Government’s RMA Replacement Bills Get Worse At Select Committee, Now A ‘Race To The Bottom’ – Greens

The Government’s replacement resource management bills have come back from select committee weaker than before, removing and weakening key environmental safeguards and leaving New Zealanders to pay the cost.

“At a time when pollution and exploitation of our environment is unprecedented, these Bills are now a race to the bottom. The Luxon Government is stripping away environmental protections while New Zealanders are left paying for the costs of environmental damage and the Government’s regulatory relief framework,” says Greens Party Environment spokesperson Lan Pham.

“The Government has not listened to Local Councils or submitters at all. Almost all submitters opposed the regulatory relief framework, which would force councils to pay private landowners not to destroy biodiversity. It has been estimated to cost ratepayers $2 billion, while the report writers themselves cautioned there is a high degree of uncertainty around those estimates.”

“One of the most concerning changes made during the select committee process was the removal of requirements that environmental use and development occurwithin environmental limits.”

“Environmental limits acting as a backstop to development were one of the few remaining safeguards in the legislation. The Government has watered them down and included references to big agriculture and aquaculture instead.”

“These bills are meant to be fit-for-purpose environmental laws for 2026, yet they do not integrate with our climate legislation and do not address climate emissions. Incredibly, only the ‘positive’ effects of climate emissions will be considered.”

“The Government has also removed the precautionary principle, which would have provided a basic guardrail where there is a lack of scientific certainty about potentially harmful activities.”

“Following push-back from industry, the Government also removed the only clauses that would have given councils tools to address over-allocation of our depleted rivers and groundwater through market mechanisms and comparative assessment of permit applications.”

“The Bills’ so-called ecosystem health limits fail to provide meaningful protection. These are not actual environmental limits. They can only be set after councils consider economic and social factors, interim limits are only set at 10-year intervals, and actual limits could take at least 20 years to achieve.”

“The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment warned the limits framework provides no environmental bottom line. The Commissioner noted that existing RMA provisions act as legislative backstops to prevent pollution, but the proposed legislation contains no equivalent safeguard.”

“The Government would not even agree to include a requirement that ecosystem health limits prevent significant and irreversible harm to the natural environment.”

“New Zealanders are already paying the health and environmental costs of polluted drinking water, unswimmable rivers, lakes and beaches, biodiversity loss, and climate change. These Bills will make a bad situation far worse,” says Lan Pham.