The slash backlash: How forestry giants just softened post-Gabrielle environmental rules
Sunday, 7 June 2026
Less than three years after Cyclone Gabrielle exposed the devastating consequences of forestry slash, the Government has rolled back key environmental safeguards despite warnings from environmental groups, iwi and affected communities.
The changes to the National Environmental Standards for Commercial Forestry (NES-CF) dismantle restrictions introduced after logging debris and sediment swept through Tairāwhiti and Hawke's Bay in 2023, smashing bridges, destroying farmland and littering beaches.
Documents released to the Sunday Star-Times reveal a corporate lobbying blitz by major forestry companies, industry groups and international investors, who argued the post-Gabrielle rules were costly, unworkable and driving investment offshore.
The Government ultimately sided with the sector. Forestry Minister Todd McClay said the changes were needed to restore confidence and protect the industry's “right to operate”.
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For former Esk Valley resident Steve Wheeler, the reversal is a bitter betrayal.
When Cyclone Gabrielle tore through Hawke's Bay in February 2023, forestry slash jammed against the Waipunga Bridge upstream from his home of more than 30 years. When the makeshift dam finally burst, a pulse of water, mud and logs surged down the valley.
Wheeler's 7ha property was buried beneath two metres of toxic muck, wiping out vehicles, suffocating his livestock, including pet pig Prudence, and destroying a renowned garden built over decades by his wife, Liz.
“The typical attitude of business says, ‘if you regulate us, we'll go out of business’, Wheeler said. “My attitude is, if you can't be regulated to do the right thing by your community and by your nation, you shouldn't be in business.”
Just weeks before Cyclone Gabrielle, 11-year-old Oliver Shone was holidaying in Gisborne. While playing in the shallows of Waikanae Beach, a wave shifted a massive pine log, part of an ongoing tidal wave of plantation pine waste choking the coastline.
The log rolled over the boy twice, inflicting unsurvivable head trauma.
Three months later, 10-year-old Juliana Marston was struck and partially buried by another rogue log on neighbouring Midway Beach, shattering both sides of her pelvis.
In the wake of a coroner’s report into Oliver’s death, his grandmother, Marie Shone, asked the the forestry industry “be a bit more stringent in how they deal with the slash”.
A public outcry led to a scathing Ministerial Inquiry into Land Uses in Tairāwhiti and Wairoa.
It recommended a “polluter pays” model with forestry companies forced to carry half the clean-up costs, a Crown facilitator to prioritise regional funding, and a specialised commissioner to oversee the region's environmental laws.
Instead, the then-Labour Government required foresters operating on high-risk erosion-prone land to remove larger pieces of slash after harvesting, while strict limits were imposed on the amount of debris that could remain on site. Councils were also given greater powers to restrict new forestry planting.
The rules took effect in November 2023.
Less than a year later, the new coalition government signalled they would be rewritten. McClay described the regulations as an “unworkable regulatory burden”.
When consultation opened, the $6b forestry industry, which employs up to 40,000 people, mounted a campaign for change.
‘We find this environmentally irresponsible’
New Forests, managing approximately AU$11.66b in funds and over 4.3m hectares of land, warned overseas investors were already looking elsewhere.
'Investors in existing funds have expressed an interest in limiting further exposure to New Zealand forestry and reweighting to other geographies,' chief executive Mark Rogers wrote.
The industry also claimed the strict residual slash limit was a mathematical impossibility that ignored normal landscape conditions.
PF Olsen, managing commercial forestry estate for over 1300 clients, argued the slash limits were impractical and difficult to comply with, while OneFortyOne New Zealand described the post-Gabrielle reforms as a political response to pressure “with an outgoing government's attempt to bridge public opinion”.
Others argued the rules could actually worsen environmental outcomes by forcing machinery onto fragile hillsides to recover debris that would otherwise remain stable.
Forest Enterprises Growth Limited manages over $350m in assets across the Wairarapa, Gisborne, and Hawke's Bay.
“This regulation risks increased erosion, increased slope failure and increased debris mobilisation and resulting discharge. We find this environmentally irresponsible…” Gisborne regional manager Warren Rance wrote.
Timberlands Ltd, which manages the 190,000-ha Kaingaroa forest estate, said a single national standard failed to account for significant differences in risk between sites.
Summit Forests and New Forests separately objected to the broad powers given to councils to control new planting, arguing local variation created uncertainty for investors.
The industry also resented broad powers handed to local councils to restrict where commercial trees could be planted. Most submissions asked for uniform national rules.
Several large growers attempted to distance industry from the word erosion, arguing that calling landslides a forestry problem was misleading.
