The small crowd was primarily made up of environmental activists and at least one nominated candidate in the Bega Valley Shire Council elections.

Mr Shoebridge addressed the group on what he said were “appalling decisions” being made in Bega under the current planning laws.

“You can’t see a better case study of what’s happening here in Bega than McDonald’s,” Mr Shoebridge said.

“They put in their application to build in a totally inappropriate floodplain on land that’s partially zoned residential.

“If a local business, a local fish and chip shop tried to do that, they would be laughed out of town. They would be rejected by the planners, they would be rejected by the councillors.

“But here we saw McDonald’s use its pressure to get, by a narrow majority, approval by the council under the current planning laws - and the community has no appeal rights to challenge it.”

According to Mr Shoebridge, if the vote had gone the other way and the application rejected on the basis of the planning classification, McDonald’s would have the right to appeal to the Land and Environment Court.

He said McDonald’s was just the most obvious current target in Bega, but the problem spread much further.

“We’ve got big business coming into town, ignoring the local zoning, ignoring the wishes of the local community, building on an inappropriate floodplain and then getting a freebie on rates that no other local business would get,” Mr Shoebridge said.

“It’s a classic case of big multinationals having their way.”

Mr Shoebridge said a State Government planning green paper currently open to community input would be a “generational mistake” if the laws came to pass.

“Change in policy needs community pressure,” he said.

“We need to ensure local councils have power over local development plans.

“Taking away the right of the local community to have a say on the development going up next door is a major backwards step.”

Bega MP Andrew Constance was on gazetted leave this week, but responded to Mr Shoebridge’s claims that the community was being increasingly shut out of planning decisions.

“The ‘green paper’ to which he refers is a rewrite of the Planning Act that we committed to review with the clear aim of devolving decisions to a community level, to local government,” Mr Constance told the BDN.

“We just couldn’t continue with the convoluted set of planning instruments.

“The idea is to give greater clarity in local planning so people know where they stand.

“We’re not final on this – that’s why the green paper is up for consultation.

“What David may not realise is that 97 per cent of DAs (development applications) are already being delegated to council staff.

“Thirteen local government areas in Sydney have even established independent planning panels.