Greens should demand facts

Greens should demand factsThe Property Council of Australia says the Newcastle Inner City Residents Alliance (NICRA) has misrepresented the proposed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between UrbanGrowth NSW and Newcastle Council for planning and delivering a world-class regional capital city.Hunter Chairman, Edward Crawford, said NICRA were running a dishonest scare campaign by claiming the MOU is a legally binding document that would give Council’s General Manager over-riding authority on major planning decisions.”Any MOU does carry a degree of seriousness and mutual respect, but Clause 10.2 explicitly states the MOU is not legally binding.””And it certainly has no power to grant the General Manager new planning controls.””Both of NICRA’s claims are blatantly untrue.”Mr. Crawford said the MOU was an effective way to establish an official partnership between NSW Government agencies and the City of Newcastle on growing jobs and transforming the urban landscape.”Certain decisions have been taken by the NSW Government in relation to reconnecting the city to the waterfront, delivering light rail infrastructure and providing substantial improvements to public amenity.””The MOU provides a framework for implementing those decisions and is a sensible way of detailing each parties requirements and responsibilities””And it restates, very clearly, that UrbanGrowth NSW and the City of Newcastle will need to work together over the life of the State Government’s program.””UrbanGrowth NSW has entered into this style of MOU with Local Governments across Sydney to successfully facilitate complex, large-scale urban transformation projects.””They are not new and contain nothing that Councillors or residents should find suspicious””Greens MP David Shoebridge and Greens Councillor Therese Doyle stood with NICRA members last week calling for greater transparency from UrbanGrowth NSW””The Greens should now be calling for NICRA to deal in facts”Media contact: Edward Crawford| M 0431 365 780 | E [email protected]