September 01, 2016
Ruataniwha land swap unlawful
Conservation groups and iwi are celebrating a Court of Appeal judgment stopping the Director General of Conservation from swapping land for Ruataniwha Dam.
The $275 million scheme has been opposed by Ngati Kahungunu Inc because it would degrade water quality in rivers in the central Hawke’s Bay.
Greenpeace agriculture campaigner Genevieve Toop says while the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council subsidiary driving the project is likely to keep pushing for ways to continue, the judgment is important for environmental protection.
"If this land swap did go ahead it would have set a precedent that specially protected conservation land in New Zealand can be swapped for commercial development when it gets in the way of things like massive irrigation schemes. We hope that the director general of conservation takes that to heart and that we don't see this kind of situation happen in the future," she says.
Genevieve Toop says the regional council might try to use the Public Works Act to get the land it needs for the dam, but that would be hard to justify for what is essentially a private for-profit scheme.
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