to speak a lot on this one tonight because I think Councillor Connolly basically said everything I wanted to say, so there's no point repeating it. Suffice to say a couple of points to add to the debate. There is absolutely no way on this planet I'll ever put my name to something like this, to a motion like this. I will not be putting my name to calling for a Royal Commission, and I'm already putting on notice that I want my name recorded against this embarrassing motion . You had a public rally as part of your point one in this motion that you think is a justification to call a Royal Commission when you've got 67,000 residents in the Hawkesbury, roughly, you invited 24 community organisations from across the state and you got less than 100 people, and you think that that's enough to call a Royal Commission and then subsequently bring a motion into this chamber to support that?

You want to talk numbers? Let's talk numbers, and that's pretty pathetic . Oh, geez, it's just ongoing tonight, isn't it? Continuous. So anyway—

It's a point of order, Madam Mayor. There seems to be continuous interruption from the gallery. And

Zero control. Excuse me, Councillor Richards. A statement was made. He's not continuing to call out. If there was continuous calling out— He

Just said one thing

That's all I've heard. It's the

Whole meeting. Well, it's especially on this motion.

Well, I've asked them to be quiet, okay? I've asked them and asked them. Let's see if they respect

You. Let's have a look

Let's wait and see.

So how— there she go. Oh, wow. Instantly.

Can the gallery please be quiet?

Instantly. Okay. So I'm not going to continue on too much to say that so much focus tonight has been on the current state of the government in New South Wales. Well, you know what? No government gets it 100% right, and let's basically look at this council. It certainly doesn't get it 100% right all of the time. But the inertia and the activity currently taking place in New South Wales is a much better acceleration of projects in the stagnant 16 years of Labor state government, where we had absolutely no advancement, and that mentality to do nothing. Point of order, Councillor Ross.

Relevance, please, ma'am.

You're talking about transport projects now. I'm talking about lack of transport projects under the former state government. Continue, Councillor. Complete relevance. To do nothing means that the current Liberal state government has had to play significant catch-up. So in playing that catch-up, no, they haven't got it 100% right. We as Liberal councillors have come out on the record about the corridor project saying that it was not right, and we're happy to say when it's not right. But calling a Royal Commission, please, absolutely ridiculous.

Further discussion?

Councillor Calvert.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I firstly don't speak on behalf of the Labor Party. I want to make that clear to Councillor Connolly, Councillor Zamprogno, sorry. As councillors, I think we have a responsibility to secure the best outcomes for our citizens, and I think that's what Councillor Ross is trying to do with this notice of motion. Perhaps a Royal Commission might be the wrong way to go. That seems to be what some councillors believe. But what he's doing is raising the issue. The issue is lack of transport infrastructure, especially in the Hawkesbury. Now surely all councillors would want to see that improve. We'd want some kind of planning to include the Hawkesbury. We've been neglected for so long .

And when you look at some of the things that are happening lately in the Hawkesbury, they seem to be piecemeal things that someone in the local member's office suddenly thought of. They got a map out of the drawer and said, 'Let's put a line here.' And that's the depth of the planning that's taking place, and that's very disappointing. We do need much better planning. I would have liked to have this motion include more emphasis on public transport. I think that's—it's implied in there, but it should be spelt out. And it always intrigues me that in the 1860s, the government managed to, of the day, the Colony of New South Wales managed to build an integrated rail network that went right across the state, out to Dubbo and Broken Hill and wherever else you go.

Yet we can't seem to build any new railway lines these days, and if we do, they don't match up with the existing railway lines. There's no linkage, or they take you to Chatswood where you've got to stand on the station and wait for a crowded train to come in. That to me is not very good planning. What we had back in the 1860s was public transport paid for by the public purse. The government did that in those days, and now we still have a system that operates very well, thank you. That's, you know, how many years is that? The emphasis in this current government, however, is upon private investment. They think the private companies are going to solve our transport problems. They say to these private companies, Well, you give us a map and tell us what you want to do, and we'll go ahead, and then you can have the tolls for the next 30 years, and also we'll pay for half of it for you, or even three-quarters of it for you.

That's the depth of the transport planning that's going on at the moment. So I actually agree with Councillor Ross that this issue needs to be raised so we have better outcomes for the people of Hawkesbury. As I said, maybe a Royal Commission's not the way, but you can't deny that the issue is there and the issue needs to be addressed.

Thank you, Councillor Calvert. Councillor Wheeler. Thanks, Madam Mayor.

So clearly, despite the allegations, this isn't quite a political minority, is it? There are organisations on this list from throughout Sydney.

I think it's interesting to note who some of them are.

Anti-WestConnex Group, Blaqc, Corb, Richmond Residents and Ratepayers, Cogra — not Hawkesbury, Cogra. Why are these people so up in arms? Let's look at some of the recent decisions. We've got the Outer Sydney Orbital now ending at Richmond.

This isn't a solution. This is a major orbital and freight line that now ends on a floodplain, on a two-lane road that's already in gridlock. How is that decision supposed to make the people of Oakville and Vineyard feel better? They've been told by the local member's office that he doesn't want the road to go any further, and they're going to wait and see what happens in the Central Coast. Well, it's pretty obvious what's going to happen when they suss out the Central Coast. One of two things is going to happen. It's either going to be too difficult to ram a road through bushland and escarpment, and the whole thing will be dumped. After huge negative impacts on the people affected by the existing corridor, and all those properties where they're now living in the shadow of a corridor that may or may not happen, or they'll ram the corridor through over the top of vineyard and oakville.