NZFM (NZ Forest Managers), who manage approximately 80,000ha and harvest 1 million cubic meters of timber annually, argued that weather and geology were mostly responsible.
“Referring to 'severe erosion from a commercial forestry activity' inaccurately attributes a geophysical process to a specific land use, which is misleading,” they wrote to MfE.
PF Olsen mirrored this argument in its submission: “The phrase 'severe erosion from commercial forestry' is misleading. Erosion is predominantly driven by underlying geology, not forestry per se.”
‘Privatising gains and socialising risks is not acceptable’
But iwi, environmental groups and community representatives argued the industry was attempting to shift responsibility for damage that had repeatedly fallen on downstream communities.
The NZ FSC Standard Development Group (Environment Chamber representatives), an expert group that writes stewardship rules, said the industry's defence that slash disasters were caused by exceptional weather was no longer credible.
'It is unsustainable to continue to externalise adverse economic, social, cultural and environmental effects,' the group wrote.
Ngā Waihua o Paerangi Trust (Ngāti Rangi) pointed to repeated slash failures on ancestral land and rejected a system where forestry companies kept the profits while communities carried the risks.
One company, later fined $355,000, was responsible for 400,000 cubic metres of forestry slash clogging waterways, damaging farms, and littering beaches in 2018, they wrote.
“Given the damage that slash causes…What should also be considered is the cost and benefit of taking the risk, and who benefits or is harmed. Privatising gains and socialising risks is not acceptable.”
Ngāti Kahungunu Iwi Incorporated said post-harvest debris and sediment run-off had repeatedly devastated catchments during major storms, while Te Tauihu o Te Waka-a-Māui, representing eight mana whenua iwi across the top of the South Island, opposed weakening environmental safeguards to accommodate commercial operations.
Whanganui-based Te Kaahui o Rauru criticised “the leniency” of the proposed new rules.
“The proposals are attempts to lower environmental regulation to achieve economic viability which begs the questions - how sustainable are these activities?”
Agribusiness Parininihi ki Waitōtara (PKW) warned removing national environmental bottom lines rewards bad actors while punishing responsible land stewards.
The corporate pressure campaign ultimately carried the day in Wellington.
But McClay rejects suggestions the Government has weakened environmental protections. He said the changes replace a blunt national standard with a risk-based system that better reflects local conditions.
Under the new regime, harvest planners must assess landslide and slash mobilisation risks using slope and erosion data. Higher-risk sites will require resource consent, while lower-risk operations can proceed under permitted activity rules provided they demonstrate how slash risks will be managed.
“The amendments instead set appropriate, risk-based standards,” the minister said.
McClay also rejected claims that central government was stripping power from councils.
“We are ensuring when councils want to go further than national direction their decisions are based upon evidence,” he said.
“There are instances where more stringent rules have been implemented than justified, and the Government considers that forestry settings should be set nationally to enable certainty and consistency, while supporting flexibility in rules to protect sensitive or local environments.”
The minister said feedback from both councils and forestry companies showed widespread frustration with the 2023 rules, which he said were difficult to implement and poorly targeted.
“Many council staff were frustrated that the blanket rule captured low-risk sites with no clear environmental or safety benefit.”
When pressed on whether taxpayers and local regions will continue to socialise the immense infrastructure and environmental clean-up costs of future forestry slide events, McClay’s office explicitly rejected the notion of an industry bailout, maintaining that the standard legal and financial liability frameworks for landowners remain unchanged.
He pointed to increased penalties for breaches of the Resource Management Act introduced in 2024.
“There is no change to existing legal or financial liability for landowners.”
It is also unlawful for insurance policies to cover RMA fines or penalties, he said.
‘I cannot take Mr. McClay out to lunch’
Following what he says were “vile fights” with insurance companies, the Natural Hazards Commission and local councils, Steve Wheeler managed to secure a buy-out for his buried property.
It allowed him to buy a new home in Puketapu, near Hastings. But he’s acutely aware that the door has shut behind him, with both insurance companies pulling back from flood-prone regions and the coalition government signalling that taxpayer-funded buyouts won’t be happening after future climate events.
“The way that we were looked after… was excellent,” Wheeler says. “But we cannot see it ever happening again.”
Wheeler, a former police officer and military veteran, says the regulatory rollback is down to political access. If he had the chance to confront McClay face-to-face about relaxing the rules, he would ask a single question: “We understand why you're doing it. How do you think your grandkids and your great-grandkids will view you further down the track for doing it?
“But there's the realities that I, as an individual, cannot take the likes of Mr. McClay out to lunch,” he says. “The bosses of the forestry industry can and do.”