Philippa Stevenson: Team finds vacuum at the RMA centre is being filled

COMMENT


If the Resource Management Act was a piece of food it would be a doughnut - the kind with a gaping hole in the middle.

In the 13 years since it was enacted, regional and district councils have been hamstrung by a lack of Government policy on matters of national importance.

When in 1998, after three years of investigation, Waikato University's International Global Change Institute (IGCI) suggested ways to rectify our environmental planning system, improving the national policy framework was top of its list.

"Except for the coast, councils have had little guidance from central government on matters of national importance because national policy statements have not been prepared," said the team headed by Professor Neil Ericksen.

The IGCI has done the most in-depth study of the contentious RMA.

In 1995 the international team of researchers set out to find whether the 1991 law that shifted the major responsibility for managing our environment from central to local government was achieving its objectives.

The first phase of the study evaluated the quality of district and regional policy and plans, the second looked at how well plans were implemented through resource consents, and the current stage - to be completed in 2006 - is examining just what effect, if any, the RMA has had on our environment.

The Government's latest proposed changes to the act are doing the rounds as Associate Environment Minister David Benson-Pope takes the result of a four-month review out for public discussion (tonight in Auckland).

Jan Crawford, co-author of the IGCI report and a planner with 30 years experience, has looked at the Government's proposals to see how they stack up against the researchers' recommendations.

The review's proposal for greater use of national policy statements and environmental standards "fills the hole in the doughnut, the vacuum at the centre of the RMA," she says.

But greater Government involvement in local decision-making through submissions and a beefed up call-in process is "a bit ad hoc".

"If I was the Government I'd feel safer having a national policy statement rather than waiting to be surprised."

In the act's early days, the Environment Ministry did make submissions on proposed district plans, but so did other government agencies which ultimately only confused councils as to the Government's intentions, Crawford says.

High on IGCI's wish list was capability building, especially for small councils, so the Government's proposal to strengthen the Environment Ministry's leadership role in order to improve performance, provide greater national guidance and promote user education "gets a big tick".

The crunch will be whether the dollars follow, says Crawford. Benson-Pope will have to persuade the Cabinet to come up with more funds, and a more authoritative ministry will have to anticipate what is required to improve the system and be proactive.


How much will it need?

The ministry's current best practice programme has funding of $200,000, of which $150,000 is spent on a quality planning website. To deliver in future, Crawford suggests several million dollars will be needed to provide the assistance outlined in the review to councils, iwi and business.

She says the proposal to improve council consent decision-making is merely "tweaking" and unlikely to assuage business concerns.

The intention was to provide certainty in the consent process but business wanted certainty of outcome.

Crawford welcomes new inquisitorial powers for councils conducting hearings but says most proposals to make the Environment Court more efficient will make little difference.

They simply codified actions the court had already taken.

But requiring the court to have regard for the local consent authority's decision and to focus only on matters in contention was "long overdue".

The IGCI study found that building iwi capacity to provide consultation was crucial but, Crawford says, the review sends a mixed message.

On the one hand it suggests Maori be treated like any other affected party for consent applications, but the RMA section requiring councils to take into account the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi remains unchanged.

She predicts Te Puni Kokiri will have difficulty providing a definitive register of iwi authorities and tribal areas as disputes are likely to continue to arise.

"In any case, planners are used to dealing with all sorts of community interests. For instance, various environmental groups sometimes have differing aims and responsibilities. Councils are used to dealing with pluralities in their communities. It's an ambivalence we should just live with."

Under the review, regional councils will have a greater role in strategic planning through their regional policy statements.

District and regional plans will only be required to state policies and rules with the benefit, it's proposed, of making plans simple and shorter.

In effect, Crawford says, regional councils would be telling district councils what they have to do and, by implication, what they should spend - a change likely to impact on the often already tense partnership between the two.


Ministry for the Environment

Waikato University


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