The people who are living in what was Vineyard Stage 2 are now being told that there isn't enough information for developers to engage with them, so they're now on hold again after thinking that their lives were sorted, that they could make a decision, enter an agreement and move on. So we have two sectors of our community in limbo. We've got the BloCHAG group who clearly think that the treatment that their residents were subject to does warrant further investigation, even if they are safe. So instead of behaving like the bunch of nimbies that they were accused to be, they're actually saying things like,

The current system fails to deliver technically competent infrastructure design. They're calling for an investigation into the just acquisition process.

So they're not saying, Well, look, we're safe, doesn't matter about the rest of you. They're saying that something is rotten in this process. We've got the WestConnex and tolls group. Now there was an excellent discussion on 702 this morning about the impact of tolls on Western Sydney residents in particular. We've got businesses ringing in saying that they're paying $6,000 a month in tolls. We were driven to the airport a couple of months ago by a local business who runs a shuttle service. He is closing his business because he cannot handle the impact of the tolls on his business. It's not viable. We've got a state government foregoing registration revenue to compensate, while private toll operators pocket the tolls that residents are now paying.

This is madness. We've heard from Ms McInnes that the transport allocation is three times the health allocation and nine times the education allocation. These are staggering figures, particularly when you consider the health concerns of the residents of the Inner West due to the WestConnex exhaust stacks. They're probably thinking that maybe they need a bit more put into the health budget to compensate for what's about to come up the chimney just beside their house or just beside their kids' school.

If you look at the comments from the New South Wales Heritage Network, they say the community deserves an active role. The sheer mass and scale of the transformations currently underway are perhaps the most important heritage issue to be confronted across the state. We hope this will encourage a process of participatory decision-making, which all levels of government play the roles of facilitator and community collaborators, rather than exclusive decision makers. Rather than exclusive decision makers. Now, this is a government that came to power using the line that it would hand planning powers back to communities. Nothing could be further from the truth.

What we've got here, this call for a Royal Commission, marks an unprecedented loss of faith in a government. Not for an Upper House inquiry, not even for a trip to ICAC, but for a much higher authority to shine a light on the high-handed, pro-development, ideologically driven transport problems now inflicted on Sydney: Epping, Beecroft, Liverpool via Regents Park, New South Wales Heritage, Healthy Transport for Beautiful Cities, Cyclists Against WestConnex. And the Hawkesbury. This is not an isolated minority. This is a community saying we have had enough and we want a way forward that involves us, not just the state government and its cronies at Transport for New South Wales.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. Further discussion?

I might just briefly address a couple of points. I just reiterate what Councillor Wheeler said. This is a motion to get council support in supporting a call for a royal commission. It's not a call from the Hawkesbury for a royal commission. It's a combination with a whole group of various groups across the Greater Sydney region who are calling, who have raised their concerns about various aspects of planning and the operation of those various bodies. I think there is a growing dissatisfaction, and it's been raised at a number of forums that I've been in regarding the manner in which the transport projects and decisions are being rolled out. And I think that we should all, I mean, if councillors are worried about council funds, we should all be worried about the public expenditure of our taxpayer funds and how that's going.

And it's particularly concerning of the figures that Ms McManus did raise regarding education and health receiving much less. We must remember there's a huge city being built on our doorstep, and yet we don't have the certainty about the infrastructure that is being delivered out here, and we have changing announcements. We don't get the certainty that is so called for within this chamber all the time. And so this is really an area that needs quite a bit of investigation, and a royal commission may well bring out the issues that have occurred over the last few years in regard to that. I'd just like to address something that comes up periodically, both in here and online, and that is the definition of what an independent councillor is, because independent does not necessarily mean impartial.

And there seems to not be a distinction between those two things, in that some people think that an independent councillor is not entitled to have an opinion. This is entirely untrue. Being an independent means you're not a member of a political party. It doesn't mean that you have to sit on the fence about every single issue that comes up and not have an opinion. Obviously, everyone who is elected is representing people who bring the issues to us for us to bring forward in here is one aspect of it. And of course, people have an opinion on what is going on in the area. It would be quite absurd to think that anyone who is an independent has no right to contribute or to bring up whatever issues they would like to bring up.

I think that needs to be corrected and should not be continuously referred to because it's a misrepresentation. Just a point of

Misrepresentation when you finish, Madam Mayor. Okay

Sure. I'm speaking regarding me, by the way, with that, Councillor Connolly. The other thing is that saying that we don't want to work in good faith with the government, I think that is not true. In many aspects, we have gone out, particularly with our work with the Greater Sydney Commission. We've been supported with the city deals. We're working with the federal and state governments and really working to try and deliver what is best for our community, and that's always what's at the forefront, I would hope, of all councillors' actions, but certainly at the front of mine. So we do work in good faith. I've put forward a number of things to the local member that I think would enhance this area very much, which have not been addressed, but I hope will be at some point, particularly with regard to just things such as the dumping problem and things like that.

So I think it's very unfair, just because on this very highly contentious issue, which will always be contentious and will always have this council divided, I think it's unfair for you to conclude that that means not working in good faith with the government, because that isn't true. So I'll finish there, and Councillor Connolly, raise your point of misrepresentation.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. It seemed to be—I just wanted to clarify, Madam Mayor, that in my comments that you addressed regarding the independence of independent councillors, I wasn't suggesting that you weren't to have an opinion on an item. I don't think I said anything like that. My point was that the independents in this chamber are in fact party political, vote as a block, and might as well be in a political party.

Councillor Connolly, that simply is not true.

That's his opinion. Excuse

Me. Yes, it is. It's an opinion. It's not a misrepresentation. It's an opinion. Thank you. One moment, Councillor Ross. Well, I'm sorry if you clarified what you meant then .

Excuse me, Mayor.

