ECan too controlling, group says

Some Hurunui landowners say they’re living in the ‘‘grips of a dictatorship’’, claiming Environment Canterbury is punishing conservationists by controlling their day-today activities.

Critics say rules being considered by Hurunui District Council – at the behest of ECan’s Regional Policy Statement (RPS) – are ‘‘draconian’’, and have been forced upon the council by ECan so it can gain access to properties it had previously been barred from entering.

The RPS provides ‘‘directions’’ to district councils to include biodiversity policies in their district plans. It does this to ensure councils are adhering to central government’s Resource Management Act.

But a group of landowners said the latest ‘‘directions’’ had gone too far, and unjustifiably control how they conduct their day-to-day business.

In the policy proposed by Hurunui council, landowners would have to apply for resource consents before they could perform everyday tasks such as spraying weeds or building fences around their native bush.

For those consents to be approved, the landowner would have to pay for an ‘‘ecological assessment’’ of their property.

A group of Hurunui landowners with native bush on their properties – calling themselves Hurunui SNA – have described the changes as a ‘‘blackmail trap’’ and say the mandatory ‘ecological assessment’ is a ploy by ECan to control and monitor their activities.

Under the new rules, they would have to allow surveyors onto their property – something many had previously forbidden – which they say is an overstep of the council’s remit.

In response to the policy changes, the group, which has consulted with councils for more than 15 years, bowed out of discussions because they said was ‘‘no chance of a workable outcome’’.

The group has directed its frustrations towards ECan, which they said had reached historically low levels of trust with Hurunui locals.

Jamie McFadden, a conservationist who runs a native bush restoration business and is spokesman for Hurunui SNA, said the rules punished landowners who had done the right thing and voluntarily preserved native bush on their properties.

‘‘I have never seen to this extent the loss of trust and frustration with ECan, it’s worse now than it has ever been before,’’ he said.

‘‘[The new rules] penalise the guys doing the good stuff. It’s not collaborative, it’s not working with landowners.’’

Canterbury’s district councils also expressed concern about ECan’s biodiversity ‘directions’, with all eight who submitted on the RPS expressing concern about its regulatory approach.

Six of the councils – including Hurunui – said they should be able to determine their own rules around biodiversity.

An ECan spokeswoman said the organisation had a responsibility for ‘‘setting a direction regionally,’’ and worked with district councils to develop their own biodiversity policies.

She said the Hurunui council had consulted with landowners and other interested parties before notifying the policy.