Planning Legislation Amendment Act 2026

The direct institutional effect is on the territory planning authority. For a draft major plan amendment prescribed by regulation, new section 63(1A) requires the authority to give a copy of the consultation notice to each person prescribed by regulation. The identity of those recipients, and the amendments that trigger the requirement, cannot be established from the Act alone because the relevant regulations are not set out in the supplied text. The authority’s administration of consultation may therefore involve additional notice preparation and delivery for the prescribed cases, but the Act gives no estimate of the associated workload or cost.

People prescribed as consultation-notice recipients are directly affected by that process: the statutory change provides for them to receive a copy of the notice. The Act does not say that every person affected by a planning proposal must receive an individual copy, nor does it describe the legal effect of receiving a notice. Those matters may be addressed by the principal Act or regulations, which are not reproduced here.

The changes to exempt development rules may affect people proposing step-free access paths to single dwellings, and people assessing whether a structure falls within the swimming-pool definition or whether an encroachment meets the amended shadowing criterion. The exact consequences depend on the surrounding provisions of the regulation, not reproduced in full. The new path provision is tied to compliance with an external design standard that can change over time.

The terminology substitutions in the Recovery of Lands Act 1929 and Surveyors Act 2007 affect readers and administrators applying those provisions. The source does not establish any change to substantive rights or duties from those substitutions. It also does not identify particular owners, applicants, businesses, lessees, surveyors or other individuals as affected in a specific case.

The clearest new duty is in Planning Act 2023, section 63(1A). For a draft major plan amendment prescribed by regulation, the territory planning authority “must give a copy of the consultation notice to each person prescribed by regulation”. The obligation is conditional on both the amendment and the recipients being prescribed. The Act does not state a separate delivery method, deadline, or consequence for non-compliance in the text supplied. Those details may be found in the principal Act or regulations, but they cannot be inferred from this amendment alone.

Section 63(2) is altered so that “subsections (1) and (1A) do not apply” if the authority is satisfied that the stated condition is met. The material supplied does not reproduce the condition after “that”, so its content cannot be assessed here. Mechanically, the amendment expressly extends the exception to the new subsection (1A), as well as subsection (1). The authority’s satisfaction is the stated decision point; the Act excerpt does not specify how that satisfaction is formed or recorded.

For step-free access paths, regulation 1.38 describes designated development where the path complies with the Livable Housing Design Standard, as in force from time to time. It expressly disapplies section 1.17, Criterion 7, for that designated development. The supplied text does not set out the criterion’s content, so it would be unsafe to describe which other exemption it would otherwise require.

The amended shadowing criterion in regulation 1.131(1)(b) concerns an encroachment under paragraph (a)(iii). It requires that the encroachment not cause shadowing for more than three hours to more than 50% of any habitable room or principal private open space of another block, between 9 am and 3 pm on the winter solstice. The provision gives a time period, a duration threshold, an affected-area threshold and specified neighbouring spaces. It does not, in this amendment, define those spaces or set out the full encroachment test.

The supplied Act contains no new offence, penalty amount, infringement notice, civil penalty, enforcement power, review mechanism or appeal right. None of sections 4 to 13 sets out a sanction for failing to give a consultation notice, using the amended swimming-pool definition incorrectly, or failing to meet the step-free-path or shadowing provisions. That is a statement about the text provided, not a conclusion that the underlying laws contain no enforcement provisions. The principal Acts and regulations are not reproduced in full.

The planning consultation amendment creates a mandatory task for the territory planning authority in the specified prescribed circumstances, using the word “must” in section 63(1A). The amendment does not state in the excerpt what happens if that task is not performed. The effect of non-compliance, including any administrative, review or judicial consequences, would require examination of the rest of the Planning Act and any applicable regulations and procedural rules. This source does not provide a basis to predict those consequences.

