Two of our young planners were lucky enough to attend the Urban Taskforce Australia forum on ICAC and corruption issues facing planning and development in NSW.
Anthony Pedroza, a Senior Corruption Prevention Officer at ICAC, presented an engaging talk on the key objectives of the Commission as an Independent statutory body – to promote integrity and accountability in public administration.
Key takeaways from the presentation relate to the prevention of corruption in the NSW Planning System by:
- improving transparency,
- accountability and openness,
- reducing the complexity of the system,
- balancing competing public interests, and
- avoiding wide discretion by decision makers.
Overall, he noted that our system needs “better regulation NOT more regulation” to assist in the prevention of corruption.
We are looking forward to attending more of Urban Taskforce’s morning tea forums throughout the year!