Nimbys fortify their coastal strongholds

The Sydney Morning Herald’s editorial on the strategies, having described them as “laudable”, ends on a rather incoherent note. “The State Government must back the warm sentiments of the coastal strategies with the cold hard cash to underwrite the employment and services needed to attract and retain people of working age. Otherwise the future of the NSW coast, north and south, will be … the world’s longest retirement village”.

Notwithstanding the Herald’s reversion to 1970s style Keynesian pump priming, economic dynamism is built on different foundations in the 21st century. It is built on low taxes, inflation and interest rates, and growing concentrations of people with assets and disposable incomes. These are the conditions in which the modern, predominantly service economy thrives. But the strategies are designed to prevent such concentrations. While they see centres like Coffs Harbour and Port Macquarie emerging as more sophisticated economic hubs, complete with high rise office blocks, it would take a much larger population base to underwrite the transformation of these sleepy towns.

All of this is a pity. If not for heavy handed restrictions on market forces, alluring places like Coffs, Port Macquarie and Byron could become important national cities with international reputations as nodes in a network of service industries - like education and information technology - stretching from Sydney to Brisbane.

According to the Herald, Byron Shire Mayor Jan Barham, a Green, “welcomed the strategy as consistent with the council’s vision for her area”. What a surprise. The government should be concerned about that endorsement. When the Greens support a planning strategy, it’s bound to be a dud.