RMA revamp set to reduce local power

By KEVIN TAYLOR

Use more national policy statements and environmental standards, with priority in developing them for infrastructure issues such as energy and transport.

Councils would have to keep a register of iwi authorities and their tribal areas. Iwi would only have the rights of any other person at consent hearings.

Environment Court to focus only on matters in dispute, rather than starting the whole hearing process over again.

Environment ministry would take stronger role in administering law.

An overhaul of planning law will give the Government greater involvement in decision-making on projects of national interest such as power stations and motorways.

In a bold move to take political heat out of damaging debate on the Resource Management Act and its perceived role in blocking big infrastructure projects, the Government has adopted a local government proposal to extend ministerial powers.

The Government plans to allow councils or applicants to ask the Environment Minister to "call in" big projects and send them to boards of inquiry for decisions.

Appeals would be allowed only on decisions on points of law - a departure from current practice where arguments about projects can be relitigated at Environment Court hearings.

The proposal, revealed by the Herald in July, was one of several ways the Government planned to become involved in decision-making on important infrastructure projects.

Other ways will include providing a Government submission on the national interest to a hearing, funding an independent co-ordinator to ensure the process runs effectively and appointing someone to a hearings panel.

Associate Environment Minister David Benson-Pope said he expected applicants seeking to call in decisions would include state-owned enterprises with big projects to advance.

Asked if local environmental concerns might have to give way to the national interest, he said: "It is not inconceivable that in major nationwide infrastructural projects, the national interest might be the predominant factor."

The moves are part of a review of the law that became public after state-owned Meridian Energy axed its $1.2 billion Aqua power project on the lower Waitaki River in March.

In May, Finance Minister Michael Cullen said the national benefits of projects should be weighed against local costs in the RMA, sparking concern the law's purposes and principles section would be rewritten.

But the Government has steered clear of that, winning praise yesterday from the Green Party.

In other moves, the Government plans to develop more national policy statements and environmental standards to give better direction and consistency across local government.

Mr Benson-Pope said priority would be given to developing statements and standards on energy, telecommunications, transport, and water and wastewater infrastructure.

Business New Zealand chief executive Simon Carlaw said the devil would be in the details, which were still to come, but he was pleased at the focus on infrastructure development.

But Forest and Bird spokesman Geoff Keey said the public and environmentalists should be concerned, especially about boards of inquiry, because that represented an erosion of local decision-making power.

It was the kind of principle used in the National Development Act, which saw the Clyde Dam project rammed through.

"The Government ... is unable to provide us with any evidence the changes are needed," Mr Keey said.

National leader Don Brash said the changes were minor and failed to address concerns about the delays, costs and uncertainties with the act.

Ministry for the Environment:
Improving the Resource Management Act: 2004 programme