Federated Farmers’ support for fast-track bill ‘ambiguous’

Analysis: At the first public hearing for submissions on the Fast-Track Approvals Bill, Federated Farmers board member Mark Hooper never said his group supported the Bill.

While it supported the legislation’s “aims”, Hooper noted there were better ways to achieve these goals. At the end of a 10-minute interview, Hooper said “Yes”, he did support the Bill – “if I have to stick my neck out”.

Hooper told Newsroom Federated Farmers was “leaning towards a little bit of ambiguity” on its stance, partially because of a “mixed view” among its constituents. The eventual admission that Federated Farmers did, in fact, support the Bill in its current form came after repeated questioning. 

Just after noon on Thursday, Hooper became the first member of the public to provide feedback on the controversial legislation. He opened by saying his group’s support had not wavered in light of “considerable scrutiny and pushback”. But he did not say that he supported the Bill itself, merely “the aims”.

At no point in the written or oral submission did he or principal planner for Federated Farmers Natasha Berkett declare their support for the Bill in its current form. Last week, even the legislation’s architect, Chris Bishop, wavered on the specifics of how powerful certain aspects of it would be.

Federated Farmers has repeatedly voiced its support for reworking resource management policies, consistently championing the rights to individual property, development and prosperity. But while the rural organisation was often referred to as “advocates of the legislation”, no part of any of its submissions declared Federated Farmers to be an advocate of the Bill: merely the “aims” of the Bill.

This is a crucial difference. The first thing Hooper said in his oral submission was that “we note that this Bill has come under considerable scrutiny and pushback, but Federated Farmers has been vocal in media highlighting our support for the aims of this Bill, and that position has not changed”. The aims; not the Bill itself. The rest of his submission was dedicated to pointing out the Bill’s flaws.

Indeed, Hooper clarified that while the problems the Bill set out to solve (a “broken” resource management system and “unpredictable, expensive” consenting) were in line with Fed Farmers’ goals, “the solution to this problem is enduring resource management reform”. Indeed, he clarified that “the goal of new RMA and new regional environmental frameworks is that there should be no need for a standalone fast-track approvals act in the long term”.

Hooper recommended a sunset clause be included in the Bill, which he later explained would ideally take effect as soon as the RMA was revised, which he wanted to see “within the current parliamentary term”. That is to say: the Bill would essentially be dead on arrival, with no opportunity for ministers to overrule the rights of individual property owners. Hooper cited the Mt Messenger Bypass debacle as a prime example of the problems associated with acquiring private land, more of which could be caused by this legislation.

For the next four minutes, he and Berkett picked apart a laundry list of problems with the Bill, focusing chiefly on how it sidelined the rights of property owners. 

“An effort to speed up consenting cannot come at the expense of private property rights”, Hooper said. Berkett later clarified that landowners (and their neighbours) would need to be consulted on the acquisition of their land under the Bill, something Hooper earlier called “common courtesy”. If this weren’t properly done, said Berkett, “that leads to that loss of social licence and lack of support for that project as well … We all like to see a fair process”.

Specifically, Federated Farmers said it wanted to see the following amendments to the Bill:

1. Landowners and occupiers be included as parties that must be consulted with prior to lodging a referral application. 
2. Activities cannot occur on private land unless they have been agreed to in writing by the relevant landowner or the land has been acquired under provisions of the Public Works Act.
3. At a minimum the timeframe for consultation should be extended to 20 working days and that land owners or occupiers should have a right to seek a waiver of the timeline for written comments.
4. Clear guidance to panels on when they should hold a hearing. For example, when a project is to be undertaken on private land and no agreement has been sought or involves the acquisition of private land.
5. Anyone seeking rights to private land through the Public Works Act be required to first attempt to secure them through fair and equitable negotiation and compensation rather than relying on ministerial powers. 

Hooper explained that “one of two fundamental principles of natural justice is that affected parties should be given the opportunity to be heard”. The Bill, in its current iteration, did not do this. 

Newsroom asked Hooper directly if he supported the Bill in its current form, with no provisions for landowners and no sunset clause.

“That’s a very good question.”

He said Federated Farmers had always supported resource management reform, its consistent history of supporting relevant legislation, and said people wanted to see progress. He explained how the Fast-Track Approvals Bill was “the first step” in a multi-step process towards reform, but still would only support “that principle”. 

Was there another way to achieve those goals then?

“The risk with [this Bill] is it leaves quite a bit of discretion in terms of how it’s applied,” Hooper said.

“It leaves a lot of discretionary power to the three ministers… if it follows the way that Chris Bishop speaks about it, well, then we support it. And maybe no further checks and balances are needed.” But he didn’t seem convinced. “Particularly, I think, if there was a sunset clause in there, [we would support it].”

Asked if his stance was due to concern about blowback from Federated Farmers’ supporters, he said: “There’s a mixed view out there, which is probably why we’re leaning to a little bit of ambiguity on it.”

Mostly, he said, people just wanted to see things get done. “So they would probably favour the fact that the Bill would go ahead, regardless.”

Newsroom asked if disapproval of this exact Bill would be incongruous with supporting development and reforming resource policy. Hooper reiterated that “the biggest issue here” was that New Zealand couldn’t get things done quickly under current legislation, and with low national productivity, “the pantry’s empty”. But he conceded that while the Bill’s methods might be “a little bit extreme”, it did address these concerns. 

Asked for a definitive yes or no on the legislation as it was – no provisions for landowners, no guidelines on acquisition of private property, no checks on ministerial overrule, and no sunset clause – he said:  “If I was to stick my neck out on the line, I’d say yes, we support it.”