(Question Time, 7 June 2022, Legislative Assembly, NSW Parliament)

My question is directed to the Minister for Infrastructure, Minister for Cities, and Minister for Active Transport. Will the response to submissions for the Blackwattle Bay State significant precinct be informed by the City of Sydney's design review to ensure amenity in new and existing homes and in public spaces, and to create a world-class foreshore and park?

Mr ROB STOKES: I thank the member for Sydney for his question and for his strong advocacy for the best possible urban planning outcomes and land use outcomes for his constituency of the City of Sydney, which is the centrepiece of the global city that I was mentioning in my answer to the last question. To be directly relevant to his question, the short answer is yes. I have had the opportunity to meet with the City of Sydney, and I commend the lord mayor for her advocacy as well as the hardworking staff at the city—people like Graham Jahn and Peter John Cantrill. The city is blessed with some extraordinary experts and an extraordinary history of expertise that has been generated over all sorts of complex projects. That expertise will be invaluable for Infrastructure NSW [INSW] as they determine the future for this really strategic site on Sydney's foreshore.

There are not many true brownfield sites left in Sydney, as many of the old industrial areas around the harbour have been transformed. This is one of the last remaining and also one of the most strategically important, because this development provides the opportunity to finalise one of the last missing links in that 15‑kilometre walkway between Rozelle Bay and Woolloomooloo Bay and provides the first opportunity in 150 years for citizens of Sydney and visitors to access that part of the harbour. That is why the vision is all about returning more than half the site—I think it is about three hectares, from memory—into public ownership and ensuring that people have access to the foreshore. That is a fundamental part of the INSW vision for the site.

It will also be a vision for many more homes and many more jobs in that critical area. I understand the city has a particular view about the mix of residential and commercial floor space there. It continues to be my view that we have an urgent need for both, but with its proximity to the new western metro, it is a logical area to ensure that it can be a context for more homes and more jobs located near a world-class fish market. The agency is still in the process of developing the response to submissions, but I have directed that INSW take particular note of the submission from the City of Sydney because of its huge experience in delivering transformative and world‑leading design in Australia's major global city.