TPC approves Chambroad's $65m Bellerive hotel, bypassing council

The Tasmanian Planning Commission’s independent panel approved Chambroad Australia’s $65m hotel at Kangaroo Bay, Bellerive, on 20 October, attaching 43 conditions to the permit. The decision moves the project past Clarence City Council, which rejected the same scheme in 2023, and lands while the council is still contesting Chambroad’s ownership of the site in the Supreme Court.

Why it matters

The approval shows a developer can still reach a construction-ready permit through the TPC even where a council has already refused the application and disputes who owns the underlying land. Clarence council rejected Chambroad’s hotel in 2023, and the then planning minister Michael Ferguson declined to fast-track it at the time. Referral to the independent commission has now delivered the outcome council assessment did not.

For other Tasmanian hotel and tourism proposals stuck behind council refusals, the Kangaroo Bay outcome is a signal that TPC referral remains a live path around local assessment, even with litigation over site ownership still running in parallel. The approval came four days after BESIX Watpac was named preferred builder for the $1.13b Macquarie Point stadium across the Derwent, the other large Tasmanian job now moving. For hotel operators, a 155-room, 4.5-star addition on the eastern shore would add room supply outside the Hobart CBD once built.

The numbers

Chambroad bought the Kangaroo Bay waterfront parcel from Clarence council in 2017 for $2.44m and has spent close to $20m on the project since, according to Pulse Tasmania. The approved 4.5-star hotel will have 155 rooms. The permit allows 91 car parks, which Pulse Tasmania reports is 167 short of what the council’s planning scheme requires, implying a scheme requirement of roughly 258 spaces.

Clarence council moved to buy the land back in early 2023 after refusing the development application, and that buy-back claim is now before the Supreme Court. Chambroad project director Greg Hudson said the company was “assessing those requirements” on the parking shortfall, and called on councillors to resolve the litigation so construction could begin. Premier Jeremy Rockliff has pointed to an estimated 100 construction jobs and more than 400 ongoing roles tied to the hotel once it is built.

What’s next

The Supreme Court action over the land’s ownership remains unresolved, and a ruling against Chambroad could unwind the commercial basis for the permit regardless of the planning approval already issued. Clarence council chief executive Ian Nelson has said the TPC decision should have been deferred until the ownership question was settled first, and the council has indicated it remains committed to pursuing its claim to the site.

Opposition figures have also queued up criticism of the process. Labor’s Dean Winter branded the TPC assessment a sham, while Planning Minister Kerry Vincent maintains the proposal had been properly tested through the commission’s independent review.

Until the court proceeding concludes, Chambroad holds a permit while title to the site is contested, and other operators watching the Bellerive waterfront will be weighing how much a TPC approval is worth against an open title dispute. The next formal step is a Supreme Court hearing date on the land ownership claim, which has not yet been set down publicly.