Hon Chris Bishop
Minister for RMA Reform
Hon Shane Jones
Minister for Regional Development

The Government has opened public consultation on the biggest change to national direction in New Zealand history, with proposals to make it easier to consent quarries and mines to enable more infrastructure development.

National direction refers to rules and policies sitting under the Resource Management Act (RMA) that inform how councils develop and implement local plans and rules.

The Government is today releasing three discussion documents proposing amendments to 12 different instruments and the introduction of four new instruments, centred on three packages: infrastructure and development, the primary sector and freshwater.

“New Zealand has a massive infrastructure deficit, but to build and maintain more infrastructure we need quarries and mines. The RMA makes it far too difficult for these types of projects to get consent,” Mr Bishop says.

“Addressing this is critical to boosting economic growth, improving living standards and meeting future challenges posed by natural hazards and climate change.

“We’ve already repealed Labour’s botched RMA reforms and made a series of quick and targeted amendments to remove unnecessary regulations for primary industries as well as barriers to investment in development and infrastructure.

We’ve also passed the Fast-track Approvals Act to make it much easier to deliver projects with regional or nationally significant benefits – and the first projects are already going through the Fast-track process.

“Next year we’ll replace the RMA with new legislation premised on property rights. Our new system will provide a framework that makes it easier to plan and deliver infrastructure, quarrying and mining projects, as well as protecting the environment.

“In the meantime we’re making targeted, quick changes through our second RMA amendment Bill which is expected back from the Environment Committee next month, and to national direction.”

The proposed changes include amendments to quarrying and mining provisions in four existing national direction instruments:

• National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity 2023
• National Policy Statement for Highly Productive Land 2022
• National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management 2020
• National Environmental Standards for Freshwater 2020.

“The Coalition Government is committed to utilising New Zealand’s mineral reserves to boost regional opportunities and jobs, increase our self-sufficiency, improve energy security and resilience, and drive our export-led focus for economic recovery. The length of time it takes to navigate various consenting processes for a major mining project in New Zealand is costing us dearly in missed economic opportunities that could lift living standards for our regional communities and supercharge productivity,” Mr Jones says.

“A mining operator currently needs to navigate the often contradictory and confusing requirements of many national direction instruments. By amending these instruments to remove duplication and provide more clarity, we are reducing costs and inefficiencies and providing the certainty potential investors and operators need to take well-designed projects forward – something our regulatory regime has long lacked. I want to be clear - we are cutting red tape and barriers, not corners. There are no shortcuts in terms of robust planning and rigorous consideration of environmental protections.”

Consultation on these proposals will remain open until 27 July 2025. The Government intends to have 16 new or updated national direction instruments in place by the end of this year.

Notes:

Quarrying and mining amendments to National Policy Statements and National Environmental Standards

The Government has committed to unlocking development capacity for housing and business growth, and to boost mineral exports. To support this, locally sourced aggregate and minerals are needed.

This targeted amendment for quarrying and mining, aims to make the consent pathways and gateway tests for quarrying and mining affecting wetlands, significant natural areas (SNAs) and highly productive land (HPL) more enabling, and to ensure the policies are more consistent across the:

• National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity (NPSIB) 2023
• National Policy Statement for Highly Productive Land (NPS-HPL) 2022
• National Environmental Standard for Freshwater (NES-F) 2020
• National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management (NPS-FM) 2020.

Key proposals to change these instruments are:

To amend wetland quarrying and mining provisions across NPS-FM, NES-F, NPSIB and NPS-HPL to make them more enabling and more consistent, which involves:

• adding ‘operational need’ to the gateway tests for mining and quarrying activities that may adversely affect wetlands under the NES-F and NPS-FM
• changing a few words in the NPSIB and NPS-HPL SNA and HPL mining and quarrying exceptions for SNAs and HPL to:
•  clarify that essential related (ancillary) activities for mining and quarrying have a consent pathway and use consistent terminology
•  remove “that could not otherwise be achieved using resources within New Zealand” and the requirement for benefits to be ‘public’ and allow regional benefits of mining to be considered.

Visit the MfE website [https://environment.govt.nz/news/consultation-on-updating-rma-national-direction] to take part in the consultation. Link will go live at midday.

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