Michael Brown Planning Strategies Pty Ltd v Wingecarribee Shire Council [2020] NSWCA 137

Court of Appeal Supreme Court New South Wales Medium Neutral Citation: Michael Brown Planning Strategies Pty Ltd v Wingecarribee Shire Council [2020] NSWCA 137 Hearing dates: 3 June 2020 Date of orders: 8 July 2020 Decision date: 08 July 2020 Before: Basten JA at [1]; Meagher JA at [39]; Emmett AJA at [40] Decision: (1) Grant the applicant leave to appeal on the proposed question of law. (2) Dismiss the appeal. (3) Order the applicant to pay the Council's costs in this Court. Catchwords: ENVIRONMENT AND PLANNING – development application – power to grant consent – local environmental plan – requirement that proposed development "is compatible" with the "flood hazard" of the land – assessing compatibility at date of determining application – whether future measures to ameliorate flood hazard relevant – future measures not part of application – Wingecarribee Local Environmental Plan 2010 (NSW), cl 7.9(3)(a) STATUTORY INTERPRETATION – extrinsic materials – dictionaries – usefulness of reliance on dictionaries in statutory interpretation STATUTORY INTERPRETATION – immediate context – consistency of operation – local environmental plan – statutory precondition to granting development consent – grammatical tense of clause – requirement for contextual construction of clause Legislation Cited: Land and Environment Court Act 1979 (NSW), ss 56A, 57 Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (NSW), ss 1.5, 4.2, 4.15, 4.16, 4.53; Div 4.1 Wingecarribee Local Environmental Plan 2010, cl 7.9 Cases Cited: Bendixen v Coleman (1943) 68 CLR 401; [1943] HCA 40 Michael Brown Planning Strategies v Wingecarribee Shire Council [2019] NSWLEC 1311 Provincial Insurance Australia Pty Ltd v Consolidated Wood Products Pty Ltd (1991) 25 NSWLR 541 Woolworths Ltd v Pallas Newco Pty Ltd (2004) 61 NSWLR 707; [2004] NSWCA 422 Texts Cited: P Herzfeld, T Prince, Interpretation (2nd ed, Thomson Reuters, 2020) Category: Principal judgment Parties: Michael Brown Planning Strategies Pty Ltd (Applicant) Wingecarribee Shire Council (Respondent) Representation: Counsel: Mr N Hutley SC / Mr C Ireland (Applicant) Mr C Leggat SC (Respondent)