Although the Maori Party has reached an agreement with the National Party to support the remaining stages of the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill (RLAB), it is unclear yet what conclusions it may reach in regards to protecting regions' GM-free status.
On Thursday last week, the Maori Party announced it was confident that the changes advocated for in the RMA amendments would lead to better balanced development and kaitiakitanga.
There was no mention, however, of what the implications were for the s360D clause which had Hawke's Bay growers and local leaders concerned about the powers that could be conferred on the Minister for the Environment to prevent regions' from declaring themselves GM-free.
In their statement last week, Maori Party co-leaders Te Ururoa Flavell and Marama Fox made no mention of the clause, but a spokesperson from the Maori Party office said yesterday that nothing was set in stone yet.
"We won't be able to talk about this until the bill gets to the committee stage before the third reading, but we will continue to advocate for stringent constraints on ministerial powers in the next couple of weeks."