Property

Independent Federal Member for Indi, Helen Haines, has written to the Victorian government expressing her dismay with its decision to remove the right for third parties to appeal renewable energy planning decisions through VCAT ... In her letter to the Minister for Energy and Resources Lily D’Ambrosia and Minister for Planning Sonya Kilkenny, Dr Haines expressed concern that under the current system, there are not enough safeguards to ensure communities are heard and their issues acted upon by developers.

From April 2023 to April 2024, the average rent increased by 18 per cent in the Cambooya-Wyreema area, higher than the 10 per cent average increase across Queensland. The latest Suburbtrends "Rental Pain Index" for April 2024 shows that for the Cambooya-Wyreema area, which also includes Hodgson Vale, Mount Rascal, Top Camp, Vale View and Finnie, the vacancy rate is just 1.04 per cent.

Three debt-ridden properties in the district were auctioned by the Naracoorte-Lucindale Council last week to recoup unpaid rates and legal costs of up to $100,000. The council says it had to put the properties under the hammer as it had exhausted all other options to recover the debts, which date back to 15 years in some cases. The properties, two in Kybybolite and one in Naracoorte, were auctioned by a local real estate company.

A large area of crown land near the village of Drake, in the upper reaches of the Clarence River catchment has been returned to the Jubullum Local Aboriginal Land Council following a successful land claim. The NSW Aboriginal Land Council NSWALC made the claim on 104.4 hectares of crown land across two adjoining blocks on the western side of Drake, which will be returned as freehold land to the Jubullum Local Aboriginal Land Council.

Victorian and Tasmanian farmer peak bodies have produced a policy for developers who want to build infrastructure, such as transmission lines for renewable energy, across their farmland. They warned that since the year 2000, Australia’s available arable land had been reduced by 15 per cent, much of it lost to infrastructure development and urban sprawl. The policy has been released as Gippsland farmers face plans for pipelines and transmission lines across their land as part of the state government’s energy policy, which aims to link offshore wind farms to the Latrobe Valley energy network.