Prospect Mayor and Labor candidate for Adelaide David O’Loughlin and his council have backed the State Government’s move to grab approval powers for apartment buildings in his council area – unlike mayors in Unley and Norwood, who are opposed to the idea.

O’Loughlin says the move is necessary because there is no other way to incorporate design review into the development approval system.

Under the State Government’s plans, released Tuesday, any building over five storeys in rezoned parts of the inner suburbs will be approved by the State Government’s Development Assessment Commission, rather than a local council’s development assessment panel.

As part of that process the buildings will be required to go through a design review process headed by the Government Architect.

O’Loughlin called the measure a “compromise” needed to ensure good design.

“We understand the compromise,” he told InDaily. “We will obviously keep working through the planning reform process to seek design control at a local council level, but in the absence of regulated design control we understand that this is a better outcome.

“What we don’t want is five-storey boxes of yuck that we can’t stop because the regulations don’t allow us to stop bad design.

“We want design control over every planning outcome. This is just a step because it’s only above five storeys. We will keep pushing to have good design control over every application we receive.

“We recognise that the current development regulations and act don’t provide good design control. The current regs can’t do it – the only way to force it is through the design review process. However that means it must go through DAC. So on balance design is far more important to our community.”

Prospect Councillor Monica Lee told InDaily her council was initially concerned about the measure when it was discussed at a council meeting on Tuesday night.

However, after the need to incorporate the design review process was explained, councillors were generally supportive, she said.

O’Loughlin said he supported the State Government’s views on the need to keep councillors out of development approval panels.

“Elected members on councils come from a huge range of backgrounds. Very rarely do they come from a design background.

“Council’s primary role is in understanding its community’s need and in setting policy. Applications should be assessed by experts in accordance with council’s agreed policy.

“The more you have unskilled councillors making final decision on application, there’s more risk that the councils will end up in court fighting battles with applicants.”

At Tuesday’s press conference announcing the policy, Premier Jay Weatherill said the change was needed to ensure “design excellence” in the medium-density accommodation the government is hoping for.

“We know that there are concerns about more compact living,” he said. “What we want to show people is that this can be design excellence – this can protect and preserve the character of our suburb by insisting on high quality design.”

Greens MLC Mark Parnell called the State Government’s move another attack on the power of local councils.

“Whatever happened to ‘consult & decide’ rather than ‘announce and defend’?”, Parnell said in a statement.

“Local government is being slowly side-lined in major decisions affecting the future of our cities and suburbs.

“They are being over-ruled at the strategic planning stage and now they are being over-ruled in their role as the development assessment authority.”