The Government has released a list of 149 projects it will refer to expert panels for consent as part of the Fast-Track Approvals Bill which it plans to pass before the end of the year.
Minister for Infrastructure Chris Bishop said these projects would have significant regional or national benefits and would create a pipeline of economy boosting developments.
The list included 58 housing or land developments, 42 infrastructure projects, 22 renewable energy builds, 11 mines, eight quarries, and seven aquaculture farms.
Among the housing and land category were some miscellaneous projects such as a luxury golf resort development in Queenstown, a new roof for Eden Park, and a steel manufacturing plant in Waikato.
But Bishop said 44 of the 58 were housing developments and would together consent the construction of 55,000 homes to help address the housing crisis.
This compares to just 33,600 homes consented in the 12-months ended August this year, and a record of 50,000 consented in 2022.
Most controversial on the list will be the mining and quarrying projects which face stiff opposition from environmentalists such as Greenpeace.
The activist group said including Trans-Tasman Resources’ bid to mine sand from the Taranaki seabed was “especially concerning” as it had previously failed in court processes.
Trans-Tasman Resources withdrew from a Environmental Protection Authority hearing in March and was accused of pinning its hopes of being given a spot on the Fast-track list.
Straterra, a mining industry association, said the list acknowledged the regional and national significance of its sector.
"At a time when manufacturing and processing plants are closing in the regions, mining brings much needed jobs and money into regional communities, and exports to boost our trade deficit. Mining belongs on the fast-track list," it said.
Another source of controversy could be the expansion of Kings Quarry in Auckland, as people related to the business donated $55,000 to NZ First during the 2023 campaign.
Resources Minister Shane Jones has been a strong advocate for both the fast-track process and the mining industry.
He was unable to make the announcement on Sunday, apparently due to a delayed flight, but Bishop said strict conflict management processes were followed.
If a conflict of interest was identified, the decision to include a project on the list would be transferred to another minister — however, Bishop wouldn’t reveal whether this step had actually been required.
A political party having accepted a donation from an applicant did not constitute a conflict for the Government, he told reporters.
Readers can see the full list at this link.
88 Comments
You're right - much of South D was marsh or tidal flat before it was reclaimed - the problem isn't drainage per se as the ground is quite porous, it's that the land is so close to sea level the water table is very close to the ground surface when there's a high tide.
That porosity makes it impractical to defend as the water simply comes up from below, so the policy is looking to be managed retreat - but given Dunedin is a prisoner of terrain, history and policy, where the people are going has been rather absent from the discussion. South D is a really low-decile area: no money seems to equate to no voice.
Notably, the monstrously expensive hospital is also being built on reclaimed land, close to sea level, when there was a geologically much better site available at Wakari: we really don't seem to be able to learn.
Edit: not only sand was used as fill. Kettle park on the sea-front is over a huge land fill, and things like building rubble are beginning to drop out of the seaward side of the dunes. The council is trying to defend against the sea...but the sea always wins and the last estimate I saw was a 50 million dollar price tag on the excavation and clean up: but as always, it seems to be a case of manana. The slightly daunting thing is that there are stories (urban legends?) that munitions were dumped there at the end the the Second World War. I'm not sure about that, but I am certain there will be some pretty nasty stuff in there.
Exactly. There’s a huge backlog of consented homes that haven’t been built or even started to be built.
The issue isn’t number of consented homes. The issue is finance and development economics.
But it will be great for Winton as they will get massive property value uplift on their rural zoned land. Assuming they can convince the panel re: flooding.
Reminds me of that bit in The Simpsons where some asks Lionel Hutz to imagine a world without Lawyers.
But in all seriousness, ACT is a protest party, because they are only interested in what their small band of donors and supporters want, regardless of whether it is good for the country or not they have or will never put forward anything major that will survive a change of government.
In all their existence, their legacy in NZ's political history has basically been limited to - preventing National from doing what they want some of the time, to having any major policy pieces they get over the line undone as soon as they leave government. All in all, a pretty average record.
It should be obvious that pandering to childlessness is a dead end for a country? There's no more selfish way to be a generation than to not replace yourself, or expect someone else to do it for you. At least Japan was man enough not to reach for immigration and will accept their demise.
