Fieldays: Act Party differing from National’s ‘flip-flopping’ in hunt for rural vote

The Act Party is unveiling a largely unsurprising suite of primary industries policies at Fieldays today, but one of the party’s newest recruits is defending the scarcity of new policy, claiming rural communities will appreciate certainty over “flip-flopping”.

Act’s Standing up for Rural New Zealand policy document is being announced by party leader David Seymour, MP and dairy farmer Mark Cameron and ex-Federated Farmers president Andrew Hoggard at the landmark Waikato event at midday.

It features much of what the party has already announced on agriculture, including scrapping the Zero Carbon Bill, tying emissions prices to that of New Zealand’s five main trading partners, ditching Three Waters, restarting live animal exports and repealing the Arms Legislation Act.

Hoggard, speaking to the Herald, said the rural sector would appreciate Act wasn’t “flip-flopping from where we were six months ago”.

“It can be great generating a bit of buzz with some new shiny things, but sometimes it gives people a bit of assurance we’ve been on the right track for a while now.”

New Act Party candidate Andrew Hoggard was formerly the Federated Farmers president. Photo / Alex Burton

His comments came just days after the National Party withdrew its support from the Government/sector partnership group He Waka Eke Noa, which was created to develop a pricing scheme for agricultural emissions. That was preceded by another change in National’s position on housing density rules.

Even though he was a long-time Act supporter, Hoggard’s move from Federated Farmers president to Act candidate was significant for the small party that was often overshadowed by National in the rural sector.

Hoggard said many Fieldays attendees had congratulated him on his venture into politics.

“I’ve had a lot of positive feedback from people saying it’s good to see someone who’s moved up through the sector into a leadership position and then moved into politics.”

He didn’t believe there was a “cannibalisation” of votes on the right, noting there had been teachers and nurses - traditionally Labour voters - interested to hear Act’s policies at Fieldays.

The party’s chief new agriculture policy promised to give regional councils the responsibility to manage, regulate and verify plans for how farms would limit harmful practices on freshwater resources.

As outlined by the Ministry for the Environment, farmers or growers with at least 20 hectares of arable or pastoral land, 5ha used for horticultural purposes or 20ha of land with combined use, would need a farm plan.

The requirements were being rolled out in stages - first to parts of Waikato and Southland from August 1 this year and eventually nationwide by the end of 2025.

Hoggard, whose Feilding dairy farm backed on to the Oroua River, said reducing “bureaucratic red tape” from the farm plan process had been one of his priorities after confirming his candidacy with Act.

While acknowledging documents detailing how farm plans would work had only recently been released, Hoggard suspected it would be overly centralised and would inappropriately apply to some farmers and growers.

He cited one person who had approached him during Fieldays who owned a 40ha “bushy” block that was largely used for guest accommodation but also had a few cattle to control the grass.

“There’s very little risk from farms like that and we shouldn’t be capturing that.”

He feared the cost of farm plans could “stretch into five figures” when renewals were added.

Despite rural matters being front-of-mind at Fieldays, Hoggard said the majority of people he’d interacted with had cited crime, the cost of living and co-governance as their top issues.