Coastal Management in NSW – Auditor General Report September 2025
The Auditor-General in NSW has recently released a report on coastal management in NSW. The specific objective of the audit was to assess whether the Department of Climate Change, Energy, Environment and Water (DCCEEW), Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure (DPHI) and a selection of three local councils were effectively implementing the coastal management framework to manage the NSW coastal environment. The councils audited were Coffs Harbour, Northern Beaches and Shoalhaven. This audit was undertaken seven years after the framework came into effect. The full audit can be accessed here.
Key findings are:
- The framework is not being effectively implemented.
- DCCEEW is not effectively overseeing and facilitating implementation of the framework by state and local government.
- Gaps in DCCEEW’s strategic planning, risk management and performance monitoring mean it cannot demonstrate that the framework is being implemented to effectively manage risks to use and resilience of the coastal environment now and into the future.
- Audited councils are developing Coastal Management Programs ((CMPs) but the process is taking longer than anticipated.
- DCCEEW and DPHI are not effectively addressing challenges to the successful implementation of the framework including gaps in mapping coastal hazards to support framework objectives for managing risks from these hazards.
- DCCEEW is not effectively facilitating partnerships across state and local government.
The audit report made the following general recommendations:
- DCCEEW should improve its oversight, facilitation and monitoring of framework implementation.
- DCCEEW and DPHI should address gaps in implementation of land use planning policy relating to coastal hazard risks.
- Local councils, and divisions of DCCEEW and DPHI responsible for national parks and Crown land, should integrate the delivery of actions in CMPs into asset management, business and financial planning, and risk management processes.
- Local councils should monitor and report on progress to the council and community.
More specific recommendations included the need for more clearly defined roles for local councils and each relevant agency “to ensure an integrated and coordinated approach to framework implementation”; improve processes for CMP development and certification; evaluate the grants program; and develop and commence implementation of a plan by September 2026 to ensure coastal vulnerability area mapping in the Resilience and Hazards SEPP 2021 “supports framework objectives relevant to managing coastal hazards”.
This report, whilst uncomfortable to some, did not come as a great surprise. Many of the issues raised had been documented in detail over six years in NSW Coastal Council annual surveys, as well as consultant reviews, and during the 5-year statutory review. The audit report states that DCCEEW identified opportunities to address risk and improve framework implementation “but it has not systematically implemented and monitored them”.
The Secretaries DCCEEW and DPHI in statements accompanying the report accepted the recommendations and indicated steps are in place or will be put in place to address them. There will be challenges. Processes to achieve better alignment with other government priorities including those of MIDO, MEMA, the State Disaster Mitigation Plan (and role of the Reconstruction Authority), and Climate Change Adaptation Strategy are needed.
Responses from councils that were audited included two issues that have been around for several years. One is how to integrate catchment impacts into CMPs, the other how to incorporate multiple coastal lakes into a single program. However, problems associated with multi-council CMPS that are part of a single catchment-waterway system were not raised such as for Greater Sydney Harbour or Hawkesbury-Nepean.
I am resisting the temptation to provide any detailed comments on the audit report at this stage. But I do welcome the call for councils, in partnership with state agencies, to adopt a more strategic land use planning approach to CMPs. This is required to achieve successful long-term implementation of the framework. Direction for this approach is spelled out in s12 of the Coastal Management Act (see also s 3 (j) in objects of the Act), and the Coastal Manual (which does need updating). As noted in the report, DPHI’s Planning division has identified opportunities to update its resources and guidance on integration of coastal management into the land use planning system, but it ”has not formally evaluated whether its resourcing is providing adequate support for councils”.
It was also pleasing to see the audit’s view on the need for councils to better “integrate coastal management into their integrated planning and reporting and risk management processes”. It stated that actions within CMPs into long-term financial planning and asset management could be improved. Despite uncertainties in funding, such planning should not constrain councils from identifying all on-going and essential future demands required to maintain and improve the council’s coastal assets whilst also identifying future steps to address risks.
Perhaps for me the most satisfying aspect of the audit are comments made in relation to the absence of certified Coastal Vulnerability Area maps (only one in 7 years!). The NSW Government in 2016 decided not to produce a statewide CVA as it did for the other three coastal areas, because it was of the view that local councils are best placed to undertake detailed hazard modelling and risk assessment. However, in this approach the audit sees problems.
While both DCCEEW and DPHI have identified risk to delivering policy objectives for managing areas at risk from coastal hazards due to “incomplete mapping” of CVAs, neither “has implemented a clear strategy for managing this gap in framework implementation and related risks”. Many of us have offered advice on this issue. I am of the view that all coastal lands below 5m AHD along with coastal cliffs (rock or sand) are subject to some degree of hazard risk in the foreseeable future. Here lies a big challenge for policy makers. The climate change era is upon us. Properties, infrastructures and amenities are at risk and mitigation strategies are required. The coastal framework is there to provide the necessary strategic planning processes to address these risks. The newly revised NSW Coastal Erosion and Inundation Assessments should facilitate action that provides clarification of risk so surely needed in this state.
Bruce Thom
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Words by Prof Bruce Thom. Please respect the author’s thoughts and reference appropriately: (c) ACS, 2025. For correspondence about this blog post please email admin@australiancoastalsociety.org.au
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