The panel provides an independent forum for those pro and anti particular develpments to argue their cases. The panel consists of independent experts, from a range of fields including law, planning, community representatives and others.

They then weigh up the facts and present a recommendation to the council. The councillors then vote on whether or not to approve the recommendations. So in their submission to the Local Government Association, our councillors planned to argue that the new JRPPs should take this form, they should be a prelimary planning panel which could make a recommendation to the council, but then it would still be up to the council to make the final decision.

I hope that the association takes this point into account in their representations to the state government.

Our councillors have a very valid point on this issue and I have to say that I agree that local councillors should make the decisions on local developments. After all, Liverpudlians voted these councillors in in the belief that they would be ruling on the developments in the area, that they would have a say on what was built here and what changes were made to the city. So why should this change?

The JRPP for our area, the western Sydney region, will feature representatives from our council. When the councillors voted on who this should be, they chose general manager Phil Tolhurst and councillor, now deputy mayor, Tony Hadchiti, with councillor Nadia Napoletano serving as an alternate if either couldn't make it.

At the time Labor councillors argued that this could be a mistake because neighter Cr Hadchiti nor Cr Napoletano have planning or engineering experience. This does seem like a valid criticism to me. But what's even worse they are only two members of an 11 person council that was voted in by the people of this area in September, 2008. Why should only they have an impact on the decisions which are made for this area? Shouldn't all the elected representatives, including the Labor ones, who won't be represented at all, have a say? After all, a lot of locals voted for them. They should all have their voices heard.

While developments that are worth more than $10 million are fairly rare, they tend to be the ones that matter.

So shouldn't local people, through their representatives, decide whether or not they should go ahead? I'm glad to see our councillors have seen this as a major issue and are lobbying against it. I hope that the state government takes notice.

Because, while its important to avoid mistakes by councils, which the new panels aim to do, what we don't want to see is any more misguided decisions or mistakes in this area in general. Mistakes that would more likely be made by state government bureaucrats that have never even ventured into the area.

Liverpool deserves more than that. And Liverpudlians deserve a say in the future of the city. Who better to make the right decisions on the future of the area than people who are familiar with it and actually live here? The final say should be left in the hands of our councillors, who have direct contact with the residents of Liverpool and know where they want the development of the area to head.