Brisbane City Council's planning chief has fended off allegations new departmental procedures will shroud high level development applications in secrecy.
New standard operating procedures were implemented in the council's planning department last week that allow sensitive documents submitted as part of major development applications to be left off council's publicly searchable development portal PD Online.
A new flag system will signal to council officers that there is further documentation available that is not publicly accessible.
Planning chairman Amanda Cooper said the new procedures were designed to protect sensitive private information such as medical documents and court orders that often accompanied applications.
"Council has got really strict rules about what must be uploaded and that has not changed in any way, shape or form," she said.
"All information that is publicly accessible now will still be publicly accessible."
But Opposition Leader Milton Dick said it paved the way for council to hide an array of documents relating to important developments across Brisbane.
"This new policy actively discourages planning officers from recording sensitive and important information, about how planning decisions are made on high level and sometimes contentious development applications," he said.
"How can Brisbane residents have any confidence in council's development assessment process if the Lord Mayor is bringing in policies to get around disclosing crucial decision relevant to planning decisions in Brisbane?"
Cr Dick questioned the timing of the implementation of the new procedures, coming soon after it was revealed council reached an infrastructure agreement with the previous owner of an Upper Kedron land parcel that significantly boosted its sale price to a developer.
"Brisbane's development assessment process has already been brought into disrepute by revelations that Brisbane City Council tried to keep secret an important infrastructure agreement over sensitive land in Upper Kedron," he said.
"Common sense says that all information relevant to making a planning decision should be on the file."
But Cr Cooper said the new system was borne from the implementation of the new City Plan on July 1, in which all development applications are done electronically.
"This is nothing new, the process is as it has always been, all that information is still available," she said.
"This is really just about making sure we have got officers being able to look and see that if there is information relating to a privacy matter or court issued approval, they are carefully considered, we don't want to be not letting officers have information."
But Cr Dick said it would lead to all manner of important documents being withheld.
"Residents have a right to know that their concerns are being listened to and that decisions are being made on the facts; not by undocumented and secret conversations within Brisbane City council," he said.
"Future development decisions shouldn't be made following conversations; they should only be made as a result of a through and transparent assessment of the facts on file."
