Planning department secretary Kiersten Fishburn,whose top priority is the state’s goal of building 377,000 new homes over the next five years,cited data showing 41 per cent of elected councillors in NSW are 60 or older,while 53 per cent are 30 to 59,and just 4.2 per cent are 18 to 29.
“You have a really disproportionate number of decisions being made at a local level that don’t have the representative voice of young people there,” Fishburn told Monday’s Sydney Summit,hosted by the Committee for Sydney think tank and supported by theHerald.
The low representation of 18- to 29-year-olds was a particular problem as they were “literally the people who are really priced out of the rental market”,she said,noting 85 per cent of development applications were still determined at a council level.
In a statement,Local Government NSW president Darriea Turley,a councillor on Broken Hill City Council,said the housing and homelessness crisis would only be solved by “the co-operation of all three spheres of government,rather than finger pointing”.
“Councils across the state are working hard in very trying circumstances to determine development applications and to carry out strategic planning in an environment where the government has hamstrung the industry with a defective yet compulsory planning portal,and feels free to change the strategic planning settings across the state on a whim without really attacking the heart of the problem,which is delivery supported by appropriate infrastructure,” Turley said.
NSW Minister for Youth Rose Jackson used the summit to flag the government would soon create a body to advise on policy from a youth perspective,and counter the disproportionate level of older representatives in public decision-making.
She said it was “total rubbish” to assert young people were apathetic about politics or policy,or showed contempt for elders and authority.