Prominent Hunter developer Jeff McCloy has slammed the recommendations from a review of the Biodiversity Conservation Act, saying that he fears they will add to the existing housing affordability crisis.
The review, undertaken by former Treasury secretary Ken Henry, found the 2016 Act was not meeting its primary purpose of maintaining a healthy, productive and resilient environment.
The 58 recommendations of the review are designed to help strengthen existing biodiversity conservation laws and to allow them to take primacy over competing pieces of legislation such as development laws.
But in a letter to Dr Henry, Mr McCloy said the recommendations would further reduce land available for urban uses and contribute to ongoing growth in land values.
"The real endangered species is the Australian family who can no longer afford a home due to this continued unsustainable approach taken to biodiversity," the letter states.
"Your recommendations will only further contribute to this unaffordability, which in a country as large as Australia is nonsensical."
Mr McCloy said his representatives were prevented from sharing a copy of the letter to those who attended a presentation by Dr Henry in Newcastle on Thursday.
The Urban Development Institute of Australia, which coordinated the event, did not respond to questions about why the letter was prevented from being distributed.
Mr McCloy's letter argues that most new housing developments are already required to allocate a significant portion of the land to biodiversity or conservation.
Fifty five per cent of the McCloy group's 70 hectare Bower project at Medowie has been given to NSW National Parks.
Fifty one per cent of the 69 hectare Monarch's Rise project at King's Hill has been dedicated for conservation.
"Without these communities there would be no economic incentive to manage conservation land for weeds, bushfire and revegetation," Mr McCloy wrote.
"This oversight is representative of the scope of your review being so narrowly focused on the effectiveness of its current objectives."
Mr McCloy, who has been building in the Hunter since the 1970s, said the complexity of biodiversity laws were not only thwarting the construction of new housing but they were not achieving their stated objectives.
"For a subdivision 40 years ago I needed an engineer and a surveyor. Today I need to employ 50 to 60 consultants on that job," he said.
Mr McCloy told the Newcastle Herald on Friday that he hoped the state government would dismiss the recommendations of the review and engage more closely with industry to improve sustainability outcomes.
