How to slow down the Fast Track Bill
Written By:
- Date published:
8:09 am, April 19th, 2024 - 19 comments
Categories: nature -
Tags: fast track approvals bill, forest and bird, greenpeace
Update: The submissions closed at midnight last night and it sounds like many people stepped up. Forest and Bird reported last night that 13,489 people had used their submission form.
Meanwhile, Executive Director of Greenpeace Aotearoa, Russel Norman, shared this on twitter yesterday afternoon:
Govt has on this Friday afternoon released list of organisations it invited to apply to be fast tracked. The usual suspects eg TTR seabed miners. However it has not released the list that will actually be in the bill. They won’t release that list until AFTER the select committee
It is a total corruption of democratic processes. The bill itself gives Ministerial decree powers to 3 ministers to approve individual projects regardless of environmental harm. And the process of passing the bill keeps the list of projects secret until after public submissions
https://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/minister-releases-fast-track-stakeholder-list
South Island conservationist Geoffery Keey put up this tweet with these two screen shots:
Seven days in politics really is a long time. Chris Bishop on Radio NZ one week apart on whether to release the Fast Track Approvals Bill letters.
Original post:
Last day for submissions on the nature and society destroying Fast-Track Approvals Bill.
Micky has a post up explaining why this Bill is so bad Towards Banana Republic Status
Both Greenpeace and Forest and Bird have submission forms online:
https://petition.act.greenpeace.org.nz/fast-track-approvals-bill-submission
https://www.forestandbird.org.nz/petitions/fight-for-nature
We can also make a submission directly on the New Zealand Parliament website:
From F&B’s Kiwi Conservation Club:
19 comments on “How to slow down the Fast Track Bill ”
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Kua hinga te manawa kairākau o Te Rua Tekau Ma Waru Tiwhatiwha te po! Kakarauru i te po! Ka rapuhia kei hea koe kua riro! Haere e te Ika a Whiro ki o tini hoa kua ngaro atu ki te Pō ...2 weeks ago
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As a long time member I am so proud of the role Forest and Bird are playing in both this legislative contest and in the many battles won against stupid major projects.
Their latest huge win in the Supreme Court against NZTA is precisely the kind of project where civil society democratic input will be effectively erased.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350242546/aucklands-east-west-link-ordered-back-starting-blocks
Thanks Micky. Done.
Got mine in..
Done. For me it's a question of trust.
I ended mine with "Cease and Desist."
Done – the venal architects of 'fast-track' are bent on short-sighted shortcuts, and shortcuts + '
fast-track' 'fast-buck' is a sad scam. Can't trust 'em, but I put it more gently.People have until midnight to make a submission.
I personally recommend doing it as an individual using the parliamentary website, because then the NACTZ can't accuse you of signing off on someone else's submission – such as the Greens – and suggesting in the (truncated) committee hearings that you can't think for yourself.
Do you think NACTZ will be spending anytime making accusations against their opponents?
I wish they would, but I suspect they will simply ignore them in their entirety and move this through at pace.
I have written my own submission.
The number of Acts of Parliament being shafted is too many to adequately cover in the time available, so I've gone with the R.M.A. as I studied it whilst doing postgrad at University.
I apologise for coming across so cynical, but governments (and councils) of all stripes in recent times haven't exactly paid much attention to the views of the citizenry, have they?
Opening bills for public submission is a legal requirement, that's the only reason they do it, and more often than not the outcome has already been pre-determined, so it's just a show to make the plebs think they care about what WE think.
Sure, I concede that public submissions can sometimes alter the shape of a bill- although that depends very much on the 'class' of submitters- but more often than not, it's a token tweak here and there.
I still occasionally make a submission, or add my name to one when I feel very strongly about something (I have added my name to one for this) but I have absolutely no confidence in our alleged democratic system anymore. They're going to do what they want.
one reason for making submissions is that if we don't, this government can claim a mandate. Submissions are more than what is in the Bill and even what happens in the Bill. So many people feel powerless, this is one way to reclaim political power. We need voices, on record, for opposition to what they are doing.
Also, if we get a change of government in 2026, we need a lot of voices by then so that the L/G/TPM government feel like they can remove the consents.
Yes, that's fair enough. It would just be nice not to have been driven to such a degree of cynicism by the system. Although I'm sure that's their intention.
Done – both Greenpeace and Forest and Bird. Haven't had time etc to do my own but added an extra to the Greenpeace one.
weka – totally agree with your comments at 7.1. What they want is for people to give up and not exercise their democratic rights to make submissions, etc.
Done. What a fucked up thing to have to submit to.
Done as well. They are un bloody believable!
The unspoken premise underlying the FTA Bill is that when it comes to major projects for the national benefit, the politicians know what is best for all of us. There is no need for any public debate; just cut the red tape.
Well, they don't.
In his book "A Bloody Good Rant", Australian author Thomas Keneally wrote an essay "Fracking for the Market" where he said:
"After Bob Carr retired as premier of New South Wales in 2005 a development at all prices gang emerged within the state Labor Party, a group of ministers who would variously later be investigated, disgraced and some of them subjected to gaol terms … "
I hope history is not going to be repeated.
"a …. gang emerged within the state Labor Party"
That already was history repeating itself (cf the NZ Labour party's nest of vipers in 1984).
If climate change is indeed the greatest problem of our time why didnt The Ardern-Shaw government approve 100 windfarms in the last 5 years ? Why leave the banning v high powered growth balancing exercise to the Nats? The fast Track Debate has already been won. Shaw and Labour should hang their heads in shame. Some debate on iron sands misses the point.
There's no such thing as the Shaw-Ardern government. We had a minority Labour/NZF government with C/S from the Greens in 2017, and then a majority Labour government in 2020.
If you are getting those basics wrong, why would your other points hold water?