Support for Waihī's mining industry after Government approval for land buy

Waihi's Martha mine pit. Photo / file

Government approval for OceanaGold to purchase land for a tailings dam provides security for a generous percentage of the Waihī community, according to Hauraki mayor John Tregidga.

Tregida described Tuesday's announcement as the right decision, adding the earlier decision by Land Information Minister Eugenie Sage had been "totally incorrect and totally inappropriate" for Waihī.

The application was first put before Associate Finance Minister David Clark and Sage but was turned down after Sage did not agree with her coalition colleague that the purchase was likely to have substantial and identifiable benefits.

Approval was granted after Minister of Finance Grant Robertson and Associate Minister of Finance David Parker considered and recommended the applications under the Overseas Investment Act.

The 180ha of farmland would enable the construction of a storage facility that would extend the life of OceanaGold's mine for a further nine years.

"Waihī has been a mining town since it was established," Tregidga said. "Currently there are between 250 and 300 mine workers who have invested in Waihī and who are an integral part of the community.

"[Tuesday's] announcement gives them long-term security."

Tregidga believed about 80 per cent of the Waihī community was supportive of the mine and, of the 20 per cent who did not, not all were opposed to the industry.

"As long as the Crown Minerals Act remains in existence, I believe mining and mining exploration will continue. The RMA [Resource Management Act] can only look at the impacts mining has, it cannot say whether it can be."

OceanaGold needs resource consent from the Hauraki District Council before it can begin operations on the land.

OceanaGold senior community advisor Kit Wilson said it would be during the consent process when Waihī locals and the wider community would have the opportunity to have their concerns heard.

Harcourts Waihi saleswoman Dee Stevenson said, at the end of the day, Waihī was, and remained, a gold mining town.

"Waihī is a destination town, mainly due to the lifestyle," Stevenson said. "We're 10 minutes to the beach and an hour to an hour-and-a-half away from major cities.

"There is a lot of information available to people considering purchasing property in Waihī and, from a real estate perspective, we encourage all buyers to undertake their own due diligence process."

She said the Waihī community had gone through a lot with the mining company over the years and, because of that, there was considerably more transparency around current mining operations.

However, Coromandel Watchdog of Hauraki chairwoman, former Green MP Catherine Delahunty, said the group was "disgusted" by Robertson's and Parker's decision which, in her opinion, had sabotaged Sage.

"Oceana have undermined the robust decision made by Green Minister Eugenie Sage with an application that is basically the same as before so they can get a new decision.

"It's a shocking attack on due process and on the Minister who made the original decision on robust grounds.

"It's not a new application, and the Labour ministers who approved it have ignored the environment and climate risks as well as the loss of food-producing land."

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told NZME on Tuesday that Sage would not lose her Land Information ministerial portfolio even though the Government had effectively overturned her decision on foreign investment in Waihi.

Ardern said the decision was the sign of a robust process, and "absolutely not" a sign of the Labour Party railroading the Greens.

She said it was not unusual for Clark and Sage to have come to different decisions in May.

"A different application was then made, two separate ministers again looked at the decision and came to a different outcome."