Page 395 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 12 February 2013
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The government will also be amending various pieces of construction and planning legislation to implement short and medium-term reforms to the construction regulatory framework. This includes streamlining and increasing the flexibility of statutory processes in relation to territory plan variations, estate development plans and within future urban areas.
The proposed Construction Amendment Bill will amend various pieces of construction legislation to begin to implement reforms within the construction regulatory framework. These amendments are the result of the current review of the Building Act and proposed by the government’s report to the Legislative Assembly in September 2010 on building quality in the ACT.
A full policy review of the Building Act is being undertaken which will result in a number of reform proposals to be implemented over the next few years. This is the first of a series of bills which concentrates on the proposals that have been finalised and agreed as part of ongoing consultation and development of the project.
The bill will also amend a number of pieces of legislation to improve the operability of regulation for the industry. Proposed amendments address issues with the interaction of consumer installations with the utility networks, improvement of the plumbing certification system, establishing new gas appliance approval processes and bringing the licensing of gas appliance workers under the Constructions Occupations (Licensing) Act. These amendments are the result of ongoing policy work, recent findings of the ACAT and national and ACT reforms affecting the building process and government programs to encourage alternative technologies.
The broad intent of the Planning and Development (Territory Plan Variations) Amendment Bill 2013 is to increase flexibility and streamline statutory processes in relation to territory plan variations, estate development plans and within future urban areas—greenfield development—consistent with community and stakeholder expectation. The bill proposes to increase the powers of the Legislative Assembly in relation to territory plan variations and provide an opportunity to reduce the time frames for draft variations by more than six months, as determined by the Legislative Assembly. It also proposes amendments to streamline and consolidate the various planning processes while retaining provision for community and stakeholder consultation.
Another proposal is to introduce a more direct mechanism to introduce site-specific provisions into precinct codes. Of key concern is the need to ensure bushfire attack levels are identified on all relevant blocks in the ACT for building and construction purposes in a timely manner. There are also a range of minor amendments intended to clarify provisions of the act, including making a distinction between public consultation time frames for territory plan variations and technical amendments by increasing the overall time frames for territory plan variations.
The government will continue to build on our strong record in the area of environment and sustainability and are proposing various pieces of legislation covering conservation of the natural environment and of heritage places as well as amendments
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