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Environment (2005)

Labour's Vision

New Zealanders value our clean air, open spaces and good water quality. These things underpin our Kiwi lifestyle, help set us apart from other countries, and are essential for our economic growth.

Looking after our environment requires well considered, robust initiatives developed with the input of those affected by them.

Labour’s approach is based on partnership underpinned by central government leadership – we work with local government, the community and business to protect and enhance the environment.

Sustainable Development

Labour believes that a clean and healthy environment sits alongside economic growth and social opportunity as the keys to an improved quality of life for all New Zealanders – we call this “sustainable development” and it guides our entire policy programme.

In January 2003, Labour established the first ever Sustainable Development Programme of Action (SDPA), focussing initially on fresh water quality and allocation, energy, sustainable cities, and child and youth development. Labour has piloted schemes to move both government and industry towards more environmentally friendly practices.

Labour will:

Extend the Sustainable Development Programme of Action to other policy areas which have an impact on our economy, society and the environment;
Ensure that all core central government agencies sign-up to the Programme, under which they commit to undertake more sustainable practices and report on their progress;
Continue to work with the private sector to encourage similar practice, and undertake analysis of tools and mechanisms to promote and reward sustainable business practice;
Investigate the use of prospective assessment tools and methodologies to anticipate in advance the possible effects of policy on the environment, public health and society.

Fresh Water: Making every river swimmable

Clean, fresh water is still reasonably abundant in most parts of New Zealand, but is becoming more scarce in others. In some areas, land use practices have resulted in serious degradation of water quality. Water quality has declined in those areas so that not only is the water unsafe to drink, but the rivers are polluted to the extent that they are unsafe to swim in. In other areas, so much water is taken out of rivers that there is little left in them.

Fresh water scarcity will increase unless we manage our water resources more cleverly. Labour has made a start through initiatives such as the SDPA, the Clean Streams Accord with Fonterra, and the money we’ve put towards improving the water quality in Lake Taupo and the Rotorua Lakes.

Labour’s goal is to make every river in New Zealand swimmable.

Labour will:

Retain local level decision-making about fresh water management, but ensure central government plays a greater leadership role in terms of policy, guidance and assistance;
Develop a vision for water management in New Zealand looking ahead 10, 20 and 40 years from today. The vision will include outcomes for, among other things, improved water quality;
Work to ensure there is enough fresh water for everybody by developing:

National policy statements and national environmental standards,
Assistance for local authorities on their water allocation policies and ways to protect fresh water ecosystems.

Work towards ensuring our rivers are clean enough to swim in safely by implementing tools and approaches such as:

A national environmental standard for water quality,
Mechanisms to control the pollution of waterways from certain kinds of land use, which lead to nitrate and other nutrient run-off.

Ensure regional councils have appropriate and up-to-date fresh water policies by:

Requiring them to have integrated, whole-of-catchment plans,
Offering Ministry for the Environment assistance to develop and implement such plans;

Fund the wastewater subsidy scheme for smaller communities to upgrade their sewage schemes, where doing so will have environmental benefits;
Work with Fonterra to ensure the targets in the Clean Streams Accord are met and extended;
Halt the long-term decline of Lake Taupo’s water quality by continuing to work with Environment Waikato, the Taupo District Council, Tuwharetoa, land-owners and the wider community to cut nitrogen input into the lake by 20 per cent;
Seek detailed information and costings about the long-term work required to improve the water quality in the Rotorua Lakes, and consider ways of partnering with Environment Bay of Plenty, the Rotorua District Council, Te Arawa, land-owners and the community to achieve sustained improvements in water quality.

Air Quality: Helping people to breathe easier

New Zealand generally has clean air, especially in places with lots of wind. But in some places, the smoke from home fires and the exhaust from vehicles can have a serious impact on air quality and people’s health. Christchurch, Nelson, and certain parts of Auckland are notable examples.

In 2004, Labour introduced the first ever National Environmental Standards for air quality, which must be met in all parts of New Zealand by 2013. Achieving these standards is expected to save a total of 625 lives by 2020.

Labour will:

Assist regional councils to implement the National Environmental Standards for air quality by:

Developing and implementing a Warm Homes Strategy to encourage home owners to install energy efficiency measures and cleaner sources of home heating. As part of the Warm Homes Project, Labour will investigate the possibility of a subsidy scheme to assist homeowners to convert to cleaner sources of home heating and implement energy efficiency measures;

Work to further reduce the amount and toxicity of vehicle emissions (see the Transport policy for more detail).

