NT's best performance in a decade
The Northern Territory has recorded the highest annual level of residential approvals for more than a decade, according to the minister for lands, planning and environment, Peter Chandler.
Mr Chandler attributes the growth to the government’s initiative to slash red tape and speed up development application processes.
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The Australian Bureau of Statistics report shows that there has been a 61.9 per cent growth in residential approvals in the year to March, setting the Territory ahead of the national trend.
“The results for March this year are startling – we had 199 approvals compared to only 30 in March a year ago, and in February approvals hit 261 compared to only 41 a year ago,” Mr Chandler said.
“The Territory government is continuing to invest in the roll-out of land and will make thousands of lots available for home building.”
In the year to March, the number of approvals for houses increased 20.2 per cent to 774, with development in the new suburbs of Muirhead in Darwin and Bellamack and Johnston in Palmerston.
The report shows that a large amount of the growth is in residential approvals, which have increased 98.5 per cent to 1,435 for units, townhouses and flats in the year to March.
Across the country, building approvals slumped 5.5 per cent in March seasonally adjusted, and 1.2 per cent in trend terms.
Dwelling approvals decreased in March in New South Wales (-3.7 per cent), Victoria (-3.6 per cent) and Tasmania (-3.5 per cent), but increased in Queensland (2.4 per cent), Western Australia (0.7 per cent) and South Australia (0.2 per cent) in trend terms.
