The rollout of the interim Erosion Management Overlay (EMO7) across the Mornington Peninsula has put a spotlight back on a central issue raised by the McCrae landslide inquiry: how long Mornington Peninsula Shire held landslide susceptibility information before meaningful planning controls were expanded.
Council has presented EMO7 as an urgent, necessary step following the inquiry. But Council’s own material and inquiry findings point to a longer and more troubling story, one where risk information existed for years while planning controls lagged behind.
This is now playing out in real time for residents, with thousands of properties captured under EMO7 and Council acknowledging the mapping contains anomalies that still need to be corrected.
Council had landslide data years before EMO7
EMO7 relies on a landslide susceptibility assessment prepared for the Shire in 2012.
The McCrae landslide inquiry examined how this information was handled and found the Shire did not update erosion management overlay schedules to reflect high-susceptibility areas identified in the earlier assessment.
The inquiry described this as an unsatisfactory failure and a missed opportunity to reduce risk long before the 2025 landslide.
That is the context residents are now weighing when Council asks the community to trust that the latest overlay will be refined quickly and fairly.
State pressure was clear, but Council still owned the pathway
In late 2025, the State pushed for urgent action on an interim overlay and made it clear it expected progress within weeks.
Soon after, Council formally pursued a ministerial process to introduce the amendment.
A separate local news outlet has raised questions about whether the State is seeking to shift responsibility for the rollout. The publicly available paper trail points to shared responsibility, but it also underlines a key point: the Shire’s delay in acting on known landslide susceptibility risk predates the State’s intervention by years.
Mapping anomalies acknowledged after the fact
Council now concedes the EMO7 mapping contains anomalies and says it intends to seek revised mapping and a revised overlay.
It has also flagged fee waivers in some circumstances.
For many affected residents, the problem is not only the existence of an overlay. It is that the overlay arrived broadly, quickly, and with acknowledged errors, after a long period where risk controls did not keep pace with available information.
Council has not provided a clear public explanation for why known limitations in the underlying assessment were not resolved before EMO7 was applied so widely.
Hastings MP raises concerns
Hastings MP Paul Mercurio has publicly questioned the accuracy of the mapping and the process used to approve the overlay.
MPSC submitted the 2012 Erosion overlay plan to the minister knowing it was completely inaccurate. Additionally the MPSC were responsible for updating the plan every five years – something they neglected to do. Had they done so the plan they submitted to the minister would have been up to date and accurate. The fault is not the planning ministers the fault lies at the feet of Council inaction.
Paul Mercurio MP
His comments align with broader public frustration that residents are now dealing with permit triggers, added costs, and uncertainty, while the accuracy issues are still being worked through.
Minister and department did not respond
STPL News emailed the Minister for Planning and the Department of Transport and Planning on 7 January 2026 seeking clarification about the approval process and mapping issues raised publicly at the time.
No response was received.
What happens next
Council says EMO7 will be refined. That promise now sits against the Shire’s track record, as examined by the McCrae inquiry, where risk information existed but planning controls were not expanded in time to prevent the consequences the community is now facing.
Until revised mapping is completed and a permanent approach is settled, EMO7 remains in force.
For residents, the issue is no longer only landslide and erosion risk. It is whether Council can be trusted to act on expert warnings when they first land on the desk, not after disaster forces the issue.
