Resource Management Act

"This Act has nationalised land in this country, and ruined many hard working New Zealanders. It is time to recognise it as the excrement that it is, and dump it," says Libertarianz Environment Deregulation Spokesman Peter Cresswell.

The RMA upholds the toxic collectivism of kaitiakitanga - or stewardship - while completely ignoring property rights; it upholds the nonsense of 'intrinsic values' while destroying distinctively human values; it touts 'effects-based planning' while regulating and prohibiting human activities; it has empowered an enormous army of consultants to interpret and manage it - an army set to increase under the proposed amendments in both number and cost.

It protects trees, rocks and mud puddles while providing no protection for human life; it protects future generations while making it virtually impossible to build the infrastructure these generations will need. It fails to even mention property rights in its 455 pages, while harbouring a savage penalties regime of fines up to $200,000, and up to two years in jail!

It is supported by EVERY party in this current parliament, yet it has seen:·Whitianga held to ransom for the edification of a very stupid woman, and a very grasping iwi; ·the Kopu Bridge delayed for years before site investigations were even allowed to begin; ·a Waiheke developer ruined because the RMA allowed Council to dump raw sewage on his boundary fence; ·it has seen iwi charging $80 an hour to ward off 'evil spirits'; ·a Wairarapa farmer given 6 months Periodic Detention and a fine of $26,000 for excavating a small part of his Wairarapa property in preparation for a paua pond; ·beachfront property owners prohibited from building new dwellings, and prosecuted for preventing their existing houses from falling into the sea; ·New Plymouth beachcombers prosecuted for collecting driftwood; ·it is routinely used by businesses to stymie their competitors, and by iwi to practice extortion on their neighbours.

This Act is toxic. It must go!

It is often defended - despite its obvious poison - because it is claimed to provide environmental protection, yet it has seen: ·consents issued to a developer to dump sewage effluent directly into an ocean outfall at Akaroa; ·to a Pulp and Paper Mill to dump toxic waste into the Tarawera River; ·and to a Meremere landfill to dump toxic leachate into the Waikato River.

This Act has, in short, been a disaster both for the environment and for property owners.  It must go!

"If anyone thinks there is an easier way," waffled pretentious poseur Simon Upton - who oversaw the introduction of this excrement, "then I suspect their view of the issue is simplistic and their imagined solution inadequate." Such is the ignorance of this former Minister of Mud Puddles that he ignores completely the eight hundred years of common law history that arose precisely to manage just such situations.

And such is her hatred for humanity that Jeanette Fitzsimons boasts her Environment Select Committee will make the Act even more onerous! And Minister Marian Hobbs agrees!

It is time to drive a stake through the heart of the Resource Management Act. It is time to replace it with common law protection of private property rights.

No other party is even remotely close to saying this. Only Libertarianz will dump it.