I looked through the list and the developments are hardly ideal. Poor locations for many of them. Building houses at Dury is not going to help at all.
It’s a way for the developer to push it through and keep the consenting cost down, but much of it won’t be built for many years.
Its uneconomic to build, fast-tracking won’t change that.
Yes, most of the development land was bought at a restrictive price, ie a very high price, so they will still expect, and in fact need that whatever they build will sell at monopoly prices.
Many of them are uneconomic but still could be onsold with consent to the 'greater fool/s.'
But if this fast-track process (which used to be called normal speed) is opened up to all, then a lot of the price paid for historical landbanking land/development land is in trouble.
If these are the fast track projects I'd hate to see what the time they'd take without fast track, 3-5+years?
I've taken particular note of Kings quarry as I downloaded their consent application, 15may23, which was fast track under the Section 17 Covid-19 (Fast Track Consenting) Act 2020 . They had to fall over backwards in their application to appease Maori and do all the preliminary work in ensuring Maori weren't offended. There should be no such molly coddling of Maori and any consent application publicly notified and Maori being treated as any other group or individual wanting to have a say. Unfortunately the RMA also requires Maori involvement.
The document an other associated documents can be found here. https://www.epa.govt.nz/fast-track-consenting/referred-projects/kings-q…
The extent of the application involves all but about 3 pages not involving addressing Maori issues, just about all having to be done by the applicant.
pg2 half of the page Maori
pg3,4,5,6 all the page "
Of note on pg6. Relevant principles and provisions of the Treaty settlements for: Ngāti Whātua o Kaipara,
Te Kawerau ā Maki, Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki, and Te Ākitai Waiohua Crown acknowledgements and apologies 40.
As part of all of the identified Treaty settlements, the Crown offers acknowledgements and
an apology as part of Treaty settlement redress to atone for historical wrongs,
restore honour, and begin the process of healing.
pg7,8,9,10 all the page Maori
pg12 and 13 all of the page "
Enough to make me want to vote Act. Fortunately we also have Shane Jones of NZ First to keep a watchful eye on the excesses of Maori. Hopefully he is able to do something about.
Why go to the expense of producing an "Essential Minerals" list that rightly includes phosphate to keep our agricultural industry going, and then exclude the project that will take us towards self sufficiency in that mineral?
Disclosure: My $5,000 investment in CRP (10 years ago) was worth less than $100 yesterday and probably $10 tomorrow.
As I understand it the luxury golf course isn't new but a redevelopment of The Hills and has been in the works for a while.
God you are all a depressing lot on this site now I know why NZ doesn't get ahead we must be all on Prozac, show a positive attitude to a government who trying to improve this country, it might not fit your narrative but a least they are giving it a go. Why don't you all become politicians then you can fix it, you all seem to have the answers. cheer up you could be living in the middle east right now
Feel for Pukerua Bay. They waited forever to have SH1 routed away from their lovely little coastal village and a less than two years later the govt is saying yes to 5000 houses and 10 years of construction. No schools doctors or train upgrades. Just more little replica houses all over the hill
There will be mistakes, and some of what looks like cronyism, but given NZ runs on cosy arrangements, maybe that's the price market economics has stuck us with to achieve anything.
Also: while this may be fast track consenting, there are only a couple of time-frames I can see mentioned.
Is there any requirement to complete the works consented in a "reasonable" time frame to prevent people just sitting on things like housing consents that have increased the value of what they own?
But...things are being done, rather than being tied up in endless unproductive process: hopefully they'll be effective and efficient.
Exactly. The fact that NZ has been in a recession for two years while other countries like Australia and the US are ticking over nicely, is testament to the fact that the economic destruction has nothing to do with covid and everything to do with the mismanagement of the previous Govt. I look at all the infrastructure spending in Australia and am saddened that in NZ nothing has been built for six years, so there is nothing that you can even look forward to being delivered any time soon. Good on NACTNZ for at least trying to remedy the dire situation NZ finds itself in.
It would have been great to see a replacement for the Inter Island ferry on the fast track list, so I'm guessing there's still no plan.
I'm also guessing that the politics of that one - WCC, Kiwi Rail, Wellington Port, Iwi, Picton Port, Picton Council, DOC and all the rest have made it a nightmare political nettle that no-one wants to grasp.
