A radio discussion describing conservation land sought for a controversial Hawke’s Bay dam project as “only stewardship land” breached the accuracy standard, the Broadcasting Standards Authority has found.

The Authority has upheld a complaint about an item on Central FM’s Cockies Hour in which host Steve Wyn-Harris interviewed the Chair of the Tukituki Water Security Project (TWSP) after the project was included on the then Fast-track Approvals Bill's list of projects released in October 2024.

The BSA agreed the description of the 22 hectares of Department of Conservation (DOC) land needed for the project as “only stewardship land”, when some 93% of it has conservation park status, was a material inaccuracy which the broadcaster did not make reasonable efforts to avoid.

The Authority also found the broadcaster failed to correct the error within a reasonable period after being put on notice.

It has ordered local broadcaster Central FM to publish a statement summarising the decision.

The land discussed in the 8 October 2024 broadcast was the subject of a deal between DOC and Hawke's Bay Regional Council for a proposed land swap which would have enabled flooding of the land for what was then known as the Ruataniwha dam project. The project stalled in 2017 after the proposed land swap was halted by a Supreme Court decision finding the Minister of Conservation had inappropriately revoked the conservation park status of relevant land.

Some 20% of the more than nine-minute Cockies Hour item was devoted to the Supreme Court decision and the status and nature of the land, which is still needed for the dam to go ahead. During the interview, the land was incorrectly referred to six times by the TWSP Chair and the show’s host.

The BSA noted the controversial nature of the dam project within the local community and the publicity around the Supreme Court’s 2017 decision.

“We would have expected the broadcaster to have some understanding of the decision, and the significance of the land’s status.

“The broadcast created a misleading impression about the land needed for the project as being stewardship land and having inferior conservation values. This undermined the public interest in the story as the audience did not have the benefit of being informed about the true status of the DOC land, to enable them to reach their own informed opinions.

“We therefore concluded the broadcast had the potential to cause harm which outweighed the broadcaster’s freedom of expression and is significant enough to warrant our intervention.”

The full decision can be seen on the BSA website here: https://www.bsa.govt.nz/decisions/all-decisions/bayliss-and-central-fm-limited-2024-092-9-june-2025/

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