Community councils raise concerns about the removal of pre-DA consultation on future Canberra developments in new planning act

The draft planning bill was released on Wednesday, following 18 months of engagement with various community groups.

Among a raft of changes to the development application process, pre-development application consultation will be removed, with the planning authority stating it is not working as planned in its current state.

Currently, developers are required to engage with the community prior to submitting an application for certain projects, such as residential developments with three or more storeys and 15 or more dwellings.

Peter Elford, president of the Gungahlin Community Council, said there was "no question the planning system needed a big shake-up", however the removal of early consultation was concerning.

"I think it's widely acknowledged that Canberra's planning system is failing in many areas ... bad developments are getting approved, the system doesn't seem to be upholding the key principles that I think most Canberra residents have around quality and preservation of green space," he said.

He said while some developers treat the consultation as a "tick box", the Gungahlin community has had some positive experiences with the process.

"One of the key aspects of good engagement with the community is [acting] early," he said.

"Because developers are required to do pre-DA consultation, some of them will get in touch early and we provide feedback and we can actually see that feedback having some impact. So we see it as something that's quite important."

Belconnen Community Council chair Glen Hyde said early consultation had been an effective process for the community in the past.

"I have grave concerns that if we take pre-DA out of the process that we will lose the ability to be able to focus on the real community expectation. It's not in the actual consultation that these issues arise, it's in the pre-DA [stage]," he said.

"If you're genuinely engaged and seeking to get as many of the issues to the surface and identified, that's where it happens."

Affordable housing advocacy group Greater Canberra welcomed the removal of the consultation period, saying it would streamline the process.

"We believe consultation is really important but we also believe that consultation should not be duplicated and that having a single, centrally run - rather than developer-run - consultation process works better," Greater Canberra convener Howard Maclean said.

The group said they would engage with the government to ensure housing supply and affordability were seen as a core goal of the new planning system, not a secondary consideration.

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The draft bill is open for public comment until June 15, 2022, before a planning bill is presented to the ACT Legislative Assembly.

Overall, the community groups welcomed the long-awaited release of new planning act but said the next three months would be critical to ensure it has a positive outcome for Canberrans.

"We've been waiting for a good long while for a review of this type and whilst I'm enthused that we're starting to make progress in the right direction there are still a lot of gaps that I hope over the next few months we will have an opportunity to contribute to," Mr Hyde said.

Mr Elford said the council has a "tough three months ahead" to interpret the bill and get the "outcomes we want".

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