Community
10 June, 2026
Focus on the living first: Hannan
Member for Wollondilly Judy Hannan says the State Government should focus on the needs of the living before it starts looking at the needs of the dead.
Member for Wollondilly Judy Hannan says the State Government should focus on the needs of the living before it starts looking at the needs of the dead.
Mrs Hannan has again raised the issue of the proposed Douglas Park Memorial Park in NSW Parliament and has called on the Minister for Planning and Public Spaces, Paul Scully to direct the Independent Planning Commission (IPC) to hold a public hearing into the state significant development application (SSDA).
She said a public hearing was warranted given the “complex environmental issues” and the “terrible, terrible impacts it (the proposal) is having on the community”.
Mrs Hannan has been a vocal critic of plans to establish a cemetery on the outskirts of Douglas Park.
Benima Pty Ltd is currently seeking concept approval for the staged development of a cemetery at 430-490 Douglas Park Drive with the capacity for more than 37,000 burial lots and detailed development consent for the first stage of works.
The first stage of works will include site preparation (demolition, vegetation and ‘bulk excavation’), construction of a chapel, administration building (including café and flower shop) and caretaker/storage building, construction of an internal road and pedestrian network, carparking, ancillary works including stormwater and other services, site landscaping, lighting and signage.
It is intended that the cemetery will eventually include a crematorium.
Mrs Hannan’s primary argument has remained unchanged.
“While I understand the urgent need for cemeteries, this is simply just not the right site,” she told Parliament last week.
“The proposal is incompatible with the site’s landscape, may intercept the groundwater table, be vulnerable to seismic geotechnical earthquakes, cause unwarranted water runoff into the Nepean River catchment and noise impacts,” she said.
As reported by The Southern Wire, the cemetery proposal has been widely condemned by local residents and by Wollondilly Shire Council.
Council held a drop-in session at the Douglas Park Community Hall last week to help gather feedback for its own submission on the cemetery application and will hold an extraordinary meeting on Tuesday (June 16) to formally approve the submission.
Mrs Hannan said the depth of sandstone at the Douglas Park Drive site had been seriously underestimated.
“It has been recorded that it (sandstone) exists between 0.6 metres and 1.5 metres below the ground level – but if you scratch the dirt with your fingernail, you will see sandstone straight away,” she said.
Mrs Hannan told Parliament the site had “unique landscape features” that needed protection from development.
“Vague descriptions of cemetery construction and inconsistencies between various documents on public exhibition give rise to concerns about the veracity of the Environmental Impact Statement.
“This current application does little to allay previously publicly declared community concerns about the environmental impacts of the memorial park,” Mrs Hannan said.
“This DA does not give local residents any peace of mind.
“Residents continue to live in fear that both the environment and their own personal health and quality of life would be adversely impacted in the short term and would last for decades.”
Mrs Hannan said the community engagement portion of the Social Impact Assessment had been solely undertaken by a communications and public relations expert with no specific credentials in community engagement or social impact assessment.
And she the Social Impact Assessment had been prepared by a member of the Metropolitan Memorial Parks (MMP) Board – appointed by the State Government.
“The Social Impact Assessment downplays the widespread public views of the community,” Mrs Hannan said.
She said the MMP had a vested interest in securing land for future burials and this bias was contrary to the principles of recent amendments to SIA guides, adopted on March 26.
Mrs Hannan said the proposed cemetery site was in a rural setting and road infrastructure would be unable to cope with traffic volumes.
“The government can’t fulfil the infrastructure requirements for the living – and yet we are asked to accommodate 37,000 interred dead people and their visitors,” Mrs Hannan said.
She said the cemetery would divert infrastructure capacity away from growth areas including Willton and Appin.
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