Councillor Ross.

Would it not be correct to call that a non sequitur

One moment, Councillor Ross. I'll just call for further discussion to give your right of reply. Any further discussion? Right of reply, Councillor Ross.

Thank you, Mayor. Rather surprising, the last councillor who spoke, cooperation with the state government. I would like to see the state government cooperate with the local government. That might be a new change, a new twist on cooperation. This money that has been spent in regard to another crossing of the river, in regard to the Bells Line of Road upgrades, has all come as a result of representations made other than by the current government. But they're quite happy to stick their nameplate onto the expenditure as if it had come out of the state treasury, and it hadn't. And then we have the wonderful budgetary announcement. Oh, seven million dollars. We're going to plan a new crossing of the river.

Hello. Where is Hawkesbury City Council involved? Hello. We have to run along like little Johnny and say, Please, sir, what have you got in mind? Ah, no consultation there, my friend. And then, in all probability, based upon where they stuck a wretched 23 metre high sign in the middle of March Street in Richmond adjacent to the park and historic area, the railway corridor, they now want to funnel all of the traffic right through there. We'll take out the parking, we'll probably take out all of the vegetation. Wonderful. So, the council's left with holding the baby . Yes. Well , what do we do about the parking that's lost for the business folk and the residents? Oh, too bad about that. Sorry, we're the state government.

We don't need to consult about anything. We've got the power. My goodness, if you don't need a royal commission under these circumstances and under the circumstances that have prevailed in the WBRP, Windsor Bridge Replacement Program Option 1, my goodness, you are very ill-informed, very poorly informed, and it behoves you to become better informed. And we can then just talk about transportation vis-à-vis the Hawkesbury. What about the rail network? We've needed a duplication from Schofields through to Richmond forever. And what happens? Oh, well, we've had about three or four different lots of communication about what we're going to do with Riverston and Garfield Road, and we're going to put something great— not, not a viaduct or an earthen embankment crossing over across the jolly railway line, when what ought to be happening is, instead of busting a town in two, we ought to be thinking about elevating the railway line.

Oh, but that's too expensive. Too expensive. Couldn't possibly do that.

Blind Freddy can tell you the most efficient utilisation of government resources in that case is to elevate the railway line so that it's not up and down hills. We can elevate the station quite satisfactorily. Point of order,

Madam Mayor .

Don't believe you're allowed to introduce new information to us.

Point

Of order, Councillor Ross, one moment. Point of order, Councillor— I think Councillor Ross is introducing very new information. Oh, I'm sorry. And mindful of the time, Councillor Ross. Thank you. Okay, thank you.

Look, there is sufficient failure within the planning and execution of transport within this state to warrant a very long Royal Commission, which hopefully would be as

Definite in its findings as one might have expected, as we've seen with a recently produced Royal Commission. Commenced by the federal government. And believe me, the current Royal Commission, as mentioned by another party here , also is turning up things that were totally unexpected. And there's going to be a lot of shock and horror when we get the Royal Commission. There'll have to be one. This is just an absolute debacle and a total waste of billions, billions of public money, which is your money and my money and the taxes we pay. And for what? For what? Please support the motion.

Thank you, Councillor Ross. I'll put Councillor Ross's notice of motion. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried.

We'll move on to our next item, which is the Mayoral minute. Excuse me, I'm leaving. I feel very—

Councillor Conolly, but Councillor Richards, can you please read onto the tape your conflict because it was in the block section.

My conflict relates to item number 180, the lease on the Girl Guides. It was less than significant non-pecuniary, as I reside close by and it has no financial bearing on me. Thank you. Our next item

Excuse me, Mayor.

Yes, Councillor Ross.

I believe there was a typographical error in that matter regarding the

Girl Guides .

Can you bring—it isn't up for discussion, so if you could just let somebody know. Thank you. Okay. Okay, all right. Well, we'll get that. Thank you. Can we just have a mover? You move that and seconded, Councillor Rasmussen, that that will be altered for the block. We've already done that. Sorry, we'll do it again. It was Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Conolly. Thank you. All those in favour?

Our next items.

Item 174, the Koala Fest Kurrajong.

Moved, Councillor Wheeler. Seconded, Councillor Garrow. Discussion?

Just very briefly, Madam Mayor, I think this is a lovely event. It's a shame that we can't fund it in full. It's really— this

Is really significant. Sorry, Councillor Wheeler, sorry. Sorry. Just off. I had to read, and I think you have one too.

You read first.

Sorry, Madam Mayor. I have a less than significant non-pecuniary interest. I'm a member of the Hawkesbury Environment Network, the organising group, but I have no involvement in the organisation of the event and will make no profit

From it. And I also have a less than significant non-pecuniary interest. I'm formerly a member of the Hawkesbury Environment Network, but reason for no further action is that I'm no longer involved in the network or any of their operations.

So continue, Councillor, thank you. Thanks,

Madam Mayor. I just wanted to point out the significance of this koala population for those that are unaware of it. This is the only population of koalas in New South Wales that's increasing in its spread and size. And given that this species is listed as endangered, and given that other populations are now considered to be critically endangered, this is very good news for this population. But it's also really good news for our town centres, for growing environmental awareness, for increasing activity in the area, and for enlivening our communities. And that's, I think, what this event seeks to do. So I want to commend HEN and the local community and the Kurrajong Forum for their dedication in putting on events like this that seek to both involve and inform the community.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. I agree. I'd just like to add that some residents had contacted us, and Mr Organ is kindly looking into having some koala crossing signs put in areas where there's been a lot of sightings of koalas, up in the Kurrajong Hills area in particular. So thank you for doing that. And I think it'll be a great event when it goes ahead. Goes ahead. Wonderful. Further discussion? No discussion. Right of reply, Councillor Wheeler? Not necessary. I'll put the vote. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. Next item, 175.

