Last year there were complaints about freedom campers at parks making a mess.
Last year there were complaints about freedom campers at parks making a mess.
Media reports over the holiday period have again highlighted the challenge to rural New Zealand from the influx of freedom campers.
In many places facilities at popular sites have been overwhelmed.
Other high-profile stories covered situations where farmers were left to sort out the mess left by campers on, or crossing their land.
Federated Farmers local government spokeswoman Katie Milne says tourism is at record levels and freedom camping in particular is on the rise, with 44,000 international visitorscamping last summer.
"The Government is making plenty in GST but doing little to fund the needs of small communities in need of significant investment to cope. While the Government has set up a 40-member working group, and has started allocating grants from its new $12m regional tourism facilities fund, there's little confidence this is a serious attempt to fix things," she says.
"We appreciate the provision of a $12m fund to help councils pay for some toilets but at that level the fund seems like a damp tea towel on a bonfire.
"The government needs to move quickly on calls for a sustainable response, in particular new revenue mechanisms for local councils in addition to rates. Rates based on property values are completely hopeless in this situation.
"You can't rate a campervan, and Department of Conservation land is non-rateable yet attracts freedom campers."
