Government announced proposed changes yesterday to the Fast Track Approval Bill. In an unusual step, Cabinet is making recommendations on how to change the bill in response to submissions, ahead of the select committee making its own recommendations to Parliament. Over 27,000 public submissions were received, including a submission by NZPI.

The changes Cabinet is recommending are:

• Projects will be referred to an expert panel by the Minister for Infrastructure alone, who will be required to consult the Minister for the Environment and other relevant portfolio Ministers as part of that referral process.
• Final decisions on projects will not sit with Ministers but with the expert panel. This is the same as the Covid-19 Recovery fast-track process.
• Expert panels will include expertise in environmental matters; will include an iwi authority representative only when required by Treaty settlements; and will include Māori development expertise in place of mātauranga Māori.
• Applicants will be required to include information on previous decisions by approving authorities, including previous court decisions, in their applications for the referring Minister to consider.
• Timeframes for comment at the referral and panel stages will be extended in order to give parties, including those impacted by a proposed project, more time to provide comments.

These changes address some of NZPI’s concerns with the bill but do not go far enough.

We are pleased to see the recommendation that expert panels should be the final decision-makers, rather than Ministers. In its submission NZPI considered that Ministerial decision-making on individual projects should be undertaken with caution.

“Our preference for the role of Ministers in the system is to set clear national priorities and strategic policy direction on New Zealand’s significant resource management issues, provide sufficient resourcing and support to the system, and then let the appropriate experts undertake assessments and decision-making”.

“We are also pleased to see a role for the Minister for the Environment in the referral process, as we were alarmed by the absence of this Minister in the Bill. However, the role should be a stronger one. We are glad that timeframes for participation in the process will be extended and hope this extension will be sufficient to allow meaningful engagement in decision-making”. However, a key timeframe NZPI recommended is still missing, which is a timeframe for the Ministerial referral process. The introduction of this timeframe is essential for the process to be ‘fast’.

“We are disappointed that Cabinet is not recommending any changes to the eligibility criteria. There should be a high threshold to access the truncated process, but eligibility has been left wide open. Despite the change to include information on previous court decisions, it is still possible to apply for activities that have been declined by a court and to apply for activities that are prohibited in plans. As there was no mention of changes to the purpose of the Bill, consideration of environmental effects remains subservient to economic development”. NZPI’s submission offered an amendment to the purpose that provides a way to restore balance and retain the requirement for sustainable management.

“We also have concerns that no changes are proposed to introduce a forward-looking requirement to adhere to Te Tiriti o Waitangi obligations. The changes recommended by Cabinet appear to further restrict the role of Māori representatives on expert panels”.

We look forward to other amendments to address these outstanding concerns when the Environment Committee reports back to Parliament on 18 October.

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