There is another political problem: getting the parties who all actually own bits of the system to agree to something that's evidence based for the benefit of the country as a whole, rather than serving their narrow needs alone.
That lack of cohesive structure and competing agendas contributed a lot to the quadrupling of the original budget. It's nonsense and poor management that has allowed something so vital to have developed to have so many 'owners'.
Yes , it was a case of the best site for a new ferry terminal not been the best site for the city. Though it seems to me the area is inherently transport based, ignoring the stadium plonked in the middle of it .I would have thought any green or people friendly development would be further towards Te Papa and beyond. Though it would be nice to walk from the station to these areas.
But it is possibly a good use of any fast track or national infrastructure provisions , when the national interest is greater than the local body / population interest.
Living in the South, I now fly to Wellington and hire a car, which means no unsealed roads and no taking stuff like a bike or surfboard up country. It's frustrating and the ferries - like Dunedin hospital and the public service jobs - are collateral damage of a government hell bent on demonstrating that expensively out of control activities will not be tolerated under any circumstances.
The days of cost-plus projects funded by taxpayers look over, which is likely bad news for our terribly inefficient infrastructure development.
I had a good friend on a driving trip down South have to park his car in Nelson for weeks, and fly home, before he could get a spot on a ferry back North after there were multiple failures a while back.
Could someone explain why cant passenger traffic be left to BlueBridge and freight simply shipped from port to port (NZ has a lot of them) and then trucked locally? Why do we need to send containers between islands by rail to passenger terminals when we could use the commercial ports? For example, why not ship from Nelson to New Plymouth or Christchurch to Napier?
I cant imagine that trucking to Nelson then shipping to New Plymouth, then trucking wherever, is going to be that much less time efficient than trucking to rail, to Picton, ferry to Wellington, then back on rail, then truck to wherever. Rail is a very slow form of transport compared to road.
Our freight handling is inefficient and the mode changes make ports unattractive - not impossible, just expensive - and our coastal shipping service is not actually ours. From memory we have one NZ flagged coastal vessel at the moment, although there are overseas-owned services running - https://transporttalk.co.nz/news/maersk-to-launch-nz-coastal-shipping-s…
Example: Wellington Port has container trucks running continuously between the dockside loading area and the container park, becasue the port has developed around Highway 1 and other roads that run through the middle of the operations area, and the prospect of expanding or redesigning is an expensive nightmare becasue there are so many parties involved - cf. the Ferry Terminals.
Is it at least facing the right direction to implement other policies that will result in truly affordable housing?
Yes, BUT.
Some of these projects will be spread over ten years or more, so 55,000 houses are only a fraction of what is needed and will not meet demand. Until supply at least equals demand, it will have very little effect on making houses more affordable.
All the benefits of the fast track process go to a few big players, in effect giving them a monopoly and shutting out many small players that still have to run the council gauntlet.
The true test will be to see if this process, ie the qualitative process that comes out of this, is opened up to everyone, so if you meet the rules, then anyone, big or small can do it. That's how truly free markets work.
Otherwise, this process will only be to the benefit of a few.
Essentially a restrictive monopoly to be further grifted.
If you want to do a development in PC NZ, this is what you need to investigate...
Urban Form, Centres Hierarchy, Visual Amenity, Natural Character and Landscape, Cultural Values (Consult the local maoris), Transport, Infrastructure and Servicing, Existing Infrastructure, Ecology, Natural Hazards, Land Contamination, Heritage and Archeology, and Reverse Sensitivity.
As you can see, nothing happens fast in the Shaky Isles.
Do we have a housing crisis? Rental inventory is at record levels. Unsold houses are piling up on the market. It seems to me that there are plenty of houses, and not enough people. The Govt would be better off focusing on why people are leaving the country in droves - and hot tip, it isnt just for higher wages in Australia.
Got any links for rental inventory at record levels, interested in that. I do wonder why we can't do something around existing house use, eg. banning whole house use for Airbnb and just allowing it for the purpose it was originally created - spare room in owners home. Alternatively charging commercial rates for Airbnbs like motel/hotels are subject to. Have read that people are pulling their houses from Airbnb due to increased costs which will be one part of the extra rental inventory story.
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