Likewise, the exempt-development amendments alter classification criteria but do not state penalties for development that does not meet those criteria. The regulation’s title is “Planning (Exempt Development) Regulation 2023”, but the supplied amendment alone does not explain the consequences of a development falling outside an exemption. It would be necessary to read the wider planning scheme and applicable approval and enforcement provisions before describing those consequences.

The amendments to the Recovery of Lands Act 1929 and Surveyors Act 2007 are limited in the text to substituting words in two provisions and a note. The Act gives no new enforcement function or penalty in connection with those changes. A complete enforcement analysis therefore requires the full amended laws, not just this amending Act.

Section 3 identifies the five laws amended: the Planning Act 2023, the Planning (Exempt Development) Regulation 2023, the Planning (General) Regulation 2023, the Recovery of Lands Act 1929 and the Surveyors Act 2007. The Act operates by inserting, substituting or omitting text in those instruments, rather than setting out a consolidated version of them. Its effect must therefore be read alongside the provisions it changes.

The amended Planning Act consultation process interacts with regulations in two ways. First, regulations determine which draft major plan amendments trigger new section 63(1A). Second, regulations determine which people must be given a copy of the consultation notice. The amended heading to section 10 of the Planning (General) Regulation 2023 expressly refers to people receiving a consultation notice and extension notice under Act section 63(1A) and (4)(b). The body of section 10 is not included, so the particular recipients and any extension-notice arrangements are not established by the heading alone.

The step-free access path provision incorporates the Livable Housing Design Standard published by the Australian Building Codes Board “as in force from time to time”. This makes the applicable standard dynamic: the reference is not limited in the amendment to a dated edition. The provision’s note says the standard does not need to be notified under the Legislation Act because Planning Act section 523(4) and Legislation Act section 47(7) apply. The standard is said to be accessible at ncc.abcb.gov.au.

The Act’s preliminary note also refers to Legislation Act section 75(1) for automatic commencement of the naming and commencement provisions on notification day. The substantive provisions commence under section 2 on the seventh day after notification. The source does not discuss conflicts with other laws, transitional rules, or application to matters already underway.

The Act’s endnotes state that the presentation speech was made in the Legislative Assembly on 18 March 2026. The text records that the Legislative Assembly passed the Planning Legislation Amendment Bill 2026 on 6 May 2026, and that it was notified under the Legislation Act on 15 May 2026. The Clerk of the Legislative Assembly certifies the supplied copy as a true copy of the Bill passed by the Assembly. The instrument is headed as the Planning Legislation Amendment Act 2026 and carries the Act number A2026-8.

Section 2 sets commencement at the seventh day after notification. Counting from 15 May 2026, that date is 22 May 2026. The note to section 2 distinguishes the automatic commencement of the naming and commencement provisions on notification day, by reference to Legislation Act section 75(1). Thus, the Act’s administrative commencement provisions and its substantive amendments have different stated commencement timing.

The source records the amendments made by this Act but does not provide a history of earlier amendments to the five underlying instruments. It does not include an explanatory statement, a second-reading speech transcript, committee report, consultation record, or a comparison table showing prior wording beyond the selected text expressly amended. The presentation speech is mentioned, but its contents are not reproduced. Accordingly, no policy rationale or prior amendment sequence can be attributed from this source.

The Act’s changes can be grouped by mechanism: a terminology correction in Planning Act section 61; a new conditional notice duty and corresponding adjustment to an exception in section 63; three changes to the exempt-development regulation; a revised heading in the general regulation; two gendered-word substitutions in the Recovery of Lands Act; and a correction to an office-holder reference in the Surveyors Act note.

The supplied legislation contains no case names, court decisions, tribunal decisions, reported disputes, or references to litigation. It therefore provides no source-grounded basis for describing how a court or tribunal has interpreted these amendments, whether any provision has been challenged, or how a dispute under the amended provisions has been resolved. The endnotes identify a presentation speech, passage date, notification date and republication website, but do not identify litigation.

