AN implemented ACT Greens’ plan will see building and development in Canberra slow to a crawl, with new houses becoming further out of reach for families, warn the Housing Industry Association (HIA). 

“Through their policy platform, the ACT Greens have effectively turned their back on affordability for Canberra families, instead focusing on an ideological environmental and anti-building agenda,” said HIA ACT executive director Greg Weller.

“It is just not plausible to say that in the future there will be smaller new suburbs, and that homes will have higher environmental standards, more restrictive building and planning laws, slower approval times, greater heritage protection and more green space – yet somehow be cheaper.

“When the Greens talk about delivering a ‘community development compact’ or protecting heritage, these are all simply code for making it easier for anti-development groups to stop new homes.

“The policy suggests that they would make it slower to get approval for homes in existing suburbs by restricting the DA Exempt pathway for homes. The suburb was planned, approved and developed for housing – the idea that you should then need another approval to build a house in it is nonsensical.

“It is again disappointing that any party with a voice in Canberra would talk down the building industry at a time when we need to be creating jobs. The claim that too many Canberrans buy a home with ‘serious faults’ is just not backed up by facts.

“The Canberra community deserves to have appropriate and affordable housing, as well as a sustainable future but these polices can’t deliver both.”

Mr Weller’s comments come after the ACT Greens’ most recent election commitment to deliver three  world-leading, climate “showcase” developments across the city in the next four years.

As part of this pledge, the Greens want to ensure that the ACT’s land release program includes at least one “showcase” development, per year, that pilots a big step forward on development quality.

“Showcase” developments, according to the party, will features green “living” walls and roofs, to keep temperatures down, and will run on 100 per cent renewable electricity.

ACT Greens leader Shane Rattenbury says: “For too long, many Canberrans have lived in homes that are expensive to heat and freezing in winter, and boiling hot in summer.”

“We need to raise the standard on the homes and buildings that a city like ours deserves – and world-leading ‘showcase’ developments will do exactly that,” he says.