We’re preparing for one of the biggest legal threats to our wild places for many years. Help us defend nature. – Forest and Bird
From the Forest and Bird website,
Environmental organisation Forest & Bird has released a video showing some of the public conservation land which will be destroyed if a land swap allowing New Zealand’s largest irrigation dam goes ahead.
Forest & Bird is preparing to appear in the Supreme Court to defend the Court of Appeal’s 2016 decision that the Department of Conservation’s planned land swap enabling the Ruataniwha dam was illegal.
The Supreme Court case this February 27th and 28th is being brought by Conservation Minister Maggie Barry alongside the dam company, Hawke’s Bay Regional Investment Company (HBRIC).
In the video of the proposed dam site in Ruahine Forest Park, Forest & Bird states “If Minister Maggie Barry succeeds in court, it could create a legal precedent that lets over a million hectares of conservation land in New Zealand be traded away and destroyed by business interests.”
Some of the important native species and habitats known to exist within the dam’s footprint, including native bats, New Zealand falcon, and rare wetlands, are also detailed in the video.
Forest & Bird Chief Executive Kevin Hague says “This case is about more than Ruahine Forest Park and what would be New Zealand’s largest irrigation dam. It’s about all of New Zealand’s specially protected conservation areas, and whether they’re safe from commercial interests.”
“Does the government have the right to exchange parts of our conservation land, which will then be destroyed? The outcome of this case will determine whether specially protected public land can be obtained and destroyed by private businesses, or whether that land belongs to the people of New Zealand, and to the environment.”
(my emphasis).
Commentary on three things,
One, this is National further dismantling NZ society and selling it off. The Minister of Conservation is appealing to the NZ Supreme Court to be allowed to trade away critical conservation estate to commercial interests. Know that for what it is.
Two, local Forest and Bird have spent 6 years defending the Ruahine Forest. The time, money and effort that Forest and Bird have and will have to put into this fight should be being spent on proactively assisting our native ecosystems not defensively protecting them from the NZ government. Every time we have to resist, we are further away from solving the real problems of the world. Conservative voters should be as concerned as left wing voters.
Three, it should be a priority of the incoming Labour/Green government to establish the Department of Conservation’s role as that of environmental protection. A constitution that enshrined the rights of Nature is probably the only way to Tory-proof that.
Donations can be made to the Forest and Bird campaign here. Membership and other ways to support Forest and Bird are here.
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