Red-zoners confident ruling will be upheld
The plight of Christchurch redzoners challenging their buyout offers will once again be heard in court.
In August, the 68-strong Quake Outcasts group and Fowler Developments Ltd won a judicial review of the Government’s offer to buy uninsured properties and empty sections at 50 per cent of the land valuation.
High Court Justice Graham Panckhurst ruled the offer was unlawful and should be revised.
Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee immediately announced plans to appeal and the hearing gets under way in Wellington today.
Outcasts lawyer Grant Cameron will travel to the capital for the two-day hearing along with a couple of group members, including Bernie Shutt who had been planning to build his ‘‘dream retirement home’’ on his Bexley section. He was offered $46,000 from the Crown and had turned down a $180,000 offer before the earthquakes.
Group spokesman Ernest Tsao was feeling ‘‘quite confident’’ about the hearing but would be happy when it was over.
‘‘I think we have the law on our side and I believe the Court of Appeal will come to the same decision as the High Court judge,’’ he said.
While the Outcasts’ pockets
I believe the Court of Appeal will come to the same decision as the High Court judge.
Ernest Tsao
Outcasts group spokesman
were ‘‘not as deep as John Key’s administration’’ the group would take the matter to the Supreme Court if ‘‘push came to shove’’, he said. The Crown’s notice of appeal seeks to challenge more than 20 findings of the original judgment.
These include that the judge erred in finding that:
The decisions were not made in accordance with the requirements of the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery (CER) Act, and were unlawful.
The decision to authorise the making of offers to property owners based on 50 per cent of rateable land value [was] required to be made under the CER Act.
The announcement of the red zone interfered with the property rights of red zone property owners. Costs are also being sought. Cameron said the case was at the ‘‘leading edge of property rights’’ in New Zealand.
The group would turn to the Supreme Court if the Court of Appeal overturned the August decision, he said.