RMA reforms running into heavy weather at select committee

The select committee considering reforms to the Resource Management Act is hearing a chorus of concern about proposals to limit rights of appeal on resource consents, expansion of ministerial powers and fears over the potential for "collaborative processes" to add cost and delay to consent processes.

Both industry and environmental advocates are expressing similar concerns about key aspects of the watered-down RMA reforms in the government's Resource Legislation Amendment Bill before the local government and environment committee.

Business New Zealand, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, and the Greater Wellington Regional Council today joined earlier submitters in airing misgivings.

Both Parliamentary Commissioner Jan Wright and regional council chairman Chris Laidlaw urged a national debate on legislation to replace the 24-year-old RMA, which was ground-breaking at the time for including environmental and resource use in one law for the first time but has displayed limitations, especially in urban development and affordable housing.

"We think the committee should send the bill back to the minister and ask him to pause, pending proposals from the blue-skies thinking of the Productivity Commission and Local Government NZ," said Laidlaw.

The Productivity Commission report on urban planning is due early next year and is widely seen as the vehicle for arguing a gradual return to separate legislation for resource management and urban planning.

"Amend or replace (the RMA)? I don't have a view at this stage but there's a very important debate on it," Dr Wright told the committee. "The two big issues for me are housing affordability and climate change."

The main issues could potentially be dealt with by a National Policy Statement under the RMA, rather than amending the legislation.

"When that emerges, then you could look at what the legislation might look like," she said.

Business NZ policy advocate John Carnegie said business investors opposed the removal of the right to mount appeals against resource consent decisions on merit, at least not until new processes envisaged by the bill had bedded down and were working well.

"Removing them [appeal rights] will create unnecessary risks," said Carnegie. "You can't rely on getting the processes right first time."

Labour committee member David Parker asked the submitters about a so far unseen submission from Environment Canterbury commissioner and former Environment Court judge, Professor Peter Skelton, which he said proposes a more structured, single process that would involve Environment Court judges in the consent process to give certainty and rigour.

Even if the process were longer than the current first round of consent processes, Mr Parker is arguing this might still be swifter than a flawed first stage increasing the likelihood of an appeal.

"It's best to ensure the first hearing has a judicial element," Mr Parker said.

Committee chairman Scott Simpson indicated the committee was grappling with the appropriate balance between the interests of directly affected communities and wider groups in society. Dr Wright had cited the recent heckling of youthful Generation Zero climate change activists at a meeting of Auckland eastern suburbs residents about housing density and heights.

"The concern is that, in the future, an alternative view might be excluded," Dr Wright said.

She praised the collaborative decision-making process as used in the Land and Water Forum because it allowed changes in knowledge and science to be incorporated in an evolving agreement between stakeholders.

"Twenty-five years ago, we thought environmental problems were probably much more solvable than they have turned out to be," she said. Adaptable processes helped deal with emerging understanding.

(BusinessDesk)