Call for Govt to take strong stand on factory dairy farming

Relevant offers

Farming

Cubicle farming still on horizon McVitty's nine farms in receivership Quake may aid apple growers Cubicle dairy applicants 'gaming' process, Smith Merino growers pull socks up Cow cubicles canned amid misinformation claims Minister turns hose on dirty dairying Dairy farms getting dirtier Perfecting the art of horse sense Jobs go as dairy co-op goes bust

A Government proposal to help Environment Canterbury (ECan) decide whether to approve contentious Mackenzie Basin factory dairy farming does not go far enough, opposition parties say.

Labour and the Greens believe Environment Minister Nick Smith is "ducking for cover" with his idea of appointing a "project co-ordinator" from the new Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to work with ECan.

They say the applications proposing cubicles for up to 18,000 cows are nationally significant enough in terms of their environmental and economic impact to justify a Government "call-in".

A call-in leaves the decision to the Government and bypasses Environment Court hearings.

Smith said yesterday he had received a report from the Ministry for the Environment confirming ECan's earlier legal opinion that the Government's ability to call-in the applications under the Resource Management Act (RMA) was constrained because most submissions were concerned with animal welfare.

ECan chief executive Bryan Jenkins wrote to Smith before Christmas asking whether "calling in" the applications might be a possibility, given their potential national impact.

Smith said the Government's options were further restricted because the applications were lodged before changes to the RMA widening the call-in criteria came into effect.

Three companies – Southdown Holdings, Five Rivers and Williamson Holdings – want to build 16 dairy farms where cows would spend most of the time in "cubicle" stables. They would live in cubicle stables 24 hours a day from March to October. Only from November to February would they be allowed outside for 12 hours a day.

ECan has received more than 3000 submissions on two of the companies' consent applications to store and discharge effluent, to excavate land, and discharge contaminants to air.

Smith told The Press that ECan would retain its legal decision-making power under his proposal, which would be discussed at Cabinet on January 19.

"It's simply a bit of a halfway house between full call-in powers and the Government being completely hands off."

ECan acting chief executive Jackie Curtis confirmed Smith had been in contact with the council and said ECan was working with the Government on the proposal.

Labour Christchurch Central MP Brendon Burns, the party's water spokesman, who found Jenkins' letter in a file of submissions, said it was good Smith had decided to get involved.

"But it doesn't seem at face value as if the appointment of someone from the EPA will provide much more teeth from what ECan already has. "It seems to stop short of a full intervention.

"Although a lot of submissions are around animal welfare issues, when you have the nation's single biggest exporter [Fonterra] voicing concerns about these proposals, the tourism industry putting out a very strong submission against, and the Prime Minister and minister of agriculture expressing concern, I think that's a pretty strong indication for a groundswell of public concern not simply focused on animal welfare. I would hope the Cabinet ... will look at the full range of impacts of these projects to New Zealand's wellbeing, export base and impacts on the fastest-growing tourism district in the country."

Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said there was a sense of "woe is me, I can't call it in" from Smith.

"He's just ducking for cover. The first decision is `do they have the power to call it in?' I think the answer is yes ...

"Do they have the power to decline it on the basis it would damage New Zealand's reputation? That second question is the open question.

"If a project would damage New Zealand's international brand and economy, the Government should have the right to decline it on those grounds."