The Supreme Court held that VCAT erred in finding it had jurisdiction to review an EPA permit refusal where the applicant sought conditions that would change the waste classification from Category A to Category B priority waste, as this transformed the application into one the EPA had never determined. Applying Hanson and Addicoat v Fox (No 2), the Court held that VCAT adopted too broad a level of abstraction by treating the decision as simply an A16 permit application; the correct approach required a more granular analysis recognising that the change in waste category was substantively different, meaning VCAT would be acting as an original decision-maker rather than reviewing the EPA's decision. The Court also held that the EPA's failure to object to earlier formal amendment applications was irrelevant to the jurisdictional question.
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