This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

A proposed mega-development on Tasmania’s east coast has prompted concerns about fast-tracked development and foreign investment in the island state.

The Cambria Green proposal was announced to the public in late April, four days before a local council meeting which voted to progress an application to create a special development zone that could house 550 accommodation units and hotel rooms, two golf courses, and an 80-bed health spa that could one day be used as a palliative care unit.

The proponent, Cambria Green Agricultural Tourism Management, helmed by Shandong businessman Liu Kejing and Melbourne-based Ronald Hu, says on its Facebook page — it does not have a website — that it wants to “bring the surrounding community along our long-term journey” to support the “integrated, eco-tourism development”.

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But some say a lack of details around what the final development would look like, combined with the lack of public disclosure prior to the council meeting and a complicated paper trail, has highlighted issues with the state’s planning processes.

The property overlooks Freycinet National Park, which rims Wineglass Bay and is home to more than 80 species of native orchid. The park is the biggest tourist drawcard on the east coast and attracted almost 300,000 visitors last year.

The Glamorgan Spring Bay council, which voted four-to-three to progress the rezoning application, has been accused of rushing the proposal and of not investigating the community and environmental impact before putting it out to public comment.

And the Tasmanian government has been accused by the Greens of putting its growing investment relationship with China, spurred on by the visit of Chinese president Xi Jinping in 2014, ahead of community-focused planning strategy.

The proposed 3,185-hectare development area covers the old Cambria estate, centred around a heritage-listed 1821 homestead. The land abuts the Moulting Lagoon, a Ramsar-listed wetland and significant black swan breeding site, and is located in the hamlet of Dolphin Sands, a few kilometres north of Swansea.

It stretches across 12 titles, which were purchased by nine different entities from April to August in 2015. Nine of the purchases, conducted in the name of seven different entities and Liu himself, were lodged on the same day in April.

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That same month, Liu visited Tasmanian premier Will Hodgman. The meeting is recorded in the official gifts register, which notes that Liu gave Hodgman a paper scroll worth $100 which was retained by government.

The application for a special planning area, approved by the council on 24 April this year, would allow for a large and varied development to be built on the site.

It is outlined in a report by Tasmanian-based urban planners Ireneinc and includes: an 18-hole golf course; a nine-hole golf course; a runway for light aircraft; a 120 room “Cambria Sky hotel” with associated gourmet bistro; 70 villas; 240 accommodation units; 80 more apartments set off the golf course; and an 80-bed health retreat, which Ireninc founder Irene Duckett told the ABC could include a palliative care unit.

Initially, though, Hu says the site will function as a high-end wedding venue.

Also in the masterplan is a village precinct with doctors, dentists, shops, and an art gallery. According to Chinese media reports, a signing ceremony was held in Beijing on 21 April — three days before the council meeting — celebrating a partnership between Beijing Lidaohengtong Culture and Art Company and Cambria Green to create three art museums on the property.

The report suggested development had already been approved. It has not, and Cambria Green has not even given a firm indication of what the final development would cost, with reported estimates ranging from $50m to $250m. Most quotes sit around $100m.

Hu said in a statement to Guardian Australia that the value of the development could not be confirmed until after the rezoning application had been finalised.

“Upon approval, the scale of the Cambria Green development will be very similar with what has been tabled in the master plan,” he said.

Britt Steiner was one of three councillors to vote against the rezoning application, demanding more time to read the 100-page application and take expert advice.

“People should have been consulted and given the information before the application for rezoning was heard,” Steiner told Guardian Australia. “It really changes the nature of the community and the environment should something like this go ahead.”

The application to amend the scheme has now gone out for public comment, with submissions to close on 15 June. But council’s opportunity to veto the rezoning has passed: it will now be decided by the Tasmanian planning commission.

If the rezoning is approved, the proposal will not go back to council for a vote unless Cambria Green submits a development application which is outside the new zoning provisions, or unless a member of the public raises an objection to a future development application from the company.

Debbie Wisby, who was absent from the meeting but said she would have voted to delay, said the proposal was now out of local government hands.

“If everyone comes back and there’s 5,000 noes and there are very good reasons behind them, then we can do a submission from council, but it’s only a submission,” she said. “I don’t think that everyone realised that once they put it out they couldn’t pull it back.”

Deputy mayor Cheryl Arnol, who voted in favour, said she wanted to get all the information about the development “on the table”.

Senior executives and planning officers at Glamorgan Spring Bay Council had known about the proposal for two years, Arnol said, but were not allowed to discuss it because it was commercial-in-confidence. Progressing the special planning area application broke that cone of silence.

“We perhaps could have deferred it for four weeks, but would the decision have been different?” she said. “By initiating the [special area plan] we have put everything on the table for the community to look at.”

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Councillors all said that constituents had raised concerns with them about foreign ownership of the Cambria Estate land.

Tasmania has the highest level of foreign ownership of any Australian jurisdiction, and China has become its largest investor. Recent high-profile acquisitions include the $280m purchase of the Van Diemen’s Land Company by Chinese firm Moon Lake Investments and the purchase of award-winning wedding venue Villa Howden by Chinese millionaire William Wei in 2017.

In 2014 the state signed a memorandum of understanding with the China Development Bank to “establish a strategic cooperation relationship in planning,” and facilitate Chinese investment in Tasmania. The three-year agreement expired in November and has not been renewed.

Foreign ownership was a significant concern for Tasmanian Greens leader Cassy O’Conner, who said Tasmanian governments reflexively leapt on the next big development as the investment that will save the state.

A spokesman for the Tasmanian government said the state was “open for business” and all proposed developments would go through the “appropriate planning processes”.

Guardian Australia contacted Cambria Green for comment.