Liberal honorary treasurer Andrew Burnes. Credit:Daniel Munoz Fairfax Media is not suggesting any inside knowledge or wrongdoing on Mr Burnes' part. A wealthy travel entrepreneur, he made a proposal for a 150-metre, 318-unit tower on May 27, an audacious move in an election climate. The application is set to reignite the political row triggered by Mr Guy's surprise rezoning decision, the most controversial by a Victorian planning minister in decades. But it also highlights the Andrews government's decision not to rewrite the planning rules for the area. In November, Fairfax revealed that Mr Burnes was one of a slew of Liberal figures and donors to be up for multimillion-dollar windfalls as a result of Mr Guy's ministerial penstroke.

Fishermans Bend was rezoned in 2012. Credit:Joe Armao Confidential briefings to Mr Guy, obtained by Fairfax, reveal proposed boundaries for the precinct were drawn up behind closed doors as early as March 2011 but were not publicly announced until July 2012. Mr Burnes paid just over $7 million for the site at 179 Normanby Road, near the West Gate Freeway, in March 2012, and moved the offices of his Australian Outback Travel business into the historic Laconia Woollen Mills building on the site. Property experts consulted last November estimated the rezoning had boosted the value of the Normanby Road site to $20 million. The approval of a high-rise apartment development would further dramatically enhance the value of the site.

It is unclear if Mr Burnes, who did not wish to comment, intends to develop the site himself, sell it on with a permit, or win approval and wait for the market to pick up again before developing or selling. The Andrews government is expected to seize on the Burnes tower proposal in State Parliament this week as it continues to press Mr Guy over his handling of Fishermans Bend. Still, in the likely event that the proposal by architects peckvonhartel meets planning requirements, Planning Minister Richard Wynne will find himself signing off on a scheme that will make one of the Liberals' most generous and active supporters even wealthier. At the time of the rezoning, there was no binding master plan or height limits, nor any mechanism to capture the uplift in property values to help pay for the infrastructure of a residential community that could be as large as the City of Ballarat. Nor was there a strategy or funds for decontamination, transport, open space or affordable housing. Senior planners remain bemused as to why the large-scale rezoning occurred when the government-sponsored Docklands next door remained unfinished and planning had already started for publicly owned sites in North Melbourne and E Gate in West Melbourne. Property industry sources are adamant that one of the reasons was the influence of some long-standing landholders and speculators who are also Liberal Party supporters.

Mr Burnes was state treasurer of the Liberal party from 2009 to 2011 and became the federal party's treasurer in 2015. He is a close friend of former federal treasurer Joe Hockey. As an individual, and through Australian Outback Travel, he has donated at least $150,000 to the Liberals in the past 15 years, including $80,000 in the year 2013-14. Mr Guy has repeatedly refused to be interviewed by Fairfax Media about his Fishermans Bend decision or answer specific questions about his actions. The proposed tower complex is by the company Normanby Rd Holdings, controlled by Mr Burnes and his wife, Cinzia, The existing Woollen Mills building would be retained. The Andrews government released a "draft vision" for the Fishermans Bend precinct two weeks ago, but a local group lobbying for better planning for the new suburb said there should be a temporary hold on large developments during the 18 months it would take to confirm Labor's final plan for the area. David Brand, an architect and former Port Phillip councillor, said developers rather than the Planning Minister were dictating how the area was being shaped.

"It's like a plague, it's not like a proper ecology of a city. The market is a marvellous mechanism for getting things done, but what exactly is being done needs to be steered with vision and foresight," Mr Brand said. With Clay Lucas