If you’ve booked an ADR conference with the ADR Registrar of the Planning and Environment Court (P and E Court) you will need to provide information about your case prior to your scheduled meeting.
The information for the ADR Registrar should not be the same as you have provided to your legal representative. The ADR Registrar does not need large, detailed briefing documents.
Your brief should be kept to the barest minimum to help the ADR Registrar understand the key issues in dispute that will be discussed in the conference. If the ADR Registrar requires more information, they will contact the parties.
This will help minimise costs payable by the parties.
The content of the brief must be agreed between the parties before being sent to the ADR Registrar.
What you can include:
- a summary of the nature of the proceedings, proposed development and issues in dispute
- a notice of appeal
- a copy of the most recent court order
- a copy of the court order that identifies the reasons for approval and refusal (if made)
- a location and aerial plan
- a plan of the proposal and elevations (if relevant), especially if the application involves a multi-storey building
- an assessment officer’s report to the delegate/decision maker (where there are no expert reports)
- a decision notice and conditions (if any)
- objections submitted by the party during the original assessment of the application
- reports supporting the application where relevant to the issues in dispute (where there are no expert reports)
- joint expert reports (if any)
- lay witness statements
- photos (where helpful to understand the issues)
- extracts from the local government planning scheme, State Development Assessment Provisions, or other statutory assessment policies or regulations relevant to the proposal/issues
- correspondence between the parties regarding resolution proposals.
What you shouldn’t include:
- a full copy of the planning scheme or other statutory assessment provisions or regulation
- the original application forms, owner’s consent, confirmation notices and other administrative notices
- general correspondence between the assessment and applicant during the assessment process,
- the statutory attachments to the decision notice
- public advertising notices and associated documents
- a list of documents and/or discovered documents
- floor plans for each storey of a multi-storey building
- reports supporting the application, where expert reports are available
- administrative court orders that don’t deal with issues in dispute
- general correspondence between the parties, unless containing proposals for resolution
- legal aspects of what’s preceded the conference, such as preliminary points of law and service of the appeal.
When do I provide the information?
Your conference booking confirmation email from the ADR Registrar will indicate the date by which the brief must be provided.
As the ADR Register may be conducting numerous conferences, they may not have time to read late briefs. The ADR Registrar may postpone a conference if a brief is delivered too late.
How do I provide the information?
Provide the brief electronically in a PDF format by email or downloadable via an external website.
Briefs up to 50 pages long can be provided as a single combined PDF document with a searchable index. For larger briefs each individual document should be a separate pdf, with a separate index, and saved as compressed archive (such as a ZIP file).
