As an outdoors group goes into bat for more national parkland, the land stewardship review process is called into question
A chunk of West Coast wilderness four times the size of Paparoa National Park could ultimately be handed over to Ngāi Tahu if the Government accepts the advice of panels reviewing stewardship land.
Public hearings are under way to hear submissions on the status of 1 million hectares of land given to the Department of Conservation in the reforms of the 1980s but not assessed until now for its conservation values.
Both the Government-appointed western South Island national review panel and a Ngāi Tahu mana whenua panel have recommended classing 182,000ha from the Grey River to the Whitcombe River as “historic reserve”.
Most historic reserves in New Zealand are smaller than 10ha and the proposal has horrified conservationists, who want the bulk of the land added to Arthur’s Pass National Park.
“Historic reserve is a staggeringly inappropriate classification for land that meets all the criteria for national park status,” says Federated Mountain Clubs past president Jan Finlayson.
In its recommendation report, the mana whenua panel chaired by Ngāti Waewae leader Francois Tumahai says the large central region of the West Coast is the heart of Poutini Ngāi Tahu history and its pounamu-related legends, customs and traditions.
The proposed Tarahanga e Toru historic reserve would recognise routes used by Māori to link the west and east coasts, the panel says.
The land in question adjoins Arthur’s Pass National Park and conservation groups say the only difference between the two areas is that the stewardship land is even more remote from roads and human development.
Huts and tracks
“The proposed ‘historic reserve’ contains numerous peaks over 2000m, many small remnant glaciers, 300-400km of riverbed, about 60 back-country huts and more than 200km of tracks,” Federated Mountain Clubs says in its submission.
The association of tramping and climbing clubs and schools says it supports historic-reserve status for sections of the Taramakau River bed, where there’s physical evidence of Māori history and for other sites recognised in the iwi’s treaty settlement.
But for most of the land, national-park status would do a better job of protecting any historic values and would also preserve public access, Finlayson says.
The higher level of protection would also make it difficult to mine the area’s gold and rare earth deposits or to build hydro power schemes such as the Waitaha project supported by Poutini Ngāi Tahu but rejected by the government in 2019.
Those options, seen as opportunities by mana whenua and other West Coast interests, are viewed by conservation groups as threats to pristine wilderness and “world-class” wild rivers.
“The other risk with historic reserve status is that public access can be restricted by whoever’s managing it and there’s no guaranteed protection for the huts and tracks … there is also the possibility of disposal, and essentially privatisation,” Finlayson says.
Part of the Ngāi Tahu mana whenua panel report that has set alarm bells ringing appears to hint at that option.
“The reserve purposes must also provide a role for Ngāi Tahu in management and decision-making, including the option of vesting,” the report says.
The “purposes” of the reserve will need to be tweaked, it suggests, to recognise Ngāi Tahu interests and Treaty rights.
“Further clarification is required of the purposes of the reserve … to acknowledge the mana and rangatiratanga of Ngāi Tahu, and provide for Ngāi Tahu well-being, kaitiakitanga and mahinga kai (food gathering).”
The right of Ngāi Tahu is “expressly reserved” to have the classification of the area and others reviewed in the future, the mana whenua panel says.
Threatened species
Federated Mountain Clubs says the option of vesting the vast area in Ngāi Tahu goes well beyond the scope of the current review.
And the national panel, in its recommendations, avoids mention of that possibility and affirms the conservation quality of much of the area.
It cites forested slopes extending from the Southern Alps into the Otira and Taramakau rivers down to the ocean, and headwater areas with “a very high level of naturalness”.
The area is also home to uncommon ecosystems and threatened species of flora and fauna, the panel agrees.
But in justifying its “historic reserve” recommendation the panel says it’s required to give effect to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi in line with Section 4 of the Conservation Act.
That means it was bound to consider the values and interests of Ngāi Tahu, it says.
Several submitters to the West Coast stewardship land review spoken to by Newsroom say they are troubled by the recommendation and by the review process itself.
The national panel is billed by DoC as “independent and expert”.
But Finlayson says two of the most knowledgeable panellists, former Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment Dr Jan Wright and wilderness expert Les Molloy, resigned early on and weren’t replaced, contrary to the rules set by the government.
DoC’s operations director, Karl Beckert, says their places will be filled.
“We are working through a process for the minister to appoint two new members to the national panel that is working in the West Coast.
“This includes identifying the appropriate stage of the process to introduce new members to the panel’s work.”
Other submitters are uneasy about the influence of Ngāi Tahu on what they say is supposed to be a purely technical process of assessing the conservation values of the stewardship lands.
They spoke to Newsroom on condition they were not named.
“The trouble is it’s such a sensitive subject that if you say anything against the Ngāi Tahu position you’re seen as racist,” one submitter says.
“But there are clear conflicts of interest. You have the two chairs of the West Coast iwi from the mana whenua panel now sitting up there on the hearings panel when potentially the iwi stand to benefit from their recommendations.”
Two of the hearings last week were held on West Coast marae, making it awkward for some submitters, he says.
“You go to a marae, you’re supposed to be respectful to the home people, but here you are having to speak against something they are backing. It’s not a neutral venue and it’s not a comfortable situation.”
Impartiality questioned
Another man says he declined to submit because in his opinion the review process was not impartial.
“You’ll always get conflicts of interest and vested interests in a small community like the West Coast, and they can be managed, but in this case they haven’t been,” the man says.
Another submitter said the panels had come up with their own interpretation of DoC’s Treaty obligations under the Conservation Act when that was something the government itself was still trying to thrash out with Ngāi Tahu.
“I’d like to ask Ngāi Tahu what is its ultimate goal for the South Island’s wild places and our National Parks? What is the end game? I’d really like it to come out and say.”
Poutini Ngāi Tahu leaders say mana whenua are prevented from defending their position at this point.
Ngāti Waewae’s Tumahai and Ngāti Mahaki (Te Runanga o Makaawhio) chair Paul Madgwick say they can’t respond to the points raised by the conservation groups while they’re in the middle of a statutory process, but will do so once that’s complete.
DoC says both iwi representatives on the hearing panel declared a conflict of interest in relation to Westpower’s Waitaha hydro scheme application that falls within the proposed historic reserve.
Tumahai also has a conflict of interest as a director of coal miner Bathurst Resources.
Each will leave the table if the relevant companies appear at the hearing and won’t engage with other submitters on the stewardship-land issues involved, DoC says.
DoC also identified a potential conflict for Madgwick and Tumahai because of their connections with the Ngāi Tahu rūnanga.
“As these hearing panel advisory members were not involved in the drafting or approval of the relevant submission, no further management of the conflict is considered to be required,” DoC says in a statement on its website.
The department received 660 individual submissions on the West Coast stewardship land review, and 5980 proforma ones.
The hearings panel chaired by commissioner Reginald Proffit will listen to the last of the submitters including Federation Mountain Clubs in online sessions this week.
The hearings are open to the public via a link on the DoC website.
Made with the support of the Public Interest Journalism Fund
