'He's on a personal crusade': Jane Smith slams David Parker's freshwater reforms

North Otago farmer Jane Smith. Photo / Supplied

North Otago farmer Jane Smith says she likes to "play the ball, not the man," but when it comes to Environment Minister David Parker and his freshwater reforms - she's willing to make an exception.

"David Parker's actually made this very personal, he's on a personal crusade," she told The Country's Jamie Mackay.

Smith was unhappy with Parker's controversial freshwater policy and she wanted to get the word out about the supposed "flawed process" behind the reforms.

"An important thing for me now is to make urban New Zealand aware of this Parkergate lack of process ... and skipping procedure ... there's a black box here that needs to be revealed."

As a former winner of the Ballance Farm Environment Awards, Smith knew what she was talking about when it came to freshwater protection.

She said it was ironic that both her and Parker were after the same outcome, which was "clean waterways and good land management", however, she believed the Minister's focus was too limited.

"Myself and my fellow farmers have a much wider view of what that looks like - not just picking on one small, narrow area. We want really diverse, resilient communities and to be able to pay our way in terms of the GDP."

In fact, Smith was so concerned she had used the OIA to find out more about the process behind the freshwater reforms.

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"It's the lack of procedure that's gone into this, and usually, as we know, if there's a poor outcome there's usually a poor process behind it."

"It really worries me that there's essentially, potentially an abuse of legislative power in there and it's a real concern."

Smith was also worried that Parker had the ability to call in any planned proposals where "a matter could be of national significance," by using the term "climate change - which is a very generic and minor test to pass."

"It really lacks any metric or rationale - we're creating these hurdles for ourselves and it's a real concern, especially when you take into account that there's very little room to move in terms of the margins in producing our food in New Zealand due to our regulatory costs and our employment costs."

In a piece for Rural News, Smith said the "inconvenient truth" for Parker was that many New Zealand farmers were already taking care of their waterways "without a cent of burden on the tax payer."

Unfortunately this "more practical timeframe does not fit into his aspirational goal of being anointed as New Zealand's freshwater godfather," she said in the publication.

Also in today's interview: Smith discussed Senior Policy Analyst, vegan and animal rights activist, Rowan Taylor and took a look at Beef+Lamb NZ's report on whether sheep and beef farms are carbon neutral. She also commented on Conservation Minister Eugenie Sage's controversial comments on the Lake Ōhau fire.