Land sales plan halted
An academic has likened soon-to-be axed land reforms, known as tenure review, to a ‘‘national tragedy’’.
The Government’s decision to scrap the scheme came after a scathing internal report that pointed to multiple failings in the process.
The decision was announced by Land Information Minister Eugenie Sage yesterday.
‘‘We’ve seen a very mixed bag in terms of the tenure review outcomes,’’ she said.
‘‘There’s been a lot of criticism of the process for a long time, and there is strong support across all of the government parties for ending tenure review and moving to a vision of enduring stewardship for our high country.’’
Lincoln University environmental management lecturer Dr Ann Brower said she was pleased with the Government’s decision, but it was a ‘‘national tragedy’’ it went on for 27 years.
‘‘It’s the greatest Valentine’s gift to the nation and to the environment, but it’s 13 years too late,’’ Brower said.
‘‘[The government] had all the information they needed for 13 years and it’s great they stopped it now but it’s a national tragedy it went on for as long as it did.’’
She said she hoped the government would quash the remaining properties currently in tenure review.
The reforms – which began informally in the early 1990s but were adopted formally in 1998 – concerned hundreds of Crown-owned farms that were leased to pastoral farmers.
The voluntary tenure review process broke up those leases: part of the land went into private ownership, with the remainder entering the conservation estate.
Critics of the reforms have said the resulting privatisation of land handed some of New Zealand’s most valuable land to wealthy property developers, often at a cost to the Crown.
It also allowed more intensified land use, such as irrigated farming,
in ecologically sensitive areas such as the Mackenzie Basin.
Some of those who bought land that was formerly Crown leases include Peter Thiel, Graham Hart, and Sir John Key. Some of the most expensive properties advertised for sale in New Zealand are on former pastoral leases.
In numerous cases, land that was privatised by the Crown for significantly less than market value was quickly on-sold for enormous profits.
A Stuff investigation in 2018 found that tenure review had cost taxpayers about $65 million, and, since its beginnings in 1992, had resulted in the privatisation of nearly half a million hectares of once Crown-owned land, some of which had become property developments and luxury golf courses.
Supporters of the process, however, say the nature of the Crown lease meant the leaseholders had significant rights over the land, and were thus entitled to most of the benefits of privatisation.
Tenure review resulted in around 350,000ha of leasehold land entering the conservation estate, which led to the creation of several conservation parks.
The government would announce on Sunday its vision for the future of the high country, Sage said. The focus, however, would be on sustainable farming and protecting the remaining landscape values.
‘‘We have seen through tenure review major freeholding, major intensification, and loss of landscape values through that process,’’ Sage said.
‘‘In the Mackenzie [basin] there’s been a fundamental change in the landscape through tenure review.’’
Federated Farmers high country chairman Simon Williamson said the decision to scrap the scheme did not come as a surprise. ‘‘From a high country point of view we’re not sure it’s really the best system closing up land to freehold other land.’’
He said having joint land management plans where farmers look after the land and have animals grazing on it, while also allowing access to tourists at certain times of the year was a better system to use.
‘‘Because at the end of the day, if you [have] a piece of native bush on your property there’s no point taking out a thousand hectares of the whole place just because you want to protect a piece of native bush.
‘‘If you want to you can put a management plan around it, fence it, give access into it and still graze it at certain times of the year.’’
He said it was ‘‘pretty shocking’’ to see the degradation of grazeable land, which had been given up.
Around 30 properties were currently in tenure review, each of which would be considered on an individual basis.
The decision to scrap the process appears to be driven by an internal report conducted by Land Information New Zealand (Linz), which manages tenure review on behalf of the Commissioner of Crown Lands.