Escaping trap of red tape
has resulted in many long overdue reforms being made or recommended.
The review looked at three key issues — access to information, planning approvals and food safety.
In its 2016 submission, the Geelong Chamber of Commerce wrote that “at a local council level the introduction of a ‘concierge-style’ personalised approach to handling planning inquiries through to final approval would help to alleviate some of the frustrations currently being experienced”.
The chamber also noted “the application of discretion and common sense, where possible, would alleviate some of the frustration currently being experienced by many small business operators”.
It was therefore pleasing to see, in the final action statement, the adoption of a council concierge service to assist small business operators navigate their way through the complex and often lengthier than anticipated planning environment.
The concierge service is designed to provide a single point of entry for approvals that can be tracked and monitored. It may include a digital platform and app to follow progress of planning applications.
The State Government is now working with five local Victorian councils, including City of Greater Geelong, on the Better Approvals Project, an initiative that has arisen from the earlier Small Business Regulation Review that seeks to test-drive reforms at local council level and co-design and customise a suite of solutions with small business operators to meet the needs of each particular local government area.
Some of the reforms included in the Better Approvals Project will look at options to introduce a council concierge service to assist businesses, introduce a single application process, move from sequential to more concurrent approvals processes, remove low risk approvals, and improve transparency on new business application processing times.
The Geelong Chamber of Commerce is currently working with the City of Greater Geelong and engaging with small business operators to test-drive these concepts, with the aim of reducing the burden of red tape and regulation and streamline the planning approvals process.
Another area of planning that the Geelong Chamber of Commerce would like to see reformed relates to the requirement for carparking for new buildings. The current metric used is based on the footprint of the building and often does not relate to the number of people employed in the building or accessing the facility.
The result is that often car parks required to be provided, based on the footprint of the building, are well in excess of those actually needed and invariably an application for exemption is lodged.
That delays the planning approval process, adding further time and cost to the small business operator as well as adding administrative load at local government level to handle the very high volume of exemption applications.
That was noted in the February 2017 Nous Report and recommended that the time and cost to process exemption applications was disproportionate to the risk involved.
This is an area of regulation that is often cited as a costly and burdensome example of over-regulation requiring reform at the state level.
The Better Approvals Project is a welcome step towards improving the regulatory environment for small businesses.
It will help to streamline planning processes and provide local council planning officers with a greater degree of autonomy and authority to be able to apply more common sense solutions to the many low-risk planning matters that currently create administrative bottlenecks and leave many small business operators frustrated and bewildered.
The Geelong Chamber encourages small business operators to actively engage with the City of Greater Geelong in the Better Approvals Project by providing feedback and participating in co-designing solutions that are relevant to businesses in this region. Bernadette Uzelac is CEO of the Geelong Chamber of Commerce and Chair of the Victorian Small Business Ministerial Council. Twitter: @GeelongChamber