Local Government Conference. Moved Councillor Rasmussen seconded Councillor Reynolds.

Discussion?

No discussion. Do we want to vote and then call for nominations? I've got a discussion. Oh, sorry, Councillor Wheeler

Discussion. Just on motion one, suggested motion one that I now can't find because I'm not on the right page. It's page 32. That doesn't really help me because I'm looking at the electronic document. Anyway, it says in there to engage with communities .

Could we add or engage with councils? So community and councils.

Improve community and council engagement? That's perfect. Page 36 in the electronic document

Thank you.

Is the seconder happy with that, Councillor Garrow?

Thank you. Further discussion, Councillor Wheeler.

Following on from the Bells Line of Road and the OSO situation, I think one of the things that was identified was that Council was unaware of what was going to happen with the corridor development, and that left us in a really unpleasant position for both engaging and explaining matters to the community, but also in terms of how we actually looked to the community as major stakeholders in this. Council was effectively sidelined, and I think we need to point out that that isn't an appropriate treatment of an elected body.

Thank you. Further discussion? No further discussion. Right of reply, Councillor Wheeler. Not necessary. Not necessary. We'll vote, then I'll call for nominations. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. Who would like to nominate to go to Albury? Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Richards, Councillor Calvert. I'll go also. That's four. Anyone else? Where's Councillor Ross? Did he want to go? No, he can add on if he wants to go. So someone move that those four councillors, Councillor Rasmussen, seconder Councillor Reynolds, move that Councillors Wheeler, Calvert, Richards and Lyons-Buckett attend the Local Government Conference. All those in favour?

Next item is item 17.

6. The planning summit moved, Councillor Rasmussen, seconded Councillor Richards. Discussion on that?

No discussion. I'll write a reply, Councillor Rasmussen. Certainly, Madam Mayor. I'll move the motion. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. Anyone nominate to go to the planning—what's it called?—Planning Summit . Councillor Richards, Councillor Rasmussen, and Councillor Wheeler, and Councillor Tree. So that's four.

I'm not sure if I'll go. I might go to that too. Yeah. All right, that's five. I'll go to that too. So that's—someone move that Councillor Rasmussen move, seconded Councillor Richards, that Councillor Richards, Councillor Tree, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Rasmussen, and myself will attend the planning summit.

Item 177.

The amendments to the SEP

Moved, Councillor Rasmussen, seconded

Seconded Councillor Reynolds. Discussion on this? Yep.

Councillor Connelly. Sorry when do we have to make our comments, if we want to make comments?

Where or when? When, now I think.

Is there a due date though?

Well, I think it's already been submitted. I read, and that these would be comments that went in if there were contrary comments to what had been sent in as the submission,

Or additional comments. I'd just like to point out that I did briefly speak to the General Manager about this, because I actually thought that this would have been a good thing to have a briefing on . However, apparently it was a very tight timeframe and it just wasn't able to be brought to a briefing. But I would imagine that other similar issues like this should be the subject of a briefing. I would have liked a briefing on

This. I would, Madam Mayor, I'd be inclined not to support the motion then. I would just be inclined to move an amendment that we note the comments that have been made. If the staff have already made these comments, they've deemed it wasn't necessary for us to be consulted on them or for us to be included in that, then that's fine. But I don't see why we then need to endorse those comments. We can just note them.

I don't think we were excluded as such. I think it was more a time issue.

Sorry, I don't mean—so I shouldn't say excluded, I mean if it wasn't deemed necessary to have Council's approval, then I don't think it's necessary now. So I would rather than be put in the position of having to endorse other people's comments, I just—

Okay. Mr Conroy.

We will probably get some further comments back on these. Like, there were 48 amendments and we were given a very short amount of time to respond. But one of them in particular relating to fences in environmental zones, that's a real issue. And so I think we'll get some feedback on those and we will bring them back to the councillors.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. Thanks, Madam Mayor. Could I just get some clarification on, I don't really understand the

Comments about environmentally sensitive areas and the fact that it seems like a hodgepodge to me and I don't really know what it means. And I'm hoping someone can explain it. I can't work out whether we're reducing or increasing protections across the board or just in bits or not at all. I don't understand. Mr

Kearns.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Our points we're making in our submission is that we feel that the amendments need to be more specific so there is more certainty. By having that broad definition, we feel that there is too much uncertainty in terms of what is exempt and complying development. So that's, given that environmentally sensitive land is defined separately in so many different pieces of legislation in the Hawkesbury LEP, in various other SEPPs and so forth, so I guess we've called for that more specific definition.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. Further discussion?

That wasn't amendment, Madam Mayor. Sorry? I did want to move an amendment.

Oh, you moved an amendment. Did you have a seconder?

Councillor Zamprogno. Oh, Councillor Kotlash. Thank you. Yes

It was just the amendment was that we note the officer's comments

No

I just questioned if it was essential to have endorsement for any regulation or anything. No, it isn't. So, yeah .

So really it's just what the motion was, but you've just changed endorse to note. Yes. Yeah . Okay.

Oh, you've just changed Councillor Rasmussen's, or did you want to change? Oh, you moved an amendment

Okay .

So we've got a motion which is what's in the business paper and an amendment which has changed the word to notes from endorse. Okay

Yeah. Councillor Rasmussen, did you just want to make that alteration, or have you— no? Okay. We'll leave it. All right.

Any further discussion?

