Relief as Rena payouts settled at last

Fat Boy Charters owner Russ Hawkins and Papamoa Top 10 Holiday Park's Bruce Crosby are happy with the settlement. Photo/File

Tauranga marine and tourist businesses have survived the tough negotiating stance taken by Rena's owner and insurer to emerge with good settlements to their compensation claims.

All 74 claims were settled after two days of talks before commercial mediator Warren Sowerby, despite the owner and insurer saying prior to this week's hearing that it would only accept liability for direct oil damage - effectively excluding claims from land-based businesses.

At stake was the $11 million deposited with the High Court by the Rena insurer to compensate Bay businesses hit by the disaster.

Fifty-three of the claims worth $5.5 million were taken as a class action by the Business Action Group (BAG). They were joined in mediation by six iwi and hapu groups and 15 individuals.

BAG member and Papamoa Beach Top 10 Holiday Park spokesman Bruce Crosby said the first day dealt with Maori and individual claims, leaving Tuesday for their group.

"A satisfactory agreement was reached with the shipping company and insurer."

Although details of the settlements were confidential, Mr Crosby said the insurer and owner approached the mediation with goodwill to reach a settlement.

"It was not in our interests or theirs for this to carry on."

Another member of BAG's negotiating team Russ Hawkins of Fatboy Charters was happy with the settlement.

"There was a lot of to-ing and fro-ing but in the finish we were happy with the outcome."

He said if they had not reached agreement, it would have gone to litigation, so the group felt it had to get a result. Despite this pressure he felt they had achieved a good outcome.

Mr Hawkins said no one got everything they wanted in mediation and it augured well for the negotiations on their claims that those who settled on Monday were pleasantly surprised by the outcome.

Mr Hawkins said a couple of their negotiators had one-on-one talks with representatives of the owner and insurer and were "really chuffed" with their attitude. He estimated that BAG had put in hundreds of hours of work to prepare for mediation. While it would have been nice for people to have been paid out for proven losses, it was commercial practice for those doing the paying to save what they could.

Simon Marshall of Maui Ocean Products said the settlement was a load off his mind. If their negotiators were happy with the outcome then it sounded like they would be paid out on a reasonable portion of the claims.

"It is not a beaming smile but it is a little bit of weight off my shoulders."

Mr Marshall said lessons must be learned from the Rena grounding, including to increase the $11 million cap payable to claimants. It was also essential that as much of the Rena as was financially realistic should be removed off Astrolabe Reef, including the bow section, the debris and removing contaminants from the stern section.

Group spokesperson Nevan Lancaster said there had been a "satisfactory resolution" but he was not able to comment further as some details of the settlement remained confidential.