Waste: Reuse, recycling, and producer responsibility

Since launching the New Zealand Waste Strategy in 2002, we have made progress towards minimising waste and improving waste recovery and management. For instance, 95 per cent of New Zealanders now have access to kerbside recycling. A Packaging Accord has been signed with industry and local government which sets real targets to increase the amount of packaging waste recycled.

There is more central government can do to partner local government and business to achieve a reduction in the amount of waste produced and better reuse and recycling.

Labour will:

Provide $12.4 million over the next four years to encourage sustainable business practice, including:

Projects to encourage innovative product design that minimise environmental impact,
Partnerships with banking, finance and insurance sectors to reward sustainable practice through eased access to credit, capital or insurance,
Extending the Packaging Accord targets to increase the amount of packaging recycled,
Expanding the national collection and disposal of unused agrichemicals, especially those containing persistent organic pollutants;

Pass into law the Product Stewardship Act, which will:

Encourage the greater reuse and recycling of waste,
Encourage environmentally sustainable product development by specifying that certain products must be labelled with information about their natural resource use, and by setting standards for product resource use.

Hazardous Wastes

Labour has already introduced legislation to better manage hazardous wastes, and has established a Hazardous Waste Advisory Group.

Labour will:

Develop and implement a hazardous waste tracking system;
Consider and where appropriate implement the recommendations of the Hazardous Waste Advisory Group;
Pass the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Approvals and Enforcement) Amendment Bill, which implements a mechanism to manage hazardous waste not currently regulated.

Contaminated Sites: Cleaning up the mess

Much more is now known about using chemicals safely but we still live with the legacy of orphan contaminated sites from the days when chemicals weren’t used safely.

Labour has:

Made over $9 million available for the clean-up of two very high risk contaminated sites – the former Fruitgrowers Chemical Company site at Mapua and the abandoned Tui mine near Te Aroha;
Increased the amount of money in the Contaminated Sites Remediation Fund, which is available to regional councils to investigate and remediate contaminated sites;
Started to develop a National Environmental Standard for the clean-up of contaminated sites.

Labour will:

Ensure the completion of the Mapua clean-up and the commencement of the Tui Mine clean-up;
Further increase the amount of money in the Contaminated Sites Remediation Fund, in particular for clean-up as regional councils move past the investigation stage into the remediation phase.

Urban Growth: Making our cities more liveable

Eighty-seven per cent of New Zealanders live in towns and cities, so it’s crucial that our urban areas live-up to our high environmental standards. This requires good planning of subdivisions, in-fill housing, greenbelts and parks, and infrastructure.

Labour appointed the first Minister with Responsibility for Urban Affairs, and instituted the Sustainable Cities programme under the SDPA. We have established a number of programmes to improve environmental outcomes in Auckland, such as the air quality programme to reduce bus fleet emissions. We also partnered with local government, design professionals and the private sector to produce the first New Zealand Urban Design Protocol, which is already influencing the urban design rules and policies of various city councils.

Labour will:

Continue the Sustainable Cities programme underway in Auckland, and extend the programme to other urban centres around New Zealand;
Support the implementation of the New Zealand Urban Design Protocol by:

Developing supporting resource material,
Working with local government, professional bodies and the private sector to ensure each make tangible commitments under the Protocol and provide information showing what they have achieved;

Develop an Urban Affairs Statement of Strategic Priorities and work with local authorities, professional bodies, and the private sector to implement a package of measures to improve integrated urban management in New Zealand.

Oceans

The health of our oceans, our land and our people are inextricably linked. The development of an Oceans Policy recognises the significant value of our oceans economically, socially, environmentally and culturally, and the growing pressures for marine space and resources.

It is also about new opportunities – how we make room for them, and how we ensure they are sustainable.

An Oceans Policy will provide clear overarching direction on how to reconcile all the uses of oceans when they come into conflict or compete for the same space. The policy will also ensure that the greatest public benefit results from the use and management of the oceans.

Labour has:

Completed Stage One of the Oceans Policy development, ‘defining the vision’. Addressed foreshore and seabed issues through separate legislation;
Launched Ocean Survey 20/20, to survey and map our oceans and seafloor and their resources, including the Ross Sea;
Progressed Stage Two of the Oceans Policy development, ‘designing the vision’, which will culminate in a public discussion document on Oceans Policy proposals.

