Regional councils 'failing'

Regional councils are ineffective and some have been captured by farmer interests, says a Government environmental adviser.

Guy Salmon, executive director of the Ecologic Foundation, handed out a stinging review of the performance of regional councils at yesterday's environmental summit in Auckland.

Salmon was a member of the technical advisory group to Environment Minister Nick Smith that recommended abolishing regional councils as part of the minister's streamlining of the Resource Management Act.

At the time, Smith's stated that recommendation went beyond the group's terms of reference.

Yesterday, Salmon told about 300 people at the Environmental Defence Society's Reform in Paradise conference that regional councils had failed to meet their objectives.

In some regions, they had been captured by farmers and farming interests, which meant efforts to manage water as a sustainable resource were also failing.

"Farmers have firm control over a great deal of regional councils. Is this governance formula ever going to deliver us clean water?"

Canterbury has 54 per cent of New Zealand's resource consent-allocated water and 67 per cent of the country's irrigated land.

Salmon said regional councils suffered from a lack of profile and lack of political authority to implement decisions.

"Even the best of them seem to be failing. We have to wonder if the political authority is there."

He recommended the Government's planned Environmental Protection Authority have regional offices, with two-tiers of government central government and district or city councils.

Environment Southland chief executive Ciaran Keogh took issue with Salmon's comments, blaming the Government and the lack of national policy statements and national environmental standards for the regional councils' lack of direction. "The top layer is missing-in-action. We get no support."

However, Salmon told The Press regional authorities had to do better than blame the Government.

Environment Canterbury chief executive Bryan Jenkins told the summit regional councils had a future.

He wanted them to add "the role of facilitator of sustainable development to the statutory role as regulator for environmental protection".

- © Fairfax NZ News