Plea to keep hands off resource act

Keith Beautrais

The Government is in danger of "shoving through" dangerous and unneeded changes to the Resource Management Act, local conservationist Keith Beautrais says.

The National-led Government's attempt to change the act failed in its last term, because the Maori and United Future parties would not support it. This term, with the help of Act's David Seymour, it could pass the changes.

The intention, according to Environment Minister Nick Smith, is to keep environmental controls while making it easier to build houses and create new jobs. The 10 changes he has outlined include greater weight for property rights, national planning templates and recognition for urban planning.

National estimates the Resource Management Act (RMA) has added $30 billion to building costs in the past decade. Mr Smith says the changes will make it easier for councils to approve developments and speed new house construction in Auckland.

Mr Beautrais, a Forest and Bird member, said Mr Smith's speech was "long on rhetoric and short on detail" and National was using the RMA as "a club to beat progressive thinking with".

It blamed the act for consents being declined, but he said many of them did not stack up for other reasons. Changes to the RMA could stop people having input into what happened around them.

"Everybody wants things to be less bureaucratic, and everybody wants to be able to have a say when things affect them."

Auckland's housing situation was different from the rest of the country's, he said.

"Should the Auckland urgency that they're always on about be used as an excuse to change things in other parts of the country?"

The RMA was better than the law that preceded it and lots of case law had built up around it. Changing it would create a "field day" for lawyers, who would build up new case law.

The new slant proposed would put economic growth before sustainability, and sustainability was more important, Mr Beautrais said. "Environmental sustainability is what everything else is built on."

Major pieces of legislation like the RMA should be changed seldom, and had to be done right. They needed agreement between political parties.

"We wouldn't want a bare majority of National and Act shoving through something that's one-sided."

He said people needed to look at both sides of the matter.

"People will need to have a good close look at what's proposed and be given lots of time to make submissions and those submissions should be taken very seriously."