Poachers and gamekeepers

May 2020 seemed like the perfect time to start building on a hospital expansion. 

The Eden-Epsom Residential Protection Society disagreed. 

It's been tied up in the courts for the two years since then. 

Their successes in blocking a hospital expansion, during a pandemic, might seem surprising. Except that their President is sufficiently expert in Resource Management law that he's the guy that Labour asked to head up their review of the Resource Management system. 

Randerson's involvement with an organisation working to oppose a private plan change that would allow a hospital expansion was disclosed by Randerson before his appointment.

My column in the Stuff papers.

Auckland Council notified the proposed plan change on March 21, 2019.

The Eden-Epsom Residential Protection Society organised meetings to block it.

A spokesperson for the society, who did not want to be named, was quoted on March 31, 2019: “We are not opposed to hospitals per se and part of our case is there are suitably zoned areas of the city laid down under the Unitary Plan which could accommodate this activity.”

Hospitals are fine, you see, but Not In My Backyard – even if they are situated on a reasonably major thoroughfare.

Auckland Council approved the plan change in May 2020, with a few modifications.

Think back to May 2020.

New Zealand had just finished its first substantial lockdown.

Building more hospital capacity, so we would be ready if Covid got here, is the kind of thing that a sane place might do.

And May 2020 is exactly when the Government, and a lot of economists, were expecting unemployment to be heading toward double-digits. The Government planned a lot of make-work projects, some of rather dubious value, to ensure that construction workers would not flee overseas.

The hospital project could have been shovel-ready. It would have been a perfect project for May 2020.

Alas.

The Eden Epsom Residential Protection Society appealed the decision.

It has been working its way up through the courts. The High Court is scheduled to hear the case in September of this year – more than two years after Auckland Council had provided its initial stamp of approval.

In its submission of May 9, 2022 to the unitary plan team, the Eden Epsom Residential Protection Society highlighted the importance of the three affected properties to the designated special character area.

Later in that same submission, the society argued that “intensification is best directed to the CBD and metropolitan centres rather than the fragmentation and ultimate destruction of irreplaceable areas of special character”.

Allowing a hospital in the area would not just affect properties considered significant, it might also set a precedent of allowing people to build things.

It is an indictment of our resource management system that a hospital expansion can be tied up in the courts for two years during a pandemic.

Can a country that worries more about a special character designation than about hospital capacity in a pandemic really be considered sane?

The Government has wished to progress an ambitious urban growth agenda, including a National Policy Statement on Urban Development requiring councils to enable more housing, and the Enabling Housing Supply legislation requiring Tier 1 cities to allow far more intensification.

David Parker, the Minister for the Environment, launched a comprehensive review of the resource management system in July 2019.

Tony Randerson, QC, chaired that review, which was completed and has been reported back to the Government. He is eminently qualified. There will not be many who better understand the system.

His panel’s review forms the blueprint for the Government’s approach to resource management reform.

The Eden Epsom Residential Protection Society’s submission of May 2022 lists Tony Randerson, QC, as the society’s president.

In answer to a written Parliamentary question on any potential conflicts in Randerson’s appointment to chair the RMA review, Minister Parker stated that, “Hon Tony Randerson CNZM QC declared that he was the president of an incorporated society that was going to oppose a private plan change request by Southern Cross Hospitals. A management plan was put in place to address the potential conflict and the treatment was that Hon Tony Randerson will not be involved in any hearings.”

This ironic coincidence has not previously been reported, but has been open secret in some parts for at least a year. 

Funny old country, New Zealand.