Madam Mayor, just quickly, I think it doesn't hurt us to actually endorse the comments by the staff. I think that shows that we've got confidence in their statements and what they've put forward on our behalf. So noting it doesn't have the same effect, as we all know, so I think we should make it quite clear to the staff that we agree with what they've said and we absolutely endorse it.

Thank you, Councillor Rasmussen. Any further discussion?

So just to clarify that this is the amendment which was put forward by Councillor Conolly and seconded by Councillor Kotlash . Right of reply, Councillor Rasmussen.

Madam Mayor, thanks. We'll

Put the amendment. All those in favour of the amendment? Against ? The amendment is lost. We'll put the motion. All those in favour of the motion? Against? The motion is carried.

The motion is carried. Next item is item 183, the Heritage Committee meetings. Councillor Wheeler. Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. I'll move the recommendation in the report with just one minor change to point 3. So where the recommendation states, Council endorse the committee's recommendation in respect of the general business item, Bowman Flag, namely blah blah blah, include and thank Ms Newland for her donation.

Okay

Thank you.

Seconded, Councillor Rasmussen. Discussion? Councillor Wheeler. Not

Necessary.

Not necessary. No discussion.

Right of reply? Not necessary. All those in favour with that slight amendment against, the motion is carried. Next.

Next item, Floodplain Risk Management Committee. Moved Councillor Rasmussen, seconded Councillor Wheeler. I might just ask if we could add an additional point to that, Councillor Rasmussen, if you would, which is to formally invite a representative from the local member's office to come to our next floodplain management meeting. They are invited, but I think we need to write a specific request from the councillors to ask because it's very, very important, and I think that they come to the Traffic Committee and I think that particularly as we've requested from Infrastructure New South Wales to have representatives from the Department of Planning and Water New South Wales to come and address us, that there should be a representative from our local member's office because the flood issues are really important and they're not represented there, and they haven't come to a meeting for years.

So I think it would be very important that we do that. So are you happy with that, Councillor? Great suggestion, Madam Mayor. Yes, good idea. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Rasmussen. Any discussion?

No discussion. Right of reply, Councillor Rasmussen? Necessary, Madam Mayor, thank you. I'll put the motion. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried.

Next one, notice of motion one, read your conflict, Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks,

Madam

Mayor .

I have a pecuniary interest in the matter. My husband is employed in Council's libraries. Thank you, and goodbye.

Councillor Reynolds.

Thank you, Madam Mayor.

You moving? Moved, Councillor Reynolds, seconded, Councillor Rasmussen.

Is that... We're

Still

It's coming. It's all right. We'll let them..

The twine and the plus button.

Okay. I emailed the draft to councillors, and there was a couple of amendments to the draft, previous draft, and there is an extra point added. I think if people, if we can scroll down a little bit. Yeah, it was pointed out to me today that some councils, I think the Hills, Willoughby and Parramatta,

Recognise that there are some commercial activities that take place in their libraries, for example, with teaching and some coaching or tutoring services being done in the libraries themselves, and they formally identify those in their library plan. So there is an extra point seven there that... Sorry, which one is it? Eight. Point eight, of course, the last one. Investigate and report back to Council on the possible provision of fees for the commercial use of Council's libraries, for example, professional tutors. Apart from that, the basis of the motion is to support local government NSW and the New South Wales Public Libraries Association's Renew Our Libraries campaign, which is to lobby the government and the opposition in a bipartisan manner to increase funding for the libraries across New South Wales.

You know, parties of all colours have been reducing the funding of libraries since 1980, and so they both share the blame. Without getting into policies for the next election, because that's not required here, I think that there can be no more worthy cause than supporting public infrastructure such as libraries. They're a hub for our community. They're recognised now, as I mentioned before at the last meeting, they're recognised as being a third place, in that the first place for a lot of people is their home, and their second place is work, and the library is where they can go for some basic time out. And it's a place where people go and everybody's equal, and there's not many places around that that can happen.

You know, it's a place where ideas are exchanged, relationships are built, people have a good time, and, you know, research shows that That our librarians themselves contribute to two particular strengths to advance the community, that is accessibility and trustworthiness. I think that, you know, again, now more than ever, in a world of electronic communication overload, a lot in our community are more mentally and physically isolated than ever before. As I said before, we spend a lot of money to maintain our parks and gardens for the benefit of the community, even though we receive no monetary return on those. And I think we should view libraries as parks and gardens for the minds of our community.

And I hope that this will be nice and quick and easy and we can support it and then join the campaign. I think we all received an email from Local Government New South Wales today with information, and I think it's called a partner pack for council staff. And I think, you know, this is a bit of a no-brainer really. Thanks.

Thank you, Councillor Reynolds. Councillor Rasmussen. Yeah,

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I'm just intrigued . My understanding of libraries—not that I spend an awful lot of time in libraries these days; I used to, way, way back—but the commercial use of our libraries, how does that work? Can someone give me an idea of how that works? Are we leasing out the library, or are we leasing out part of the library, or are we leasing out—

Mr Conroy.

Libraries are places of quiet and solitude. Supposedly

Yeah.

Libraries have changed dramatically. So the most recent example I can give you is the library that's just opened in Camden, and there's one room in that library that's a quiet room. And if you go into that room— You have to be quiet. But everywhere else, there's young children jumping around, writing on walls. They're a community hub now, and they— so some enterprises do operate out of libraries. So the Willoughby Library, for example, is a library that's— it's a very large space, and within that they do have some learning activities that are supported by businesses that come in and operate out there, so business hubs and learning code camps and things like that. So there are some commercial activities that do occur in some libraries.

