Gary Taylor: Checks needed on council

Opinion

With a large new Auckland council managing the region's environment from 2010, it's important to maintain checks and balances to ensure it acts in the interests of local people and the environment.

One source of support for communities is the Resource Management Act. It enables them to have a say on what kind of place they want to live in and it allows them to challenge council decisions on their district plan. But the Government plans to change all that and to dramatically reduce local people's rights.

It proposes to disallow appeals to the Environment Court on the content of plans unless special permission is obtained. The consequences of this in the new Auckland Super City are far-reaching. The Auckland council will have a great deal of power. This proposed amendment to the RMA would give it much more.

The Environment Court is a specialist tribunal highly skilled in deciding the merits of cases brought before it. It consists of a judge plus commissioners with environmental expertise.

Limiting the right to go to court on the merits of the district plan would remove an important quality check and leave the council free from independent scrutiny. It would reduce the rights of community boards, local resident groups and individuals to challenge the content of the plan which decides what development can occur and where.

It appears that Environment Minister Dr Nick Smith may himself be having second thoughts about the proposal. At a recent Environmental Defence Society seminar he acknowledged that it was a "tricky" area.

There are other measures in the RMA amendment bill that will have a further "chilling" effect on public access to the Environment Court. More financial hurdles are being created: the filing fee for appeals has just increased from $55 to $500 and security for costs is being reinstated. The right to appear as a party will be constrained and public notification of proposals will be reduced.

All these measures undermine one of the great strengths of the RMA - its participatory and democratic nature - and need revisiting by the parliamentary select committee.

The bill is not all bad. The RMA is 18 years old and needs a tune-up. Other measures will reduce delays in getting consents and simplify many of the complexities. A fast-track for major infrastructure projects like Auckland's transport upgrades can be made to work while still allowing communities to have a say.

Prior to the election, the National Party presented itself as blue-green, as progressive on environmental issues. It needs to live up to those worthy goals. A good start would be preserving open access to the Environment Court.

* Gary Taylor is chairman of the Environmental Defence Society: www.eds.org.nz