Urban planners say Australia’s community consultation system is worsening the country’s housing crisis. Economist Peter Tulip says community consultations have a negativity bias, which can result in affordable housing projects being blocked.
Around Australia, state governments are coming up with new planning pathways that make it more difficult for residents to block affordable housing projects. Many of these pathways include removing community consultation from the equation entirely.
In Queensland, for example, community consultation is not required for social or affordable housing projects deemed important enough to be a State Facilitated Development.
Urban planner, Dorina Pojani, said listening to the community was a good idea in theory, but had “completely backfired” in practice due to what she described as human selfishness. The University of Queensland associate professor said in Australia’s community consultation sessions, NIMBYs — residents with the mentality “not in my backyard” — were over-represented.
