Nick Clark: Towards a system that respects property rights - Tidy tweaks or real change?

After decades of planning gridlock, the government has promised to put property rights at the heart of New Zealand’s resource management system. But will its latest reforms deliver lasting change or just patch up the mess we already have?

The government is proposing sweeping changes across three packages covering infrastructure and development, the primary sector, and freshwater management. The direction is largely positive: streamlining infrastructure consenting, reducing housing barriers, easing regulatory burdens on farmers, and providing greater freshwater flexibility.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 21/10/24

Don’t forget the Paddle Ferns, while saluting Kiwi sports teams’ weekend triumphs – and please note Peters’ success in Thailand

Our sports teams did the country proud over the weekend.

Besides holding on to the America’s Cup and winning the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup, our teams beat Aussie netballers (here in Wellington) and Indian cricketers on their home turf.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 1/10/24

New name – and a richer swill – for 20-year-old government fund to help clean up contaminated sites

Oinkers will be heartened to learn the Government has established something that looks like a new trough. Or rather, it has put more swill into an old trough and given it a new name.

Mind you, it’s not the most alluring of names. It’s the Contaminated Sites and Vulnerable Landfills Fund, a source of dosh intended to help councils and landowners clean up historic landfills and other contaminated sites that are vulnerable to the effects of severe weather.

Jeffrey McNeill: Why NZ needs to decide what it wants from local government...

Basic service provider or mini democracy? Why NZ needs to decide what it wants from local government

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s recent challenge to local government “to rein in the fantasies and to get back to delivering the basics brilliantly” was unsurprising, given his government’s focus on fiscal restraint.

It was in keeping with his announcement that councils’ legislative purpose of delivering their communities’ economic, social, environmental and cultural wellbeing are to be removed from the Local Government Act.

Jeffrey McNeill: Resource management is always political

Resource management is always political – the Fast-track Approvals Bill is just honest about it

The government’s Fast-track Approvals Bill has been widely criticised for potentially handing too much power to three cabinet ministers, and raising the risk of conflicts of interest and political interference in environmental management.

Ironically, the bill also helps demonstrate why the original Resource Management Act (RMA) was always doomed to fail – and what its replacement will have to get right.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 19/6/24

More money flows through the infrastructure pipeline – and Public Works Act changes aim to hasten the flow

Infrastructure is big deal in the Beehive news agenda today.

The government is making it easier to build infrastructure by modernising the Public Works Act.

And it is braying about the billions of dollars being pumped through something called the National Infrastructure Pipeline, which provides a national “view” of current or planned infrastructure projects, from roads, to water infrastructure, to schools

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 14/6/24

Favours announced to foster a flourishing forestry sector – and we get a measure of the axing of public service jobs

The Government continued the flow of good news to the country’s primary producers during a busy 24 hours for the Beehive press team.

It was the forestry sector’s turn to savour announcements intended to enable it to flourish.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 10/5/24

No, the govt will not be cutting back on every budget – and the Defence vote is among those to be given a funding boost

Reporting on defence spending late last year, RNZ said the coalition government will have to make some tough calls this term to help the force address staff shortages and ageing infrastructure.

Dr Eric Crampton: GST back to councils?

If a localist agenda involves punting more responsibility down to councils, then central government assistance in funding some of those responsibilities could make sense.

If councils were only responsible for core infrastructure, that can and should be covered by rates revenue and user charges on use of the infrastructure. If the resulting rates charges are unaffordable because of low income in the district, that's generally a problem for central government redistribution policy. Central government takes a lot of money from higher earning households and redistributes it to lower earning households, particularly lower income households with children.

Nick Clark: Boosting our cities and regions

New Zealand faces significant challenges in managing growth, delivering infrastructure, and improving the well-being of our communities. Our productivity performance has been dismal. Cities and regions are grappling with housing shortages, transport congestion, and skills gaps. The current model of mostly centralised decision-making and funding is struggling to keep pace with these complex, cross-cutting issues.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 15/4/24

Govt’s Wellington tunnel vision aims to ease the way to the airport (but zealous promoters of cycling will be riled)

A pet project and governmental tunnel vision jump out from the latest batch of ministerial announcements.

The government is keen to assure us of its concern for the wellbeing of our pets.

Guy C. Charlton: There is a ceiling on rate increases

There is a ceiling on rate increases. It’s time to look for alternatives to local government funding

Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown’s recent unsuccessful demand to have the central government repay the GST levied on property rates is the latest salvo in the battle over funding for local government in New Zealand.

It points to the topsy-turvy state of local government finance and the inability of central government to address local government financial and public policy concerns.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 26/3/24

The PM baulks at cyber grilling but Collins is not so shy – and McCully is given a job by the Minister he mentored

China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department.

Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning Report – he would not even confirm that ministerial statements were in the offing.

John Tookey: One year on from Cyclone Gabrielle, NZ still needs a plan to fix its failing infrastructure

Cyclone Gabrielle caused chaos one year ago. Repairs due to that storm and the Auckland floods have required substantial time and resources. Hawkes Bay, parts of Auckland and the Coromandel all still bear the scars of the worst storm to hit New Zealand this century.

The good news is that most initial repairs are complete. The bad news is that the restored infrastructure is just as vulnerable as it was prior to Gabrielle. Restoring infrastructure to the way it was before a natural disaster is not necessarily the best approach for a resilient future.

Kerre Woodham: Our infrastructure cant keep up with migration

I was reading Robert Mcculloch's most excellent “Down to Earth Kiwi” blog.

His latest piece is an article on mass immigration and making the premise that high net immigration will ultimately dilute the influence of indigenous people on the future of a country. That the more people we have coming in with different cultures, different priorities, the less importance the views of indigenous people have on the future of the country, and we can get back to that, and the Treaty, and the debate over whether we should be having a debate on the Treaty closer to Waitangi Day.

Eric Crampton: Housing and the nimby problem

Pro-housing policy generally tries to find ways of outflanking NIMBYs – the Not In My BackYard objectors to new development.

It’s an approach well-supported in academic research and reflected in New Zealand policy.

John MacDonald: Time for a Ministry of Works comeback?

Remember the old Ministry of Works? Reckon we need it back again?

I reckon we do. Because we have another example today of what happens when you rely on governments and individual organisations to run big infrastructure projects.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 8/10/23

Just one week to go until Election Day – and a few regions become the beneficiaries of the latest funding announcements

The busy bees have been out and about, feverishly dispensing largesse in the last-gasp days of the 2020-23 Labour government.

Mike Hosking: Infrastructure is boring, but we need to pay attention

The problem with infrastructure is that it's boring.

It's also years away and, given all that has unfolded in this country of late, half of us don’t believe it will ever happen anyway.

Nevertheless, it's important. When you get a few reports into the sector, they never get the noise they really deserve.

Kate Hawkesby: We need to build more roads

I’ve decided we need to build more roads.

I don’t know why we don’t just build roads everywhere all the time. The most transformational thing this government –who said they’d be transformational– could have done was build more roads. I don’t know why they hate them so much and cancelled so many of them.