Edward Campbell
Clayton Utz
Ed is listed by Best Lawyers and Doyle’s Guide and has been recognised by Best Lawyers as Lawyer of the Year numerous times for both Real Property (Canberra) and Leasing Law (Canberra).
Ed has almost 20 years’ experience advising governments, landlords, tenants, lenders and developers on the full spectrum of property law. Ed acts for the Commonwealth and Territory governments and the private sector in major real estate transactions, leases, retirement living transactions and property development.
Department of Defence: acting for Defence a number of complex transactions including:
- pre-commitment lease arrangements involving several leases and a bespoke D&C development agreement for lease addressing significant program and construction risk allocation issues and a complex yield-on-cost rental formula, and
- several acquisitions and disposals including on-market and off-the market transactions, analysis of the Commonwealth Property Disposal Policy, Lands Acquisition Act and the Australian Capital Territory (Planning and Land Management) Act and addressing issues relating to development of road infrastructure, divestment and contamination issues.
Suburban Land Agency: advising the SLA in relation to the West Belconnen Joint Venture. This is a major development PPP known as Ginninderry. It is the first ACT/NSW cross-border development, totalling over 1,600 hectares which will create 4 new suburbs (3 in the ACT and 1 in NSW) with involving the delivery of approximately 11,500 new dwellings. The matter involved consideration of legal issues relating to the JV structure, the SLA’s enabling legislation and development delivery issues, including in relation to the cross-border interaction between governments.
Major commercial property transactions: acted for several institutional real estate clients on high-profile, high value capital transactions in the ACT over many years including commercial office building acquisitions and disposal for Lendlease, Brookfield, Dexus, AMP and Challenger.
ACT retirement living portfolio: Ed is heavily involved in the ACT retirement living sector. He has acted for the largest retirement village operators in the Territory including Keyton, Goodwin Aged Care Services and Hindmarsh Retirement, providing regulatory advice, structuring and establishment of retirement villages, acting on village sales and acquisitions, acting on residential aged care facility acquisitions and on the day-to-day transactional requirements of operators.
Department of Finance: finance is the lead agency for the Commonwealth Property Management Framework. Ed has prepared a report advising Finance on updates to the Commonwealth National Lease suite to achieve operational efficiencies and make the CNL more acceptable in the commercial leasing market. He applied his understanding and experience gained in undertaking several hundred leasing transactions for government and private sector clients to prepare the report and implement its recommendations. Refining the CNL has given Ed unique, first-hand experience with the terms of the CNL.
Services Australia: advising the agency on 100+ leases, renewals and surrenders of lease throughout Australia at any one time. As well as project managing that workload, Ed commonly provides more complex real estate-related advice including in relation to pre-commitment leases and interpreting the CNL.
Defence Housing Australia (DHA): acted for DHA in relation to the application of State and Territory residential tenancy legislation. This matter involved a review of State and Territory RTAs, preparation of a compendium of relevant RTA provisions; consideration of the application of State and Territory legislation to a Commonwealth entity and advising on strategic issues relating to the application of RTAs and the form of the DHA residential tenancy terms.
Suburban Land Agency: advised the SLA in relation to the Denman Prospect Stage 3 Land Release. This is an englobo land release set to deliver suburb-wide residential and commercial development sites.
City Renewal Authority: advised the City Renewal Authority on the sale of Block 40 Section 100 City, a complex land sale project undertaken by the ACT Government.
Norrebro development in Watson: acting for HTI on its Norrebro development in Watson. The matter involves the creation of a multi-layered title on the subdivided land including the establishment of a Community Title Scheme and 12 separate units plans within the precinct. This matter involves complex subdivision and titling issues requiring the development of a bespoke marketing contract and advice on the requirements of planning, community title and unit title legislation.