Cell tower rules changes unlikely

BY JIM CHIPP - THE WELLINGTONIAN

New Zealanders are complaining in increasing numbers about the proliferation of cellphone towers, exempt from resource consents, but don't expect any radical rule changes.

Although Prime Minister John Key has reportedly told Manukau Mayor Len Brown that Cabinet would review the national standard, Environment Minister Nick Smith has dismissed the report as second-hand.

Dr Smith acknowledged he had received a lot of communications from individuals and groups about the national environmental standard the Labour-led government enacted last year, but said he still firmly supported the principle of a universal standard.

A national environmental standard defines the safe level of radiation for all New Zealand sites, and prevents local councils from considering safety in their locations.

Residents have complained to The Wellingtonian that sites are too close to their homes, that two or more towers are being erected close to their homes by different companies, that the process of formulating the standard was unfair and that there is a lack of consultation about where they will be installed.

The standard allows towers, cabinets and panel antennae to be installed on any road or road reserve as of right, provided they comply with emission and size limits.

Dr Smith said he supported a national environmental standard on radio frequency control.

"It is a nonsense having each of our 84 councils having to try to establish what the safe levels of radio frequency are in communities," he said.

"To put it frankly, it doesn't matter whether you're in Invercargill or Kaitaia; the health impacts or otherwise of radio frequency communications are exactly the same."

There was a lot of misinformation about radio frequency radiation, but New Zealand's permissible emission level from towers was conservative and safe, he said.

"The science around cellphone towers is pretty robust. The advice from the World Health Organisation and from our own expert committee was that the current standards are more than adequate to safeguard the public. People have asked for 100 per cent safety. In the real world, 100 per cent doesn't exist."

In some parts of the country, including Wellington, the new standard was more restrictive than the local councils' previous rules had been, he said.

However, Dr Smith was expecting to receive a parliamentary select committee's report before Christmas and he was keeping an open mind on the standard's establishment process. The report goes to Parliament in March.

The committee was very interested in the issue of co-location, where two or more companies use the same structure, he said.

"That is one of the areas I am looking at.

"One of the issues is that often co-location will reduce the impacts of cellphone towers on neighbourhoods," he said.

However, the first company usually built its tower to the maximum height restriction, forcing successive ones to obtain resource consent for extensions and it was usually easier to put up another pole, Dr Smith said.

"I'm of the view that we should re-look at that and see whether the commerce rules or the resource management rules make it easier for co-location."

Will the Prime Minister instigate a review of cellphone tower regulations?

Early this month the Howick and Pakuranga Times quoted Manukau Mayor Len Brown as having said in a meeting of his council on October 28: "I have spoken to the Prime Minister, who will recommend the Cabinet looks at changes to the National Environmental Standard, particularly the need for consultation. Everyone acknowledges that this is not perfect."

Environment Minister Nick Smith downplayed Mr Key's reported comments.

"I don't put any reliability on any of the claims about the PM and what the PM might or might not have said.

"I wouldn't give that too much credence; it's all very second-hand," he said.

A spokesman for Mr Key's office said Mr Key vaguely recalled meeting Mr Brown, but couldn't remember the exact words that were said.

A spokesman for the Manukau mayor's office said that Mr Brown was correctly quoted and that Mr Key had undertaken to take the radio frequency rules to Cabinet to look at changing them.

The radio frequency standard that Dr Smith has referred to was set in 1999 by a committee in which six of the eight members made money from radio emission.

The exceptions were the Ministry of Commerce and the New Zealand Institute of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Green list MP Sue Kedgley disputed that the standard was either robust or safe, and said its permissible radiation levels were being challenged in the European Parliament.

"The standard is completely and absolutely deficient because it does not take into account that there are biological, non-heating effects," she said.