April 11, 2017
RMA changes allows iwi to work closely with council
Maori political commentator Morgan Godfrey is questioning whether the Maori Party made the right trade off between protection of the environment and consultation with iwi.
The party’s two votes were what National needed to pass its reform of the Resource Management Act last week after its other support parties ACT and United future baulked.
The price was a new Mana Whakahono-a-rohe process that will allow iwi to work more closely with councils on resource consents.
Mr Godfrey says it needs to be weighed against the other changes, which make it easier to exploit the environment.
"Sure it’s easier for families to build a deck and all that, they don't have to fill out heaps of forms, but it's also easier for people to gain things like oil exploration rights, so the question I am keen to get an answer to is do iwi really want to be complicit in a system like this, a system that just makes it easier to exploit the environment?" he says.
FULL INTERVIEW WITH MORGAN GODFREY
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