How I Broke the System — Lawfully

Introduction

For over 30 years, the TRZ2 zoned front block at 7 Cullen Court, Spotswood sat idle — ignored, unmaintained, and misclassified. When I lawfully activated the site for trailer hire under Section 6(3) of the Planning and Environment Act 1987 (Vic), I didn’t just use the land. I exposed a structural blind spot in Victoria’s planning system.

This post outlines the 9 key moves I made — each of them entirely legal, but deeply unorthodox — that collectively broke the bureaucratic pattern and is likely triggering statewide discomfort.

1. Activating TRZ2 Land Without a Permit

I lawfully activated my mothers TRZ2-zoned property for trailer hire, without a permit, by proving it was a transport use and invoking Section 6(3). Council expected a permit. I gave them none — because the law didn’t require it. The TRZ2 zoning is ultra vires. Neither The Department of Transport nor the Hobsons Bay Council has proper governance over the illegally zoned block that is my mother's TRZ2 zoned property. That makes me the de facto governor of the land. A role I didn't ask for but stepped into in order not only to highlight the TRZ2 zoning mistake on my mother's property and to put it on the agenda for rezoning at the ministerial level but also to force the system to improve.

2. Publishing FOI Responses to Expose Zoning Errors

I filed targeted Freedom of Information requests with The Department of Transport to uncover that Clause 23 consent had never been issued. Then I published the evidence on a public legal archive, undermining the entire TRZ2 zoning classification.

3. Building a Website Like a Legal Data Room

This website isn’t a blog or protest site — it’s a structured legal case, written in Council’s own format. It includes risk matrices, zoning reform proposals, FOI archives, and rebuttals. I did this in the hope that the site will serve as a reference point for internal staff so policies and procedures can be updated not just at Council but certainly at The Department of Transport - for the good of all Victorians and not so I could personally exploit the opportunity at a higher level for personal gain - eg by working with a large developer like Meriton.

4. Using EXIF Metadata to Prove Activation Date

When I took the first activation photo on April 18th, 2025, I preserved the full EXIF metadata. That evidence — embedded at the hardware level — preemptively kills any challenge to when site use commenced. As a Computer Scientist I am fully qualified to not only do this but audit it as well.

5. Naming the Flaw: Ultra Vires Zoning

Most residents might feel something is wrong. I named it precisely. I explained how VC205 (and previous road zoning amendments) applied to 7 Cullen Court were ultra vires — beyond legal power — because no consent for the TRZ2 zoning was on file from The Head Transport Victoria and the title instrument proved private ownership.

6. Writing Council-Style and Department of Transport-Style Memos Before They Did

I’ve authored internal-style risk assessments, planning policy briefings, and legal interpretations — before either agency published a formal response (because why not help? I'm Bitcoin retired since 2021). My writing speaks their language and it does so because I am a former long serving federal government employee who worked at the cutting edge of science and technology at DST Group for 21 years.

7. Triggering Institutional Discomfort with Just 3 Trailers

The block is only 112 square metres or thereabouts. I parked three galvanized cage trailers. Yet that simple act has likely destabilized TRZ2 as a zoning category, and forced senior officers into audit mode. Small land, massive system disruption.

8. Branding the Legal Victory as a Business

Rather than approaching this as a personal dispute (disputes greatly bore me), I framed it through the lens of Spotswood Trailers — a transport-related, lawful, registered with ASIC business. It rebranded compliance as commerce. But why does a Computer Scientist want to own and run a trailer yard? Great question, i'm glad you asked - this is not about trailers. It's my case study in helping to improve governance for the benefit of all Victorians.

9. Remaining Calm While Dismantling Bureaucratic Logic

I never ranted. I never raised my voice (except perhaps a little at the Council Compliance Officer as I was watering my mothers flowers). I let the law, documents, timestamps, and logic do the talking. And in doing so, I’ve set a precedent that is harder to ignore than to contest.

What started as a desire to use my mother’s small block legally has become something larger: a live demonstration of how one citizen, acting lawfully and systematically, can expose planning contradictions that have gone unchecked for decades.

This is what happens when the system isn’t built to handle someone who actually bothers to read the law — and follows it better than the agencies do.

I might add - in this early era of Artificial Intelligence - Government planning agencies better start catching up quick smart because large language models exist today right now in real time that I could also use if I wanted to in order to find every legal loophole in every Victorian Planning Provision not just in TRZ2. Smart developers are probably already doing as such to make extraordinary profits or if they're not they will be soon.