Barbara McKenzie
stovouno.org
The West Coast
After a Department of Conservation appeal to the Environment Court in 2012, the West Coast Regional Council was ordered to add a further 215 schedule 2 wetlands to its Soil and Water Plan. It is estimated about 5000ha of wetlands on private land are affected, with landowners required to pay for ecological assessments to see if the land qualifies for full protection under schedule 1. The government is refusing to pay compensation.
West Coaster Tony Barrett has seen 70% of his 607-hectare block designated as an SNA. Much of the land is now undeveloped, having a history of passing from its original bush-clad state, to being cleared, dug over and mined for gold, then left to gorse and scrub, which has provided host to regenerating bush. The SNA designation means that Barrett or subsequent owners ‘would need resource management consent from the Department of Conservation to fell trees, run stock, convert to dairy and possibly to pick moss’
DomPost, Wednesday, February 19, 2020
There is an expectation that West Coast residents will be particularly hard hit when the government strengthens SNA provisions (see below, ‘Proposed National Policy Statement on Indigenous Biodiversity’).
Are SNAs legal?
SNAs represent an hitherto unseen assault on private property rights, which has not been discussed and approved by the public, and whose legality is questionable. There is now a convention, promoted by councils and environmental agencies, that the SNAs are based on the RMA, that the Act requires that councils take control of private land to protect (and restore) biodiversity. For example:
‘The Resource Management Act 1991 places obligations on local authorities to protect and maintain indigenous biodiversity on land in private tenure. However, how this should be done is not explicitly prescribed. Authorities are guided by a variety of means (e.g. ecological guidance and case law), and implement their responsibilities to varying degrees and with inconsistent success.’ (Advances in the identification and assessment of ecologically significant habitats in two areas of contrasting biodiversity loss in New Zealand)
Likewise, email correspondence from both the GWRC and the environmental NGO Forest & Bird confirms that their SNA policies rely on the RMA.
‘RMA Section 6(c) directs councils (under sections 30 and 31) to protect significant biodiversity within their jurisdictions’ (GWRC); ‘Section 6(c) of the RMA places a responsibility on Councils to protect “areas of significant indigenous vegetation and significant habitats of indigenous fauna” as a matter of “national importance” – these areas are usually referred to as “significant natural areas” (SNAs) in District Plans’
Forest & Bird
SNA Policies are NOT based on the cited provisions of the RMA
Section 6 of the Resource Management Act, Matters of national importance states:
In achieving the purpose of this Act, all persons exercising functions and powers under it, in relation to managing the use, development, and protection of natural and physical resources, shall recognise and provide for the following matters of national importance:
(c) the protection of areas of significant indigenous vegetation and significant habitats of indigenous fauna:
Not mentioned by either correspondent but affecting not only the West Coast but landowners in the Wellington Region is 6 (a):
(a) the preservation of the natural character of the coastal environment (including the coastal marine area), wetlands, and lakes and rivers and their margins, and the protection of them from inappropriate subdivision, use, and development:
Section 5 of The Resource Management Act, Purpose and principles, states:
(1) The purpose of this Act is to promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources.
(2) In this Act, sustainable management means managing the use, development, and protection of natural and physical resources in a way, or at a rate, which enables people and communities to provide for their social, economic, and cultural well-being and for their health and safety while—
(a) sustaining the potential of natural and physical resources (excluding minerals) to meet the reasonably foreseeable needs of future generations; and
(b) safeguarding the life-supporting capacity of air, water, soil, and ecosystems; and
(c) avoiding, remedying, or mitigating any adverse effects of activities on the environment.
There is nothing in the Act which provides that ‘biodiversity’ should trump human rights and human welfare. The RMA provides for the protection of outstanding natural features and landscapes, of areas of significant indigenous vegetation and of significant habitats, while acknowledging the importance of the social, economic, and cultural well-being of people and their communities. The RMA makes it clear that while all efforts should be made to protect the environment, protect endangered species and preserve significant natural areas, the welfare of people and communities should come first.
The only reference to private land in the RMA is to protect it with regard to heritage orders, eg:
189 (1A) (1A) However, a heritage protection authority that is a body corporate approved under section 188 must not give notice of a requirement for a heritage order in respect of any place or area of land that is private land.
No provision in the RMA authorises the claiming for rewilding of gorseland, building sites, agapanthus or rhododendron shrubbery on private land.
To be continued…