Do You Need Council Approval in Cherbourg?

Cherbourg is an Aboriginal community in the South Burnett, on Wakka Wakka country, about two and a half hours north-west of Brisbane. The land there is held differently from land in the surrounding shires, and that difference changes the order in which approvals happen. Before the familiar "do I need a development application" question, there is a prior one about who holds the land and what interest you can obtain in it.

The short answer

Usually yes, but tenure comes first. Cherbourg is Deed of Grant in Trust (DOGIT) land, held by Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Council as trustee. Before a development application, you normally need a lease or permission from the Council as trustee. Development assessment under the Planning Act 2016 is a separate, later step.

Figure 1: On trust land the tenure gate comes before the planning gate. Clearing one does not clear the other.

What the land tenure is

The Cherbourg local government area is Deed of Grant in Trust land — roughly 3,130 hectares granted by the State in fee simple in trust, and held by Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Council as trustee for the community. It is not sold as ordinary private freehold.

That trustee role sits alongside the Council's role as a local government. The same organisation is both the trustee of the land under the Aboriginal Land Act 1991 (Qld) and the Land Act 1994 (Qld), and the local planning authority under the Planning Act 2016. Those are two distinct jobs.

For anyone wanting to build or run a business, the order of operations follows from this. The first thing you need is a lawful interest in the specific parcel, and on DOGIT land that is usually a trustee lease granted by the Council. You apply to the Council in its trustee capacity, it decides whether to grant a lease for the use, term and conditions, native title is addressed as part of that process under the Native Title Act 1993 (Cth), and the lease is registered with the State land registry. Only then do you hold something you can build on.

Does a planning scheme apply?

Yes. Cherbourg has adopted its own local planning scheme — the Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Planning Scheme. So once tenure is settled, the planning side runs the same way as anywhere in Queensland: the scheme sets the zones and codes and tells you whether a use or building is accepted, code assessable or impact assessable. Accepted versus assessable development explains those categories.

In practice the Council does assess real development under this scheme. Its own council meetings have dealt with material change of use applications for residential development and with reconfiguring a lot — subdivision — so the assessment machinery is live, not theoretical. A point worth remembering on trust land: a lease of more than 10 years that divides a lot is itself reconfiguring a lot under the Planning Act, so a long lease and a development approval are often linked.

What still works the same way

Beneath the tenure layer, the ordinary Queensland framework applies. A new or intensified use is a material change of use and may need a development application. Where one is required, it is lodged on the standard DA Form 1. And building work is handled separately again under the Building Act 1975, usually by a private building certifier — a different approval from the planning one. Where the project is small domestic work that is accepted development under the scheme, no development application is needed — but building approval from a private certifier under the Building Act 1975 may still apply. Accepted development does not mean unregulated; it means the project meets all of the planning scheme standards without needing a DA. Keep records of how it meets those standards in case the question arises. Building approval versus development approval sets out that distinction. In a remote community, getting a private building certifier is a practical constraint in its own right. There may be only one or two certifiers who regularly work in the region, and travel costs can add materially to the project. It is worth identifying a certifier early — before you finalise a design — to confirm they are available and to understand their fee structure for the location. Finding a building certifier in QLD and building approval versus development approval set out the general process.

Where to start

Start with Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Council, and be clear which role you are asking it to play. If your question is about getting an interest in the land, that is the trustee. If it is about whether a use will be approved, that is the assessment manager. For most projects the trustee conversation comes first, because there is little point assessing a development on land you have no interest in.

Where the State has a role — for example a state-controlled road or a state interest triggered by the proposal — the State Assessment and Referral Agency (SARA) is the referral point, and the Council can tell you whether that applies.

Because the first gate here is tenure rather than a planning lookup, an instantDA planning report is not the starting point for a Cherbourg project — the Council as trustee is The practical sequence is: (1) approach the Council in its trustee capacity with a proposal that identifies the parcel, the proposed use, and the term; (2) the Council as trustee decides whether to grant a lease under the Land Act 1994 and the Aboriginal Land Act 1991, including any native title procedures required under the Native Title Act 1993 (Cth); (3) if granted, the lease is registered with the State land registry and you hold a registrable interest; (4) with that interest in hand, approach the same Council in its separate capacity as assessment manager to determine whether a development application is needed under the planning scheme. . A report can be useful later, if a development application is needed and you want the zone, codes and constraints gathered in one place, but it does not grant or substitute for the interest in the land that has to come first.