"Unintended consequences" of the Otago Regional Council not being able to notify its Land and Water Regional Plan last year will be worked through with the Ministry for the Environment.

At its meeting in Queenstown on Wednesday, council moved to ask Central Government to undertake a legislative amendment to address one of the biggest issues - water permits.

A report from team leader freshwater and land Tom De Pelsemaeker said there have been several unintended consequences for ORC in performing its function to sustainably manage freshwater. 

They related to continuing with the current planning framework and were a particular issue for managing rural diffuse discharges and water quantity in Otago.

The regional council has focused on the most important areas of the plan which had the most impacts, and that was largely regarding the farming community.

The council will ask Environment Minister Penny Simmonds to make a legislative amendment to existing water permits so their expiry date was after the new plan was operative, overriding the existing December 31 date and extending it to 2031.

The Government’s National Policy Statement on Fresh Water (NPS-FW) was being consulted on this year, and staff were regularly in contact with ministry officials about what that might mean for Otago.

The regional council has already spent $20million on its original land and water plan and expected it would take another five years for the new one.

Cr Gary Kelliher said he was surprised that the issues were still being talked about and were not already in front of the minister, “this is an utter no brainer that we’d support this.”

Have a story to share?

Contact [email protected]