Councillor Conolly. Thanks

Madam Mayor. Just a question first, Madam Mayor, through you. I wasn't at the briefing, but I did read through the briefing materials that were available, and I wasn't sure, based on that, has there been— has the Hawkesbury Libraries experienced anything like an 18% reduction in our funding this year from the state government?

Mr Misfud.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. The 18% reduction is an 18% reduction in the overall state government budget. So the effect on this council's allocation is not yet known. So until we get that allocation, we won't know how that is affected.

But does that— sorry, Madam Mayor, does that 18% also still include non-recurrent grant funding?

Mr Misfud.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. The 18% reduction is made up of two reductions. One in regard to competitive grants, which are about, I think, about $4 million of the $5 million reduction, and the other $1.2 million reduction is about the general subsidy given to councils on a per capita basis.

Councillor Conolly. Look, Madam Mayor, I won't be supporting this notice of motion on the basis that, and Councillor Reynolds has said it's not about politics, and that's fine, but Council's noting an 18% reduction in library funding when we don't even know if Hawkesbury's libraries are going to have anything like that. Of the 5.2 million, just over 4 million is non-recurrent grant funding. So how you call that a cut, I'm not sure. It's just that that funding, which was provided for a specific reason, is not being provided again. It was not a cut to recurrent funding at the library. It's just that specific capital works that maybe take place in the past are not taking place this year . And I take your point earlier, Madam Mayor, about wanting to work with the state government.

I don't think that coming out and saying we're going to join a campaign against your library funding cuts, when in fact the very bulk of the funding is not being cut, it's just non-recurrent grant funding that's not being renewed, I think that's not showing good faith in wanting to work with the state government. I think if we want to do this legitimately, we would note that there is non-recurrent grant funding, which was always intended to be non-recurrent, not being renewed, and a small reduction in the overall library subsidy this year. That would be more legitimate. And I think if we want to be Hawkesbury Council and work in good faith as Hawkesbury Council with the state government, we might wait and see if our funding actually gets cut, because why would we go and join a campaign against library funding cuts if we don't even know what our funding situation is yet?

To me, that's not working in good faith for state government. It's running a political campaign. And it's all good and well for the Labor candidate to want Hawkesbury Council to do this, but I would ask Hawkesbury councillors to take a view of what is good for Hawkesbury Council, not the Labor candidate for Hawkesbury, if we want to have a good relationship with the state government. In terms of point eight, investigate and report on council the possible provision of fees for the commercial use of council libraries, for example, for professional tutors. I would not be in support of that at all, Madam Mayor. The community pays for the library already. If local kids want to go and get tutored at the library, we shouldn't be putting prices up on tutors so that the cost of tutoring goes up for our local community.

They're already paying for the library through their state taxes and through their local rates. The library, it belongs to the community. We shouldn't be going and making local services like tutoring more expensive for local kids by trying to take a cut of that. I don't think that's right. If you're talking about large-scale commercial activities, which I don't think we have any, maybe that'd be a different thing. But if you're talking about classes or tutoring made available to local kids or local students of any age in our local library that they already pay for, I'm not going to be in support of asking council to come back on with a report on how we can possibly milk some more out of that and take a cut of that for ourselves.

Councillor Connolly. Further , Councillor Calvert.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. This policy on libraries, I find it as a typical Liberal Party policy that both the state and federal governments, Liberal governments, have done over the years. They tend to redirect funding from the community areas such as hospitals, schools and libraries, and redirect that money to their friends who run the private motorway companies. And we've seen the results of that earlier tonight. And then sometime just before an election they'll suddenly announce a 10 percent increase, even though for the two years beforehand there's been a 50 percent decrease, and we're supposed to say thank you for that. And I can see that happening here again. Also over the last couple of years, this state government has sacked 4,000 TAFE teachers during a time when there's a skills shortage, and at the same time they reckon they're creating jobs.

So this library funding, I mean, people can argue about it's only this percentage or that percentage, but you've got to put it into the whole picture of what this government's doing. It's taking money away from us as a council, it's putting on cost shifting every year, and we need to support this because it's just another nail in the coffin, and we really need to stand up every time this happens and say stop doing it because we want the community to receive the funding it's supposed to receive.

Further discussion? Councillor Ross.

Yeah, sure. I'm not inclined towards Councillor Connolly's viewpoint on the grant funding . We received a couple of fairly substantial grants to upgrade the [unclear] Centre with the grants that were achieved, grant monies. The elimination of that, and it appears as if it's, the larger part is being literally removed from the state budget totally. So there's $4 million that... was previously a grant program and has now been abolished.

That inherently has, it might not be apparent this year or the next year, but over the next certainly five years, there are going to be cash implications and expense implications for Council.

If it's not possible to gain grant funding to do some maintenance-type activities and revamping and refurbishment of these places to keep them pleasant and agreeable to their users, it necessarily has to cost the ratepayer again. I'm sorry, I don't agree with that. It's pretty poor when you get the figures released by Mrs. Galea indicated that

Last year, last financial year, Hawkesbury City Council received 8.6% of its operating funding in the way of, if you like, reimbursement from the State Government. In comparison to what is being offered by other State Governments and in comparison to what the arrangements We're going back in former times. This is a case where, by just allowing things to tack along and not allow such things as the CPI increase or some other basis for increase, that the grant effectively becomes diminished and a disappearing factor.

