Wamberal documents to be made public

Central Coast Council has two weeks to make public two draft documents about Wamberal Beach after the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal (NCAT) ruled in favour of their release.

The ruling was made on Monday, July 14, after Corinne Lamont applied for the documents before she became a councillor and while Council was under administration.

Once she became a councillor after the elections in September of 2024, Lamont was given access to the documents but under confidentiality obligations.

This meant that as a councillor she was not allowed to make them public.

As a resident, Lamont had submitted Government Information Public Access (GIPA) requests, asking for copies of draft reports of stage six of a six stage report into the cost benefit analysis (CBA) into different options for Wamberal Beach.

Unlike Stages 1 through 4, the Stage 6 Final Report was never issued in draft form.

Lamont told the Tribunal she wanted the documents at the time to make a submission about a development application (DA) for a seawall when a proposal from Wamberal Protection Association was on public exhibition in mid 2024.

The Tribunal outlined both the public interest for and against disclosure of three documents.

“Regardless of whether that DA process has moved on, I find that the underlying reason was to obtain more transparency over the matters considered by the Council in conjunction with other parties in the absence of councillor oversight at the relevant time the drafts were in the course of preparation,” the ruling said.

“The evidence also establishes that there were no councillors appointed at the relevant times the drafts were prepared.

“I also find that her (Lamont’s) past associations with community groups establish her strong interest in the matter for the purpose of such dissemination.

“I find these public interest considerations in favour of disclosure to be of significant weight.”

The judgement found there was a strong public interest in contributing to positive and informed debate on issues of public importance including, broadly, the issue of how to protect a community against the effects of climate change and/or coastal erosion.

“Recent ‘record breaking’ storms along the Australian eastern coast, and their devastating consequences, further heighten community concerns,” the judgement said.

It said the competing views and interests have continued unabated since the CBA prepared back in 2017 and noted the following comments included in a council staffer’s affidavit:

“The CBA concludes that one of the engineering options considered (Options 2-7) are expected to provide a net public benefit for the local community and for visitors to the area, under base assumptions,” the affidavit said.

“Only a Planned Retreat (Option 8) provides greater benefits than a continuation of the current approach of no specific managed intervention (Option 1, maintaining current, status quo approaches).

“The analysis concludes that the net costs imposed on residents, visitors and other parties from the loss of the beach and construction of a seawall, exceed the net benefits stakeholders would receive from the effects of a seawall.

“The key beneficiaries from construction of a seawall are the approximately sixty owners of beachfront properties at Wamberal.”

The judgement stated that the requested documents “fit squarely within this area of public concern, where it is also acknowledged by the Respondent’s witnesses that there are highly contested community views on the building of a seawall”.

The NCAT decision means Lamont will get public access to the “Draft 01” and the “Draft Final” versions of the Report titled “Stage 6 Cost-Benefit Analysis of Wamberal Terminal Coastal Protection Options” dated 26 June 2021 and 27 April 2021 respectively.

Parts of the reasons for the decision were marked not for publication and remain confidential.

A third document was mentioned by Cr Lamont and it was the initial draft document with numerous comments and markups.

It was kept confidential.