Labour will:

Develop an integrated and comprehensive framework for managing the marine environment, including the interface between land and sea, by completing and implementing the Oceans Policy;
Make the Oceans Policy a flagship of sustainable development in action, and a means of optimising the value of our oceans to New Zealand;
Give effect to the Oceans Policy vision of healthy oceans, wisely managed, for the greatest benefit of New Zealand.

The Tools - Regulation, monitoring, reporting, and education

In New Zealand, the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA) and the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996 are the two key pieces of legislation that provide the tools to protect our environment. Non-legislative measures such monitoring, reporting and public education are also important tools.

Resource Management Act

The RMA is about striking the right balance between using our environment and protecting it for future generations.

The RMA is a good one. We want to make it work better for all New Zealanders.

Some 95 per cent of applications are granted without difficulty or disagreement, and only one per cent are appealed to the Environment Court.

Labour has significantly reduced unnecessary costs and delays in the Environment Court by, for instance, halving the backlog of cases since 2001 and getting waiting times for hearings down to 3-6 months from 18 months.

Labour instigated a review of the RMA in 2004 to further improve the working of the Act. This resulted in the passing of the Resource Management Amendment (No. 5) Act in August 2005.

Labour is committed to ensuring the changes brought about are put into operational practice. The key areas that labour will be targeting are:

Improving the quality and timeliness of local decision making;
Assisting councils, or providing alternative hearing processes, for cross-boundary and very complex consent processes;
Providing New Zealand-wide consistency in planning and environmental standards, so as to reduce compliance costs and ensure that standards are applied uniformly.

Improved local decision making for consents

Labour believes that local communities through their councils should be involved in resource decisions, and that much can be done to improve local decision making processes.

Labour will:

Ensure that councils are involved in all resource management decisions which affect them;
Ensure that applicants for resource consents cannot bypass local councils by applying directly to the Environment Court (i.e. no "direct referral");
Ensure that if consents are appealed to the Environment Court, the Court must have regard for the original council decision;
Build council capacity, through training and accreditation of hearing panels;
Monitor and review council performance and provide targeted one-on-one assistance for some councils;
Change to an inquisitorial hearing style so that panels can more efficiently identify issues;
Give councils the power to strike out, in part or in whole, vexatious or frivolous submissions;
Provide for pre-hearing meetings to identify those issues already agreed and those still outstanding, and allow evidence to be required in advance of hearings;
Give the Environment Court the power to make a declaration on whether an application for resource consent should have been notified or not;
Support community involvement in RMA decision-making by continuing to fund the Resource Management Act Education and Advisory Service (EAS) and the Environmental Legal Assistance Fund (ELA).

Improved cross-boundary and complex consent processes

Labour has worked with Local Government New Zealand to work out how best to deal with cross-boundary and very complex resource decisions. These provisions acknowledge the need for some decisions to be dealt with at a national level in consultation with local communities, or at the local level with support from central government.

Labour will:

Allow the Minister for the Environment to intervene in some resource consent applications in cases where there is widespread public concern/interest, significant use of natural resources, possible significant or irreversible damage to the environment, or where there is limited capacity of the local authority to deal with the matter;
Ensure that if intervention is required, the most appropriate form of intervention takes place from a range of options including making Crown submissions, appointing a member to hearings panels, directing councils to consider matters jointly, or "calling in" the application;
Ensure that these options are decided in consultation with the affected councils;
Ensure that "call in" provisions, where a matter is referred to a Board of Inquiry or the Environment Court (Ministerial Referral), the public is given notice and reasons for the decision, and the public are able to make submissions;
Ensure that Boards of Inquiry are chaired by an Environment Court Judge;
Ensure that, unless the matter relates to the coastal marine area, the Board or Court makes the final decision, not the Minister, and that that decision is appealable to the High Court (on points of law only).

New Zealand-wide consistency in planning and environmental standards:

The reform package heeds the call from local government, NGOs and industry for more central government leadership, including the need New Zealand-wide consistency in standards and policy statements.

