'Windgate' reflected in Meridians energy prices

“Talk about bad timing for Meridian. Yesterday we had Windgate’s $175,000 revelation and today, Meridian’s 4,000 electricity customers in Southland and Otago discover they will be paying 5.8 percent more for power in March,” says Don Nicolson, Federated Farmers President.

Windgate is highlighting the urgent need to reform DoC’s statutory advocacy role it enjoys under the Conservation Act. The ability to ‘buy’ DoC’s silence has also highlighted the one-way street compensation has become. With it, the contradiction of DoC being a statutory advocate while looking to fund improvements to its estate. If DoC’s statutory advocacy doesn’t change it will increasingly fester a negative perception.

“The issue in Windgate is the perceived way in which DoC got its money from Meridian. From the outside, it looks like DoC had a legal gun to the applicant’s head by way of its statutory role while its other hand was outstretched looking for cash. Cash that successfully saw DoC’s legal guns holstered and that’s not a good look,” Mr Nicolson continued.

“The number one priority is to end DoC’s statutory advocacy role under the Conservation Act and the lawyers this keeps in business. Doing this doesn’t stop DoC from objecting in the future but places DoC on the same footing as other departments, companies, organisations like Federated Farmers and private individuals.

“It also means DoC will be more judicious in what they object to rather than the shotgun approach farmers see being employed. To paraphrase George Orwell, all objectors are created equal, but in the case of the Conservation Act and the RMA, some objectors are more equal than others.

“Federated Farmers supports most of what DoC does and wishes to see the money it spends on lawyers and non-core activities poured into New Zealand’s fantastic biodiversity.

“It’s palpably unfair that private land owners can’t demand compensation if their land is ‘protected’ for conservation values. Windgate shows that there is no reason why the compensation provisions stripped out from the original RMA should not be reintroduced with the RMA reforms underway.

“If compensation is good enough for DoC’s goose then it’s good enough for the private land owners’ gander,” Mr Nicolson concluded.