Count the number of times the Resource Management Act mentions property rights. Then count the number times Gazza and Dave talk about remedying this. Let me give you a clue: the correct answer looks like a full moon.
Proposed "changes to the RMA are good," fawns Environmental Defence Society chairman Taylor. "The Resource Management Act is important legislation protecting our environment," blathers Benson-Dope. Crap. The RMA is appalling legislation nationalising the property of New Zealanders.
Benson-Dope is just so much empty hot air, but if the EDS really wanted to protect the environment without doing over their fellow New Zealanders they might propose using property rights in defence of nature instead of regulation and nationalisation.
Says Elizabeth Brubaker from Canada's excellent Environment Probe:
Many environmental groups prefer regulatory solutions to environmental problems. But regulations are made by remote governments who, driven by the need to create jobs or some undefined "public good," are often the least responsible stewards of natural resources. Governments of all political stripes have given us thousands of reasons not to trust them to protect the en-vironment: they've licensed – and bankrolled – polluters, turned forests into wastelands, emptied oceans of fish, and dammed rivers that were once magnificent.She's right you know. I'd strongly suggest NZers still living in the belief that government can fix everything, including our environment, should read this, this and this. Then perhaps they too might join me in advocating a stake driven through the heart of this RMA.
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