The Environmental Defence Society has been working on the reform of the resource management system for the past 3 years. It has established that the current law is not providing sufficient protection for the environment and has excessive process churn.
The Government has released an Exposure Draft of a new bill for scrutiny by the Environment Select Committee and EDS is scheduled to appear before it tomorrow. In advance, EDS is releasing four think-pieces it prepared for the Ministry for the Environment. EDS has also released its full submission on the bill.
“We are making these reports public because they address some of the key issues arising out of the exposure draft of the Natural and Built Environments Bill, its related discussion paper and the proposed Strategic Planning Bill,” said EDS CEO Gary Taylor.
“The full reports are available on the EDS website. To assist readers, a summary of the reports on Resource Management Reform was produced, which can be viewed here.
The summary comprises the following:
“It is clear that the bill must provide better protection for our environment while streamlining and simplifying planning processes. These objectives are entirely compatible. We can’t afford to go backwards with environmental outcomes,” Mr. Taylor concluded.