Labour will:

Resolve the problem of some councils not addressing their functions resulting in gaps in environmental management, by ensuring that councils complete plans or address issues that are not in plans;
Give explicit recognition of regional councils' role in identification and monitoring of contaminated land, developing policies to ensure the integration of infrastructure with land use, and in natural resource allocation;
Provide more flexibility in the transfer of discharge and water permits without prejudicing environmental outcomes;
Develop National Policy Statements and/or National Environmental Standards for clean-up of contaminated sites, drinking water sources, application of bio-solids to land, and rare and endangered eco-systems;
Investigate the need for, and develop if necessary, National Policy Statements and National Environmental Standards for fresh water quality, fresh water management (including allocation), electricity transmission, telecommunications, electricity generation (renewable and non-renewable), land transport noise, storm water from roads, sewage discharges into the coastal marine area;
Ensure that environmental standards are developed to achieve greater consistency and coverage across localities, but allow councils to set stricter environmental controls only where the standard recognises the need for local variance.

Environmental MONITORING & Reporting

Labour recognises the importance of robust environmental monitoring and reporting.

Where regional and district plans exist it’s important to check that resource consents are granted in accordance with those plans, and that compliance with consent conditions is enforced. It’s also important to check that the plans themselves are achieving their environmental aims and objectives.

Labour will:

Invite territorial and regional councils to review jointly the effects of plans and consents on parts of the environment. Two reviews per year will be initiated by the Minister for the Environment and paid for by the Ministry for the Environment;
Improve environmental management performance of central, regional and local government by:

Providing public information about the environmental review and complaint functions of the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, the Office of the Auditor-General and the Office of the Ombudsman so that people know who they can complain to about poor RMA practices and decisions,
Resourcing the Ministry for the Environment to communicate with these review and complaint agencies about the type of complaints they receive, their recommendations for remedial action, and suggestions for where the Ministry might target one-on-one assistance if a council is involved,
Resourcing the Ministry for the Environment to examine and review the environmental performance of local councils, especially where complaints have been received about a particular council;

Develop an environmental indicators reporting system to report on New Zealand’s key natural resources by:

Establishing key national environmental indicators for air, water, biodiversity and waste,
Working with local authorities and other relevant agencies to develop a system to monitor and report on these indicators;

Investigate the need for an Environmental Responsibility Act requiring Government to report to Parliament on an agreed set of environmental indicators, and its programme to address any indicator area where standards have regressed.

The Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996

The Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996 protects our environment and human health from the risks posed by hazardous substances and new organisms. We have made a series of changes to the Act since 2002 to:

Toughen up the rules around new organisms, especially genetically modified organisms;
Streamline the hazardous substances provisions to enable more effective conditions to be placed on substances, while reducing the costs associated with compliance.

Labour will:

Pass the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Approvals and Enforcement) Amendment Bill, which further improves the workability of the hazardous substances provisions of the Act;
Assist farmers and small-to-medium enterprises to comply with their obligations to safely use, store and dispose of harmful chemicals by funding an internet based tool that provides simple and clear advice about what is required, and how to comply;
Implement any necessary changes to make the HSNO Act and Biosecurity Act work together more effectively to protect our environment from incursions by unwanted organisms.

Genetic Modification

Labour’s position on genetic modification remains the same as that recommended by the Royal Commission on Genetic Modification – to preserve opportunities while proceeding cautiously.

Accordingly Labour strengthened genetic modification laws in 2003. The Environment Risk Management Authority (“ERMA”) is now able to set conditions on the release of any genetically modified organism (“GMO”), rather than simply allowing full release without conditions. We also put a number of “minimum standards” in the HSNO Act for ERMA to consider before approving any application.

We streamlined the procedures for low risk, laboratory research into GMOs. This enables world-leading work to proceed in our universities and Crown research institutes both efficiently and safely.

Labour also reviewed ERMA, resulting in over 40 recommendations to improve the organisation’s ability to handle applications involving GMOs. We properly resourced ERMA to implement these recommendations, all of which have now been implemented.

To date there have been no applications to fully or conditionally release a GMO, but the laws are in place and ERMA is ready should it receive one.

Labour will:

Maintain a policy of preserving opportunities while proceeding cautiously;
Retain zero tolerance of unapproved genetically modified organisms;
Conduct a review of the new laws governing applications to conditionally or fully release a GMO after ERMA’s consideration of the first application is complete to identify any necessary changes.

Environmental Education

Environmental education enables people to learn about our environment and how we can protect it. It is important for maintaining a sustainable society into the future.

Labour will:

Continue to run public education campaigns to raise awareness about environmental issues, and to promote actions that people can take to help protect the environment, such as the Reduce Your Rubbish and 4Million Careful Owners campaigns.
Encourage our kids to learn about sustainability by providing funding to increase the number of Enviroschools around New Zealand.

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