Development Approval in WA: When a Pet Business Needs None at All

In WA, the answer might be nothing at all

Most planning guides open by telling you what to lodge. Western Australia is the one place where the first question is whether there is anything to lodge, and for a lot of pet businesses the honest answer is no.

This guide is general information for Australian pet business owners. It is not legal, planning, accounting or financial advice, it does not take account of your circumstances, and it does not take account of your site. Australian development approval is set across state legislation, state planning instruments and local planning schemes, each published separately. This guide brings that fragmented material together in one place. It is based on publicly available information, verified on 9 August 2026, and linked at the point each fact is stated so you can read the original. We maintain those links and re-check them, but we do not control what those bodies publish, and planning instruments change. You remain responsible for your own position: confirm it with your local government or a qualified town planner, and make your own decision before you act. Petboost accepts no responsibility for any action taken on the basis of this article. Planning outcomes are site-specific and discretionary. Two identical businesses on two streets in the same council area can get different answers, and nothing in this guide predicts what an authority will decide. If anything here is inaccurate, tell us and we will correct it.

What it is called here, and who decides

It is called development approval, and your local government grants it. The Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage states that local governments "assess and/or determine the majority of development applications in Western Australia", by elected council or by officers under delegation (planning.wa.gov.au).

Every local planning scheme in the state carries the same deemed provisions, in Schedule 2 of the Planning and Development (Local Planning Schemes) Regulations 2015. Deemed means they form part of your council's scheme whether or not your council wrote them in, so the rules below work the same way in Perth as in Northam. The in-force consolidation is dated 3 November 2024 (legislation.wa.gov.au).

Clause 60 creates the requirement. The original uses dashes and lettered paragraphs, so the punctuation here is changed to run it as one sentence:

A person must not commence or carry out any works on, or use, land in the Scheme area unless the person has obtained the development approval of the local government under Part 8, or development approval is not required for the development under clause 61.

Using land is caught, not only building on it, so opening a salon in a shop that used to be a florist is development even if you never lift a hammer. But clause 61 is the other half of that sentence, and it is where WA pulls away from every other state.

There is no private certifier for development approval in WA. If you have read about New South Wales, where a private certifier can sign off a complying development certificate, there is no equivalent here. A private registered building surveyor does exist, but only under the Building Act 2011 and only for building permits, which answer a different question about the building work itself (legislation.wa.gov.au). WA's fast lane is not a certifier. It is that the approval is not required.

Everything turns on one letter in a table

Find your council's local planning scheme text, find the zoning table, then find the column for your zone and the row for your use class. The letter where they cross is your answer. Schedule 1 clause 18(2) defines them:

Two more subclauses matter. Clause 18(5) says that where a use is class P or class I the council "may not refuse an application for development approval for that use in that zone". And clause 18(3) is the tie-breaker where a business could be read into two classes at once: "A specific use class referred to in the zoning table is excluded from any other use class described in more general terms."

Your pathways in WA

The lane that matters: no approval at all

Clause 61(2)(b) removes the requirement for "development that is a class P use in relation to the zone in which the development is located" where there is no works component, or where approval is not required for the works component. Clause 61(5) adds that this "has effect despite the zoning table for this Scheme".

The other half is item 5 in the table of exempt works at clause 61(1), verbatim in full:

Internal building work that does not materially affect the external appearance of the building.

That carries a heritage condition, which is that the building is not in a heritage-protected place of the kinds the clause lists.

Put them together. A class P use, in a shop tenancy, with a fit-out that is internal only and does not materially change the outside of the building: item 5 exempts the works, which satisfies clause 61(2)(b)(ii), which exempts the use, which satisfies clause 60(b). No development approval is required at all. No form, no fee, no clock, no neighbours.

Key Takeaway: In WA the fast lane is not a faster application. It is no application.

The second lane: the exempt class D table

Clause 61(3) does the same for some class D uses. Item 1 of its table is a Shop in a commercial, centre or mixed use zone, on the condition that the "Net lettable area is no more than 300 m2". A class D shop of 300 square metres or less in one of those zones is exempt on the same terms, provided the works are exempt or there are none. Most grooming salons are well under 300 square metres. Whether your business is a shop is the next section, and it is not settled.

The trap, and the two switches

Clause 61(8) catches first-timers. An exemption that applies to the works does not decide whether approval is needed for the use, and an exemption for the use does not decide the works. Two questions, both to be cleared.

Clause 61(6) switches the exemptions off entirely where the site is in a special control area whose scheme provisions require approval, or in a designated bush fire prone area where the scheme's bush fire clause requires it. Ask about both by name.

