Source: Federated Farmers
Nearly 200 Canterbury farmers packed into a community hall last weekend to voice their growing anger and frustration at the region’s consent crisis.
Organised by Federated Farmers, the Ashburton meeting drew a standing-room-only crowd and delivered a clear message: government intervention is urgently needed.
“That’s a massive turnout for a meeting we called at short notice. It goes to show how hot this issue is for farmers,” Federated Farmers Mid Canterbury president David Acland says.
“Environment Canterbury (ECan) are putting local farming families under huge pressure with unnecessary cost, uncertainty and red tape just to renew their existing resource consents.
“Farmers will be spending tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars on a piece of paper that may not be needed once the RMA is rewritten in a few months’ time.
“We need a solution now – not months away – to save those families the unnecessary stress, cost and heartache.”
ECan administers around 20,000 resource consents, with thousands due to expire in the next 18 months.
A similar situation will happen in other parts of the country, albeit at a smaller scale.
Farmers say those trying to renew consents are being hit with excessive demands and crippling costs.
At Saturday’s meeting in the Lagmhor Westerfield Hall, the sense of anger was palpable.
“Frustration and a fair level of emotion was evident in the crowd. There are some significant farming businesses facing real strain over what’s happening,” Acland says.
Many farmers are being asked to provide extensive technical data, ecological assessments, and full Overseer remodelling, even when their farm systems haven’t materially changed.
Some have been given barely two weeks to compile the information or risk their consent being publicly notified, meaning a full hearing process and even greater expense.
“With the initial consent fee, the expense of engaging a consultant for early advice and just making a start on the paperwork, you’re probably looking at $10,000 minimum,” Acland says.
“That’s just to get the ball rolling. Then for more complex consents, like those involving irrigation, costs can easily run into six figures.”
He says the timing is deeply frustrating, given the Government is in the middle of overhauling the Resource Management Act (RMA).
“The whole basis on which consent conditions are being judged is about to go through wholesale change, but councils are pressing on with this unreasonably bureaucratic approach.”
The inconsistencies are adding to farmers’ anger.
“One farmer with two properties – one in a nutrient allocation red zone and another in a green zone – had a smooth process getting consent in the former but the consent for the green zone property was causing all sorts of headaches,” Acland says.
“There seems to be an element of luck of the draw in terms of which planning officer your consent application lands on the desk of. Rules aren’t being applied consistently.”
In another case, he says, a farmer submitted a completed consent application only to receive a 13-page request for further information.
“That’s absolute madness,” Acland says.
Among those attending the meeting were Environment Minister Penny Simmonds and rural MPs Miles Anderson, Mike Butterick and Grant McCallum.
“There’s absolutely no doubt the Minister and other MPs understand the issue, but now we need to see some action – and fast,” Acland says.
He says while it was positive to hear about transitional work already underway as part of the RMA replacement process, farmers are still stuck in limbo until it comes into force.
“What we hammered home to them on Saturday was that, yes, we know you’ve got stuff on the way, but we’ve got this dead ground between now and the new legislation.
“Consents are expiring now. It’s causing huge stress and uncertainty, and people are holding off investing in the future as a result.”
Federated Farmers is calling for a clear, legally binding solution that would allow farmers – not just in Canterbury, but nationwide – to continue operating under their existing consents until the new RMA framework is in place.
Acland points to the Government’s decision last year to step in and block Otago Regional Council’s flawed Land and Water Regional Plan as proof that direct intervention is possible.
“We know they have the power to take such sensible action when it’s needed.
“It’s not enough just to write a letter to councils asking them to back off a bit and show some restraint.
“We need something definitive – and we need it now.”
