04 Aug 2005

The Resource Management Amendment Act 2005 was passed by Parliament on 3 August 2005. The Act was passed with amendments in the Supplementary Order Paper to the Bill as reported back by the Local Government and Environment Select Committee.

A new section 35A has been included, which imposes a duty on local authority to keep records for each iwi authority, or if appropriate hapu within its region or district.

The Ministry for the Environment has issued new guidelines for consulting iwi and hapu resource managers, following the recent amendments to the Resource Management Act.

Councils will now have to maintain records of each iwi authority, and groups which have told councils they're representing hapu on RMA matters.

The records have to contain contact details, any iwi planning documents lodged with the council, and the areas over which groups claim manawhenua status.

Te Puni Kokiri is to assist councils to keep such records, through its Te Kahui Mangai web-based information service, ready in October.

A major change is that neither an applicant nor a consent authority now has a legal duty to consult anyone, including iwi or hapu, about a resource consent. However, councils must still consult iwi authorities, but not hapu, over their proposed policy statements and plans.

The amendments allow iwi or hapu to enter into joint management agreements with local authorities or government departments, but these can be terminated by either party, with 20 days' notice.

Note there is a specific difference between resource management and resource ownership. Termination of joint management agreements may result is resource allocation decisions that that may affect property rights and Treaty rights.

The movement to a system of National Environmental Standards may have a good or bad effect depending on how they are developed. It is therefore necessary for iwi /hapu involvement or collective iwi/hapu involvement at the standard setting stage.

The proposed package “Improving the Resource Management Act” was released in September 2004. Public feedback was sought on this up until 4 October 2004. You can read a summary of feedback here.

It provides for training and accreditation for hearing panels and staff, an ability to remove vexatious applications, iwi would be consulted only at the planning stage, and there is a government promise to provide more leadership to councils. Read More