If you do have to apply

Clause 75(1) gives the local government 60 days "after the day on which the application is accepted for assessment", or 90 days where the application is advertised or referred to another authority. The clock starts on acceptance, not lodgement, and clause 63A gives the council 7 days to accept it or tell you what to fix. Miss the deadline and clause 75(2) says the council "is to be taken to have refused to grant the development approval", which opens the appeal route below.

Two details to get right. Clause 63(1)(a)(v) requires your plans to show "the existing and proposed use of the site, including proposed hours of operation", so trading hours are a statutory part of a WA application and conditions get written against them. And clause 62(1)(b) requires the owner to sign, so a tenant needs the landlord's signature before lodging, not afterwards.

The fee, which WA actually publishes

Schedule 2 of the Planning and Development Regulations 2009 sets maximum fees. Your council may charge less, and may not charge more unless exempted (legislation.wa.gov.au).

That last row triples it, so a $295 change of use becomes $885. And the first row is the one to act on: a written answer from your council costs at most $73, the cheapest risk reduction anywhere in this guide.

The lane you can stop worrying about

Development Assessment Panels changed on 1 March 2024. The mandatory thresholds were removed and the system is opt-in above $2 million (planning.wa.gov.au). No salon fit-out comes near that, and you have to elect it.

What is a pet business called in a WA scheme

Working from home: this one is answered

The City of Cockburn publishes a page titled "Dog Grooming (Home Based)" that classifies the business for you. On a Home Occupation, verbatim: "You do not need Planning Approval, so long as you comply with the criteria outlined in the definition of a 'Home Occupation'." On a Home Business: "Planning Approval is required for a 'Home Business'", and a Home Business "is categorised as an 'A' land use under the City's Town Planning Scheme No.3", which "means that the planning application will be advertised to adjoining properties and landowners and occupiers as part of the assessment process" (cockburn.wa.gov.au).

That is one council's published position on its own scheme, not a statewide rule. It is also the only WA local government page we found that classifies home grooming directly, and it tells you which line you are staying on the right side of: no employees outside your household, a small floor area, no retail sale or display on the premises, no extra parking demand, and no effect on the amenity of the neighbourhood.

A shopfront salon: not published, and we are not going to guess

No WA local planning scheme, local planning policy, state department page or council page we could read states whether a commercial grooming salon in a retail tenancy is a "shop" or an "animal establishment". Both readings sit on the face of the definitions in Schedule 1 clause 38, and neither names grooming.

Shop covers premises "used to sell goods by retail, to hire goods, or to provide services of a personal nature, including hairdressing or beauty therapy services".

Animal establishment covers "premises used for the breeding, boarding, training or caring of animals for commercial purposes".

Grooming is a service of a personal nature in the ordinary retail sense. It is also arguably the caring of animals for commercial purposes. Clause 18(3) tells you that if a scheme lists both classes and grooming falls inside the specific one, the specific one wins. It does not tell you whether grooming falls inside it.

Here is why the unanswered question matters more than anything else in this article. Take a real, gazetted scheme, City of Canning Local Planning Scheme No. 42. In its zoning table, Shop is P in the Commercial, District Centre, Local Centre and Mixed Use zones, while Animal Establishment is X, not permitted, in eleven of the thirteen zones, and a D use only in Rural and Rural Residential (wa.gov.au). In that one scheme the classification is the difference between needing nothing at all and not being able to be approved anywhere urban. Those letters are Canning's, in Canning's scheme. Your council's table will have its own.

So put the question to your council in writing, before you sign anything: under your local planning scheme, is a dog grooming salon a "shop" or an "animal establishment" at this address, and what is the letter for that use in this zone?

If you disagree with the answer, section 252(2) of the Planning and Development Act 2005 lets an applicant apply to the State Administrative Tribunal for review of the responsible authority's decision as to "the classification of a use under the planning scheme", and separately as to "the permissibility of a use that is not listed under the planning scheme" (legislation.wa.gov.au). The classification itself is reviewable.

Councils state the change-of-use rule differently, so get yours in writing

The City of Cockburn writes that "Planning approval may be required when seeking to change the use of an existing building or land from one use to another" (cockburn.wa.gov.au). The City of Wanneroo writes that "All changes of use require Planning Approval from the City of Wanneroo" (wanneroo.wa.gov.au).

Both were read on 9 August 2026 and both are recorded here as read. We are not going to adjudicate between a council's published statement and a regulation. The practical point is that this is exactly the difference that makes a phone call worthless and a written answer valuable. Ask your own local government, in writing, and ask about clause 61 by name.