So, again, we're being inflicted with things that the state government just chooses to cost shifting with. And it just puts more stress and strain on our ratepayers. And here we are. We've got our poor folk, and you're aware of it . Some of them are finding the change in rates a little bit oppressive. But in part, it's Macquarie Street calling the tune again. And we're being left to hold the baby and carry the can. No wonder we're talking about sullage. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Ross . Any further discussion? I just think I took this motion to be more about libraries overall as a part of communities, not specific only to our library. So I think that the cut in funding overall is something that can relate to us and has. And I think that it would be good to point out what would happen if we did have these cuts. I think that it's a really important service that we run. And I think that, I'm not sure about the commercial use too, but I think that if it's something that is being used commercially, I don't know, because like Councillor Rasmussen and I do go to the library, but not probably during the day, not in the afternoons, which I expect is when tutors would use it.

If people are using it for a purpose, then that should be fair for everyone, not just a few people, I suppose. So I guess it's good to have a look at what the setup is and what the system would be for if that was something that was being used. Any further discussion? Councillor.

Yeah, Madam Mayor, I just want to follow that point again, if I may, just a quick one. Yeah, I'm not sure about this commercial thing either, whether we've got anybody in the library at the moment Yeah, okay, well, yeah, and that's good that we will tease that out. But whether or not that just reinforces the point that Councillor Ross made, that, you know, the more that the grants are reduced or not CPI'd or whatever, the more we up our commercial use of these sorts of facilities. And I'm not sure that I like that scenario or methodology, because we see it in so many other areas, and I think we should be very cautious about doing just that. You know, that is increasing fees and charges just so we can balance the books for the library, because they then become something else. They become small tutoring houses rather than libraries

Any further discussion? No further discussion. Right of reply, Councillor Reynolds.

Yeah, thanks, Madam Mayor. Just on the comments regarding to point eight, it was just, as it says, to investigate and report back on the possible provision of fees for commercial use of Council's libraries, for example professional tutors. Now, as I said, that came from comments that were made to me today about other libraries in other councils using that. Now, I mean, in some discussions with, for example, in the Enhancing the Arts working group, there has been, you know, the idea has been thrown about that, you know, the Gallery could be used for certain purposes and leased out for whatever. Now, if there are people, for example, who are using the library for tutoring or something, then I think it's quite reasonable to perhaps, you know, talk to them, see if there's something that could be to make their lives easier, better, you know, and if there's a small fee involved, there's a small fee involved.

If they don't want to pay a fee, well then maybe we can work something out. It's not to say that, you know, we're trying to nail someone or whatever, but I think, as Councillor Connolly said, Councillor Connolly's comments that we shouldn't look into it, it's just like, I mean, that's living in ignorance as to what's going on in your facilities. If you want to do that, that's fine. You know, Councillor Connolly says ratepayers are already paying for it. They're paying for it because the state government's cutting funding. I mean, the legislation was 50% each, and now it's dropped down to 92.5% and 7.5%. As regarding, he thinks that this isn't working with the state government and it's because our funding perhaps isn't being cut.

If he rereads point 1 .1c, it says these cuts will have an impact on council libraries . That includes the LGA, it's not ours. This is about supporting local government New South Wales and about New South Wales Public Libraries Association. I understand Councillor Connolly would want to prefer to support the state government rather than fellow councils, other councils in the state. We know when we were going through our discussions in 2016 regarding Fit for the Future and looking where we could make $4 million in cuts, Councillor Connolly said we would get rid of the gallery and the library because nobody uses them. Point

Of order.

I did not say

That, and this is brand new

Information. That is absolutely ridiculous. I never said that. Okay, well that's a misrepresentation, it's not a point of

Order, but anyway. Point of order. That new information is being introduced in right of reply, Madam Mayor

Okay, I withdraw that and I'll change it to, Councillor Connolly used words to that effect. So I think it's, again, you know, the libraries are no longer, as the General Manager said, libraries are no longer just libraries. They're a community hub , and council is about the community. It's not about the New South Wales state government. It's about working for our community and working for our people. For the best outcomes for them. And, you know, we're not going to go in. I mean, yeah, we're going to, you know, the suggestion is to write a letter to Mr Perrottet and to the Shadow Minister as well, you know, in a bipartisan approach. Now, you know , the Liberals over there just bring their state government stuff into it.

I'm the Labor state candidate out there. In here, I'm independent. And your post on Facebook tonight, you know, is quite interesting. I commend you for posting from Facebook from inside the council chambers. It's quite clever, multitasking. So I would suggest that those councillors here who have a social conscience will support this motion. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Reynolds. I'll put Councillor Reynolds' notice of motion. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. Councillor

Wheeler

Yes .

Would it be possible to be considered for the attendance at the Local Government Conference, please?

Yes, I think we can add on. Councillor Ross was absent when that nomination was taken

I'm sure. Yes. Yes. Well,

We could just move

A procedural motion, and we could move that we— someone, Councillor Rasmussen could move that Councillor Ross also be added to the list of people going, seconded by Councillor Reynolds. All those in favour? Aye. Okay, done . Okay. Item 187.

Seven. Councillor Wheeler. Thanks, Madam Mayor.

Do you have a seconder? Seconder, Councillor Ross. Sorry ,

I'll just find my place.

Excuse you.

So we've got increasing numbers of self-funded retirees as the population ages and people move from relying on pensions to relying on superannuation. Unlike the pension, self-funded retirees are quite a mixed bag of wealth levels. Some are very well provided for. Others survive on income levels similar to the pension with very little leeway. So Council can and does defer rates for those who are asset rich and cash poor. And pensioners are granted limited relief to the tune of $250 a year. But low-income self-funded retirees really have the worst of both worlds. They've got limited income, no relief, and often an unwillingness to defer their rates against low-value properties. This problem is only going to get worse across New South Wales, and we need to have some parameters to deal with it.