That absence should be read narrowly. The text provided is an amending Act, not a litigation database or a complete set of decisions. It does not establish that there has been no litigation concerning the Planning Act 2023, the two planning regulations, the Recovery of Lands Act 1929 or the Surveyors Act 2007. It also does not show whether litigation existed under earlier versions of the amended provisions or whether any proceeding was underway when the amendments commenced.

For legal research, the distinctions would matter: a proceeding could concern the principal Act rather than a provision changed here; a decision might address the meaning of “designated development”, the consultation process, or an underlying concept without mentioning this amending Act; and a dispute could be unreported. None of those possibilities is evidence that such a case exists. The source only supports the narrower conclusion that no litigation history is stated in this instrument.

The amendments are specific enough to identify possible topics for later case-law research, including the scope of “prescribed” amendments and recipients under section 63(1A), the operation of the exception in section 63(2), compliance with the dynamically referenced housing standard, and application of the revised shadowing criterion. Whether any court has considered those topics is outside the information supplied here.

The consultation duty is not expressed as applying to every draft major plan amendment. Section 63(1A) applies to a draft major plan amendment “prescribed by regulation”, and requires notice to “each person prescribed by regulation”. Both limbs depend on regulations whose text is not included. Reading the new subsection alone will not identify which proposals or recipients are covered.

The exception in section 63(2) refers to a condition after the words “if the territory planning authority is satisfied that”. The amendment changes which subsections the exception can disapply, but the supplied extract does not reproduce the condition itself. It would be a mistake to treat the amendment as giving an unrestricted discretion to avoid consultation. The condition and the rest of section 63 need to be read.

The step-free path provision uses the Livable Housing Design Standard “as in force from time to time”. The applicable technical criteria may therefore depend on the version in force at the relevant time. The amendment does not reproduce the standard. Its note also expressly addresses notification under the Legislation Act, so the standard’s status should not be assumed to be the same as a regulation made and notified under that Act.

The swimming-pool definition uses both a depth threshold, more than 300 mm, and a principal-use test. A vessel that can hold water to the specified depth is not described as a swimming pool solely on that fact; the stated principal-use requirement also matters. The bathroom bath and spa-bath exclusion is specific. The definition does not state how borderline structures are classified.

Finally, the shadowing test contains several cumulative details: the relevant encroachment paragraph, the “more than 3 hours” period, “more than 50%” of a habitable room or principal private open space, another block, and the winter-solstice window of 9 am to 3 pm. The exact measurement method and meanings of the defined terms are not supplied here.

The Act itself does not provide a complete compliance manual. For the consultation amendment, the operative questions are whether a draft major plan amendment is prescribed, which people are prescribed to receive the notice, and whether the section 63(2) exception applies on its stated condition. The Planning (General) Regulation 2023 section 10 is identified by its amended heading as dealing with people to be given a consultation notice and extension notice, but the body of that section is not reproduced. A complete procedural account requires the current consolidated text of the Planning Act and relevant regulations.

For a step-free access path, the text makes compliance with the Livable Housing Design Standard, as in force from time to time, the stated criterion in regulation 1.38. It also expressly excludes section 1.17, Criterion 7, for this designated development. The standard itself and the rest of the exemption regulation are necessary to assess a particular design. The amendment does not set out a certificate, evidence format or approval process.

For a structure potentially within the swimming-pool definition, the relevant textual questions are whether it can be filled to a depth exceeding 300 mm, whether its principal use is one of the listed aquatic activities, and whether it falls within the bathroom bath or spa-bath exclusion. For an encroachment under regulation 1.131(1)(a)(iii), the amended shadowing threshold and winter-solstice time window are the stated criteria; other parts of section 1.131 may also be relevant.

The source does not give enough information to state what a particular person must do or to determine the outcome of a specific proposal. This is general legal information, not legal advice. Zoe can make mistakes, and before acting on this, relying on it, or using any draft, have a qualified Australian lawyer check it.