Jane Nees BOP Regional Councillor www.janenees.co.nz

The Resource Management Act (RMA) directs councils to set policies and rules for thesustainable management of natural and physical resources. Under the RMA, policies and rules are developed at a regional and district level through lengthy and expensive Schedule One processes, which involve public participation, consultation, submission, deliberation and decision-making – followed often by appeals which go to the Environment Court.

What has resulted is a lack of consistency in approach and content across the country, and frustration both from the public and local authorities because of the cost and time taken in the process, which is often captured by lawyers.

One way to short-cut this is for more national direction through national policy statements (NPSs), national environmental standards (NESs) and regulations. I am very pleased to see that at last, central government is planning to do more to provide more national direction on some policy matters.

The Ministry for the Environment has identified priority areas which will provide benefits to the country by ensuring a consistent national approach and which are of such technical complexity that makes it more efficient or effective to address the issue at the national level. Areas to be progressed are plantation forestry, telecommunication facilities, urban development, freshwater management, natural hazards, biodiversity, and pest control, air quality, contaminants in soil, and aquaculture.

This is good but the process to develop national direction is slow and often out of step with timeframes for plan reviews at a local level. This requires further plan changes when the national direction comes through – again costly and time-consuming. What we need is a more streamlined process on these big issues.