So Willoughby has one approach. They've reduced costs for their waste service, and their policy requires that, to be eligible for reduced costs self-funded retiree waste service, residents have to meet the following conditions: you have to be the owner of the property, to have lived in the Willoughby Council area for the past 15 years, reside in the property as the sole or principal place of residence, be aged 70 or older, and hold a Commonwealth Seniors Card. So that's one example of a council that is making some provision for self-funded retirees who— who may or may not have high income levels. So I think this is really just calling for Council to investigate, by way of a report, how we may be able to manage this situation as we go forward with a changing population and a changing way that income levels are managed to provide some relief to some communities.

Not every self-funded retiree is cashed up. Not every self-funded retiree has a property that's worth a lot of money. I think we need to face the fact that the pension is now increasingly becoming a safety net for a much smaller part of the population as superannuation kicks in, and we need to make some provision that acknowledges that.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler. Any further discussion?

No discussion. Right of reply. Not necessary. I'll put the motion. All those in favour? Against? The motion is carried. We are now up to questions from the meeting of the 8th of May. Questions on questions. One question there, or questions on questions from the 10th of July. Any questions on questions? Councillor Zamprogno.

It's just a brief one to the General Manager. Mr Conroy, you and I had a discussion last week about getting a more comprehensive report on the action items that were compiled on our bus tour of Pitt Town last year. I'm just seeking to clarify that this response— In the questions without notice, isn't the fullest response that we're going to be getting, and that there will be something more comprehensive.

That's correct. This is just something to fit into the column, but there will be a document that goes to that meeting with those residents in September. Excellent,

Thank you.

Any further questions on questions? No. Questions for next meeting. Councillor Ross. Councillor Rasmussen. Councillor Garrow. Councillor Reynolds. Yes

One question. Could we be told how many rate payers have applied for relief under the hardship provision, please?

Councillor Wheeler. Thanks, Madam Mayor. Councillors in some areas of Windsor have received a letter asking—oh, sorry, informing them that— I'm not hunting for it and not finding it—a letter informing them that either Georgio will be looking at roads, at certain roads and areas around Windsor, including the area that bounds Windsor Mall and the mall itself, I think. I presume this is for a dilapidation report in the lead-up to the project. Is Council aware of this and have we been consulted?

Thank you. Councillor Calvert. Councillor Kotlash. Councillor Zamprogno. Yes,

Thank you, Madam Mayor. A gentle one to start with. Can Council provide some advice about when Bindi spraying will take place in the parks at Pitt Town, specifically Pitt Town Memorial Park and Bonavista Park? I'm informed that they were not sprayed last year and that rendered the amenity severely degraded. The next pair of questions verge on a request for information that might be better put in a notice of motion. So I'll just seek guidance from the general manager as to whether this can be answered in this forum. There were Section 94 contributions have been collected on properties at Pitt Town for various infrastructure, and at a meeting back in May of this year it was stated that there was $7 million in that fund. Are those funds now available for allocation to the projects

That they will be designated for? And where is Council up to on the schedule of works that will be funded by those Section 94 contributions?

Is that a notice of motion type question, or is that something to which an answer can be meaningfully given in

This forum? Madam Mayor, I'd suggest that we could put that on a councillor briefing. It is a very complex issue. It's to do with cash flow. It's to do with critical infrastructure versus discretionary infrastructure, and it also involves the rights of the developer to do things as and when they want to do certain things. So I'd rather walk councillors through that in an interactive session at a briefing. But I've got the sense of what you want to talk about.

I think the sense that I want to honour from the Pitt Town community is that there's a belief that there is money in the bank that has been accumulated for certain infrastructure projects, and therefore why hasn't it been spent? Yes, thank you.

And it could well be that when we complete that— Councillor briefing. We've got some information that's relevant to circulate into the community.

Councillor Conolly. Councillor Richards.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. There's been some confusion in the community, especially online. I've also had multiple residents contact me about the insurance going up with flooding portions of their premium. I think we need some clarification because there's parts of the community saying that council is now relying on the PMF levels, and we need to make it clear whether that is the case or not, rather than the one in 100. We also need to be able to answer to the community, maybe talking to the insurance sector, is it an issue of them bundling their different products in terms of flooding and stormwater rather than being separate add-ons? Are they bundling their things? So there's a lot of ambiguity.

Blame on council. I think we need to clear up what's actually happening there. So if we can get some information, that would be great. My second question is perhaps something I've decided I'm going to ask the general manager privately. Thank you.

Councillor Wheeler. Thanks, Madam Mayor. So I think I may have said that council—I just want to clarify—I may have said that council had received letters. It's the residents who've received letters, and I found the map. I can forward it if necessary. It's the Wilberforce Road end of Freeman's Reach Road, the Terrace, Baker Street, George Street, including both the mall and the area past Thompson Square and into what we refer to as the peninsula, Arndell Street and most of Court Street.

Thank you. Have someone move us into confidential move. Councillor Rasmussen, seconded Councillor Garrow. All those in favour

Thank you, Mr Mifsud.

In regard to item 191, whilst in closed session, Council resolved on the motion of Councillor Rasmussen, seconded by Councillor Reynolds, that one, Council agree to enter into a new lease with Weasley Community Services Limited in regard to Suite 2, De Robbin Centre, level 1, 300 George Street, Windsor, and five car parking spaces beneath the De Robbin Centre in accordance with the proposal outlined in the report. Two, authority be given for the lease, and any other relevant documentation associated with this matter, to be executed under the seal of Council. Three, details of Council resolution can be made to the proposed lessee together with the advice that Council is not and will not be bound by the terms of its resolution until such time as the appropriate legal documentation puts such resolution into effect has been agreed to and executed by all parties.

Thank you, Mr Mifsud. Meeting is closed at 10.50. Thank you, everyone.