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Hamilton local government meeting

1 February 2005

Questions/issues raised

  • Has there been any attempt to determine the dollar value of water to guide consent decisions?
  • How is the Ministry for the Environment going to provide regional councils with tools to achieve the outcomes that they want?
  • There is a problem of building sustainable development outcomes and strategic planning into consent decisions. Greater weight needs to be given to sustainable development and tools to encourage this.
  • Resourcing of poorer councils is important - there is currently inequality in the resourcing of councils and rates can not be relied on for funding.
  • The discussion document does not contain enough detail about "values" and criteria for identifying important values. Would have liked to have seen more bold statements. The document lacks teeth and it is hard to get our heads around what you are saying.
  • In terms of changing land use, there is a lack in certainty of direction in the document. Certainty is important for land-users. They need to be able to plan for investment - how would this be affected by the proposal to reduce rights ("clawback")?
  • When will something useable come out of this process? The length of time the planning process takes is an issue. There needs to be the ability to react quickly to changing situations.
  • Issues vary, depending on the part of catchment where water is taken from.
  • Tools exist but are blunt.
  • There is a need for tools that deal with over-allocation and cross boundary issues.
  • Central government, local government and science need to work together closely on diffuse discharges.
  • Inequity exists between point source dischargers who have to spend lots of money to reduce impacts and diffuse dischargers who don't have to deal with the impacts.
  • Supportive of Action 2: Important in relation to diffuse discharges. At the moment regional councils are trying to change national practices in land management. National standards would be valuable to help with this.
  • Unsupportive of Action 4: Don't think central government needs to have a role approving plans.
  • The auctioning/tendering option is commercialising water. If central government are to go down this path you need to have boundaries to protect cultural values.
  • Cost of compliance - re: standards etc, need to be considered along with resourcing. Need to look at the best way of spending money.
  • Concern about the implications of effluent spreading.
  • Possible pilot project in conversion bv of forestry land to dairying and other farming in Reporoa. Involve whole-of-government approach from beginning - make it an example of how things can be done.
  • The work undertaken at Taupo could be a model for the future - an example of dealing with national values.
  • The Resource Management Act looks at engagement with iwi, while the Local Government Act looks at engagement with Maori. There is a need to be aware of the difference and to look at the implications of this. It must be clear what sort of engagement central government wants and with whom.
  • Central government need to take the lead where there are gaps eg, Ministry for the Environment pulled together an advisory group to look at stock effluent.
  • Deciding on values is an ongoing issue.

The big issues

  • Land/water interface - subdivisions, land management etc. needs more attention.
  • There needs to be more co-ordination between central and local government and scientists; more "whole-of-government" work.
  • There needs to be a more co-ordinated approach to working together to address issues.
  • People from a range of institutions/organisations should be brought together to deal with big issues.

Last updated: 25 November 2008