Resource management reform: from legislation to reality
New Zealand's new resource management legislation marks the beginning of a significant transition that will reshape how communities plan for growth, infrastructure and environmental protection.
The Planning Bill and Natural Environment Bill have now passed their third readings and will become law once they receive Royal assent. Together, they create a new planning and environmental management framework that will replace the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA).
What happens now
While these are the biggest changes to New Zealand's planning system in more than 30 years, Canterbury Regional Council (Environment Canterbury) Chair Dr Deon Swiggs says most Cantabrians will not see an immediate change in how they deal with the council.
"The RMA stays in place through the transition period, existing regional plans continue to apply, and our core work carries on. Consenting, compliance, monitoring and environmental management all continue as normal," he said.
Chair Swiggs says a small number of changes take effect almost immediately, including some consenting settings and changes to how iwi participation arrangements work, and Environment Canterbury is working through what those mean in practice.
"We will be clear with applicants and with our partners about what changes straight away and what does not. People should not have to work that out for themselves."
How the changes will be introduced
The transition period begins one month after Royal assent and is expected to run for several years, with all remaining provisions commencing no later than four years after assent.
The new legislation requires councils, central government, iwi and hapū, infrastructure providers and communities to work together on a regional spatial plan setting out where growth will occur over the long term, supported by a land use plan and a natural environment plan.
Chair Swiggs says the reforms present both opportunity and challenge.
"A well-functioning planning system is critical for enabling economic growth, supporting infrastructure investment and protecting the natural environment. The test will be implementation, not the legislation itself,” said Dr Deon Swiggs, Canterbury Regional Council Chair.
He says the phased timeframe matters.
"Reforms of this scale cannot happen overnight. The transition period is important because it gives local government, communities, mana whenua, industry and landowners time to prepare for a significant change in how planning is done.”
Building on Canterbury’s experience
Chair Swiggs says Canterbury has directly relevant experience to draw on.
“The Canterbury Water Management Strategy is the clearest example. For more than 15 years, we have used zone committees to bring together rūnanga, farmers, industry, environmental interests and the wider community to work through genuinely difficult trade-offs on freshwater at a catchment scale, rather than fighting them out in the Environment Court,” he said.
"That approach is not perfect, and it has not resolved everything, but it has produced durable decisions and a level of shared understanding you cannot get from a submission process alone. Combined with our partnership with Ngāi Tahu, including the representation arrangements under the Canterbury Regional Council (Ngāi Tahu Representation) Act 2022, it gives Canterbury a real head start on the collaborative, place-based planning the new system expects."
Connecting the reforms
Chair Swiggs says separate decisions on local government structure are also expected, under the Government's Simplifying Local Government programme. Cabinet is considering which council reorganisation proposals submitted through the voluntary Head Start pathway should progress to detailed design, with wider reform signalled to follow the 2028 local elections.
"Environment Canterbury has a direct interest in those decisions and we will be upfront about that. The structural question and the planning reform question are connected, because whoever holds these functions has to deliver the new system," he said.
"Our focus stays on making sure Canterbury's interests are represented, the environment is protected, and growth and development are supported through the transition."