Reports that Labor's own MPs are revolting against the Allan Government's data centre spree, and new mapping showing almost 300 of these facilities already built, under construction or proposed across the country, confirm what Family First warned two weeks ago: no Victorian suburb is safe from a planning system that is being bypassed, not followed.
The Age reported this week that Victorian Labor MPs are breaking ranks with the Allan Government's aggressive push to attract data centres, as residents in outer-suburban and regional seats grow increasingly anxious about the AI infrastructure boom on their doorstep. Federal Labor MPs admitted they have been "inundated" by residents alarmed at a proposed 350-hectare, 2.4-gigawatt data centre at Plumpton — a facility that would draw more electricity than the state's largest coal-fired power station. In Geelong, NextDC has already snapped up 169 hectares of land earmarked for more than 2,000 new homes. Yet these projects are increasingly being approved through the Government's Development Facilitation Program, a fast-track mechanism that sidelines local councils and strips residents of their right to appeal at VCAT.
"When Labor's own MPs are begging the Allan Government to slow down, you know families have every right to be worried. Two weeks ago we warned that West Footscray and Geelong were just the start. Now we've got a facility bigger than any coal power station proposed for Plumpton, and residents finding out from the newspaper, not the Government," said Family First's Jane Foreman
This is not new territory for Family First. On 12 July, Jane Foreman, Dianne Colbert and Matt Emerson called out the bipartisan silence on Victoria's unplanned data centre boom, highlighting how residents near NextDC's M3 facility in West Footscray were never properly consulted before diesel generators were installed metres from their homes, and how the same company's purchase of land at Lovely Banks has put more than 2,000 planned Geelong homes at risk. A fortnight on, new reporting from the Herald Sun has mapped almost 300 data centres either operating, under construction or proposed across Australia, with Victoria hosting 22 per cent of the national total — the second-largest share behind NSW.
"Almost 300 of these facilities across Australia, more than a fifth of them in Victoria, and every one of them able to skip council and skip VCAT under this Government's fast-track program, said Matt Emerson. If you live anywhere near old industrial land or vacant paddocks on Melbourne's fringe, you could be next, and under the Development Facilitation Program, you may not get a say."
Ms Foreman says the gap between Premier Jacinta Allan's rhetoric and reality is growing by the week. At budget estimates in May, the Premier vowed Victoria wanted to attract "as many as we possibly can" of these facilities, provided they went through proper channels — yet the Development Facilitation Program is doing the opposite, waving through 24-hour industrial developments that use tens of millions of litres of water a day and enough electricity to power tens of thousands of households, without the consultation an ordinary planning permit would require.
"The Premier says she wants proper channels. The Development Facilitation Program is not a proper channel — it's a shortcut that cuts councils and VCAT out of the picture entirely. Families in West Footscray already live with the industrial hum. Families near Plumpton, near Geelong, and near every other patch of fringe land in Melbourne's north and west deserve to know if they're next, before the bulldozers turn up."
Family First says Victoria cannot afford three more years of a planning system that treats entire communities as an afterthought. Family First is renewing its call for an immediate moratorium on data centre approvals near residential areas, mandatory community consultation before any permit is issued within a kilometre of a home, and independent health and environmental assessments for existing facilities, while urging Victorians to use their vote in November to give Family First a strong voice in the Legislative Council — one that will fight for a planning system Victorians can trust.
"Every Victorian deserves to know if a data centre is coming to their street before the land is sold, not after, said Ms Colbert. Labor and the Liberals have both gone quiet because neither wants to upset the tech sector. Family First won't. In November, Victorians can elect a voice in the Legislative Council that will fix this planning free-for-all and put families ahead of multi-nation corporations."
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