Existing use rights die after six months here

If a premises was lawfully used for something before the current scheme came in, Schedule 1 clause 22 lets that use continue even though the scheme would not permit it now. It is called a non-conforming use.

It ends quickly. Clause 22(2) removes the protection where the use "is discontinued" and "a period of 6 months, or a longer period approved by the local government, has elapsed since the discontinuance". That is the shortest discontinuance period in the country, and it matters most to exactly this reader: if you are taking over premises that has been sitting empty, the right you were counting on may already be gone.

Clause 23 protects continuing, not growing. Altering or extending a non-conforming use needs development approval, and that application must be advertised, which puts it on the 90 day clock.

If you are refused

The appeal body is the State Administrative Tribunal. Clause 76 makes a refusal, a grant subject to conditions, and a refusal to amend or cancel an approval all reviewable, by the applicant or by the owner of the land. Clause 77 is the cheaper first step that never reaches SAT: the owner can apply to the council to amend or delete a condition, for a maximum of $295.

The time limit is 28 days. SAT states it plainly: "An application must be lodged with SAT within 28 days of the date on which the original decision-maker gives notice of the decision", and you then have 7 days to give a copy to the decision-maker. SAT can extend that, but you have to ask and explain why (sat.justice.wa.gov.au).

The fee. SAT splits planning matters into Class 1, where the development is valued at less than $250,000, and Class 2 above that, so every pet business dispute will be Class 1. SAT's published summary of fees puts a Class 1 application at $927 and the hearing fee at $848, reduced to $100 each for an eligible individual (sat.justice.wa.gov.au). Set that against a $73 written advice fee and the case for asking first makes itself.

There are no third party appeal rights in Western Australia. The Department states it directly: "There are no third-party review rights in Western Australia (such as an adjacent landowner). There is, however, some scope under the SAT Act for a third party to become involved in a review initiated by an applicant, including a right to make a submission to SAT" (planning.wa.gov.au). A neighbour who objects during advertising gets a submission, not a veto, and cannot appeal your approval once you hold it.

What we could not verify

• How a shopfront grooming salon is classified in a WA local planning scheme. Not published. Every WA source we found addresses home-based grooming only, and neither model definition names grooming. We are not going to assert an answer no authority has stated.
• Whether the City of Cockburn's stated Home Business floor area matches its own Town Planning Scheme No. 3. The City's page and the model provisions state different figures. We quote the City's page as its own statement and did not reconcile them.
• Any dollar figure for a local planning scheme amendment. The regulation sets a calculation method based on staff hours, not an amount.
• Professional costs. What a town planner or an acoustic consultant charges is a market price, not a published figure.

Before you sign

1. Get your council's scheme text and read the letter where your zone meets the use class you think you are.
2. Ask the classification question in writing. Planning advice is capped at $73.
3. Ask about clause 61 by name. If your use is P and the fit-out is internal only, ask them to confirm no approval is required.
4. Check the two switches, special control area and bush fire prone area.
5. Make the lease conditional on the planning answer. A conditional clause costs nothing.
6. If the premises has been empty for six months, do not rely on the previous use continuing.

Verified 9 August 2026 against the sources below. Planning instruments change, and planning decisions are made on the merits of each site, so nothing here predicts what your authority will decide. Check the linked source and confirm your own position with your council or a qualified town planner before you act.

Sources

• Western Australian Legislation, Planning and Development (Local Planning Schemes) Regulations 2015: legislation.wa.gov.au
• Western Australian Legislation, Planning and Development Regulations 2009: legislation.wa.gov.au
• Western Australian Legislation, Planning and Development Act 2005: legislation.wa.gov.au
• Western Australian Legislation, Building Act 2011: legislation.wa.gov.au
• Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage, Decision-makers in the WA Planning System: planning.wa.gov.au
• Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage, Review of planning decisions: planning.wa.gov.au
• Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage, How Development Assessment Panels work: planning.wa.gov.au
• State Administrative Tribunal, How SAT handles review applications of planning decisions: sat.justice.wa.gov.au
• State Administrative Tribunal, Summary of Fees: sat.justice.wa.gov.au
• Government of Western Australia, City of Canning Local Planning Scheme No. 42 scheme text: wa.gov.au
• City of Cockburn, Dog Grooming (Home Based): cockburn.wa.gov.au
• City of Cockburn, Change of Use Approval: cockburn.wa.gov.au
• City of Wanneroo, Business land use permission: wanneroo.wa.gov.au