Government launches new resource management legislation
The Government has introduced the Natural and Built Environment and the Spatial Planning Bills that will replace the Resource Management Act.
The 900-page Resource Management Act has been criticised for decades for being overly complicated, expensive and slow but reform has been a long time coming.
The previous National Government pledged to repeal and replace the law but couldn’t get the numbers in Parliament for its changes. Labour’s reforms are running about a year behind schedule.
Environment Minister David Parker said “New Zealand developers’ consenting costs of 5.5% of total project costs are at the extreme end compared with the UK and the EU, where consenting costs are between 0.1% and 5%,” and noted that time to consent infrastructure projects increased 150% between 2011-2014 and 2015-2019.
The Government says the “effects-based” approach of the current law is resulting in cumulative environmental damage – most notably with water quality and loss of biodiversity and top soil. The new legislation will replace this with an “outcomes-based” approach.
Under the new legislation, the National Planning Framework will contain off-the-shelf standards for housing and infrastructure projects which will remove the need for bespoke specifications for each project.
The current 100+ RMA plans will be replaced by 15 regional-level plans across the country. These plans will be created by each region’s regional planning committee comprising a minimum of six members, with a minimum of two Māori members and one chosen by central government. Each territorial authority and regional council can have a member. The time taken to prepare these plans will reduce from 10 years under the current system to a maximum of four years.
Existing national directions, such as policy statements on water and air quality, carry over into the consolidated National Planning Framework, with a new part to aid infrastructure development.
Fast-track consenting legislation that was brought in as part of the COVID recovery will be partially retained in the new permanent legislation.
The changes will mean there will be fewer consents to process – the bulk of decision-making will be made at early planning stages, with the hope of fewer delays at the consent stage.
The Government estimates costs to users will fall by 19% a year, or $149m, equal to more than $10 billion in cost savings over 30 years.
The new legislation will uphold Treaty settlements, commitments and arrangements and ensure Māori maintain established decision-making and participation at both a regional and national level. An independent national Māori entity will also be established to provide input into the NPF and monitor how Te Tiriti o Waitangi is being adhered to.
Next steps
The Government is aiming to pass the Bills through their first readings before Christmas.
They will then go through the full Select Committee process, and be passed before the election.
The third piece of the reform, the Climate Adaptation Act, will be introduced later. It will take up to 10 years for the results of the legislative changes to be fully implemented across the country.
Reaction
The Opposition National Party has criticised the new plan as being too slow to implement and containing additional bureaucracy. National’s Chris Bishop stated: “More centralisation, bureaucracy and control is not the answer.”
The Green Party’s environment spokesperson Eugenie Sage said the legislation had missed a “crucial opportunity” to put the climate at the heart of resource consenting.
The Employers and Manufacturers Association welcomed the reforms, saying “if the system works as promised then it should be more straightforward for the business, infrastructure, building and economic development communities to get the consents they need to make progress more quickly.”