By ANNE GIBSON
A spat between commercial property investors and Environment Minister Marian Hobbs broke out in Tauranga yesterday, leaving the representatives of a $14 billion industry shaking their heads in disbelief.
The need for non-political planning commissioners to hear applications for resource consent was at the heart of the fight, which saw Ms Hobbs dig her heels in against the sector at the Property Council's annual meeting.
She sees the process as political, but the property sector is pushing for politics to be left out when decisions are being made.
Bell Gully law firm partner Rebecca Macky and Auckland barrister Russell Bartlett went head-on with Ms Hobbs in front of the conference.
They argued for the need to remove politics from the consent hearing process of the Resource Management Act.
Kiwi Income Property Trust boss Richard Didsbury began the debate, criticising provisions of the act which see elected representatives such as city, district and regional councillors often appointed as "independent" planning commissioners for another territorial authority.
Yet these people are often elected on an anti-development platform, he said. They had vested interests which countered those of property developers.
Ms Hobbs' response was to reiterate that the current situation should remain. At one point she stopped, saying she was in danger of "becoming muddled," and accused the two lawyers of being intellectual.
"You are making nefarious comments about people who have good will," she told Mr Didsbury.
Rebecca Macky's response after the fight was to accuse Ms Hobbs of spitting the dummy.
But by that stage, the minister had left the conference, even though delegates were keen to continue the debate.
Earlier, Rebecca Macky had used the example of Queenstown as a situation where the Resource Management Act was clearly not working, ironically in allowing too much development.
She said the sheer number of planning applications being allowed through showed that in its current form, the law was not serving the best interests of the community.
She cited the fact that leading tourism players were warning that Queenstown's rampant development might kill the goose that laid the golden egg.
In 1999, only two of 659 consent applications were rejected.
The Mountain Scene newspaper has reported that in the 10 months to May 31, $100 million worth of building consents were issued - almost double the value for the same period the year before. Over 100 apartments are being built, with 250 to follow.
Environment Minister 'spits the dummy' over attack on law
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