Greens pledge ‘green government’ would cancel seven fast-track mining consents

Monday, 17 November 2025

A scheme to extract more than 8 million cubic metres of sand from Bream Bay, protested above by Emma Hart of Stop Sand Mining Bream Bay, is one of seven controversial potential developments targeted by the party.

The Green Party has pledged a future “green government” would revoke any consents that were granted under the fast-track regime for coal, hard-rock gold and seabed mining, without offering compensation.

If implemented, the policy would cancel any consents granted for seven of the mining projects that are currently being considered or are due to be considered for fast-tracking.

Included in the firing line would be Trans-Tasman Resources’ proposal to extract iron ore from the South Taranaki Bight and Santana Minerals’ plan for a huge opencast and underground gold mine in Central Otago, both of which are at different stages of the application process.

The other potentially affected projects would be the Denniston and Rotowaro coal mining projects, additional gold mining at the Macraes and Waihi North mines, and the Bream Bay sand extraction project in Northland.

It is rare for governments in developed countries to retrospectively cancel property rights without compensation.

Green Party resources spokesperson Steve Abel acknowledged it was “a big position to take”.

“It's an exceptional position. We believe it is justified by the twin evil of the biodiversity crisis and the climate crisis, in combination with such an appallingly poor democratic process which the fast-track has.”

The Labour Party has so far been non-committal on how it might treat fast-track consents in government. Environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said it was “watching the various projects and remained committed to projects having environmental protections applied, as they would under a ‘normal’ process”.

Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson says the country is “worth more”.

A Green Party spokesperson clarified its mining policy would “undoubtedly be a high priority for us if we’re in a position to discuss it after the election” but it was “far too early to talk about bottom lines”.

Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson said the fast-track process failed “even the most basic standards of transparency, accountability, and environmental protection”.

“We can have an economy that employs people without destroying the ecological basis of our existence for the profits of the few,” she said.

“These forms of mining are deeply destructive, boom-and-bust industries; extracting resources, selling them off overseas, and leaving our communities to pick up the pieces. We believe our country, our whenua, is worth more.”

The party was making its policy clear now “to ensure complete transparency” and put potential investors in the projects on notice that their fast-track consents would not be safe or secure, she said.

Parliament’s Environment select committee is using what speaker Gerry Brownlee has described as a “loophole” to speed up consideration of a raft of changes to the fast-track regime that the Government wants to pass into law before Christmas, many of which would favour applicants and reduce the time for decisions on applications.

Abel said the Fast-track Approvals Amendments Bill would shorten the time-frame for expert panels to rule on consent applications “in a ridiculous way, to give a panel 60 days to make a decision, and give only 15 days for submissions”.

“It's profoundly undemocratic and it excludes communities, and that's why this fast-track has become even more egregious and why we have confidence that it’s appropriate that we commit to revoke these consents.”

Minerals Council chief executive Josie Vidal attacked the Greens’ stance, which she said made New Zealand look ridiculous.

“The mining sector supports New Zealand’s high environmental standards and does not seek to undermine this. We consider the Fast-track Approvals Act, as it stands, strikes this balance.”

Experience to-date showed the fast-track regime was “not the rubber stamp that many critics thought it would be”, Vidal said.

“We are not looking for any weakening of existing environmental safeguards and there is a lot of ‘noise’ around this legislation suggesting this is happening, without any evidence.”

Greenpeace welcomed the Greens’ stance.

“The fast-track process is designed to bulldoze over environmental protections, so it is essential that the consents for the most devastating projects are revoked,” programme director Niamh O’Flynn said.

“It allows projects that have already been denied by the highest court in the land, and overwhelmingly opposed by iwi, local communities and experts. We expect the Green Party will make revoking these consents a bottom-line if they are in a position of negotiating a coalition agreement in 2026.”

O’Flynn called for political parties to “go further” and permanently ban seabed mining and all new mining on conservation land.