Ruling ‘idiotic’

By Casey Neill
The Victorian Civil Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) has “lost the plot”, according to Knox City councillor Karin Orpen.
Cr Orpen said the tribunal’s 27 November decision to grant a planning permit to a Ferntree Gully boarding house was “idiotic and unfair”.
The ruling overturned Knox City Council’s decision to deny private operator Basil De Jong a permit to convert his Craig Avenue home into an 11-room boarding house.
The latest house brings the total number in the Avenue area to five.
Cr Orpen said the decision was “made with disregard to local planning schemes”.
“They’ve made exception for one particular development to the detriment of others,” she said.
“The VCAT decision makes a mockery of state and local planning schemes.”
Cr Orpen said council’s legal advice said the decision was sloppy and appeared to have been prepared with great haste.
She called on the State Government to conduct a review of VCAT.
Knox Council chief executive officer (CEO) Graeme Emonson said council was “very disappointed” at the weight given to key issues at the hearing.
“There were matters that were overlooked, that VCAT was silent on and we’re obviously very disappointed that the council’s determination to refuse this permit has now been overturned by VCAT and we’re disappointed at the grounds on which that’s been overturned.”
Mr Emonson said legal advice was that council would be unsuccessful in an appeal of the decision. He said council was supportive of social housing.
“So this is not about the issue of social housing it’s about the issue of conducting a business which happens to be a boarding house without reference to planning,” he said.
Mr Emonson said a planning permit is not required to establish a boarding house with 10 rooms or less.
Boarding houses with more than 10 rooms are covered by the state section of the State Planning Scheme, while those with six rooms or less have to be registered under the Health Act.
The Residential Tenancies Act covers those with four or less rooms.
“We’ve got three pieces of legislation that don’t talk to each other,” he said.
Mr Emonson said the State Government needs to fix the state section of the planning scheme and pull together the Residential Tenancies, Health and planning legislation into one common set of regulations.
“Overlayed with that we say there needs to be a statewide management accreditation system that ensures that the occupants of these facilities are receiving a base level, minimum standard of management,” he said.
Knox mayor Jim Penna said council had been talking to ministers about what it sees as loopholes in the state planning scheme.
“If there’s not proper management of those boarding houses then the residents of those boarding houses don’t have any protection,” he said.
Cr Penna said Knox is not the only council that has issues with State legislation on boarding houses.
“Councils are concerned that there isn’t proper management and proper accreditation and therefore the disadvantaged people themselves are going to suffer, as well as the neighbourhood amenity.”
The Mail contacted the State Government but was unable to obtain a comment before going to print.