Water Law Forum
Are you across the latest water law developments across Aotearoa right now? This half day seminar brings together leading practitioners to consider how Environment Southland is improving freshwater quality, the current issues surrounding wetlands and the National Policy Statement for Freshwater. You will receive an update on the three waters review and discuss the effectiveness of Overseer as a regulatory tool. Walk away with key takeaways to implement immediately into your practice. WEB222NZA03
Description
Attend and earn 4 CPD hours
Chair: Natasha Garvan, Partner, Bell Gully; Chair of the Auckland Committee of the Resource Management Law Association
9.00am to 9.05am Opening Comments by the Chair
9.05am to 10.05am Te Mana o Te Wai: Lessons from Southland
How Environment Southland has approached and is working, in partnership, to improve freshwater quality in Southland. Some key learnings, takeaways and what more is still to come.
Presented by Lucy Hicks, Policy and Planning Manager, Environment Southland
10.05am to 11.05am PANEL DISCUSSION: National Environmental Standards for Freshwater: Regulations Surrounding Wetlands
Discuss the latest issues surrounding wetlands and consider its impact from a legal, urban planning, council and ecological perspective.
Panellists:
Sally Gepp, Barrister
Ella Tennent, Principal Advisor – Consents, Bay of Plenty Regional Council Toi Moana
Chris Scrafton, Technical Director – Planning, Beca
Sarah Flynn, Ecologist and Principal, Boffa Miskell
11.05am to 11.15am Break
11.15am to 12.00pm Three Waters Review Reform: An Update
- System reform and the new water services entities
- Transition process and timelines
- Intersect with RMA reforms: Implications of the NBA for three waters
Presented by Simon Pilkinton, Partner, Russell McVeagh
12.00pm to 12.50pm PANEL DISCUSSION: Issues and Challenges of Implementing the National Policy Statement for Freshwater and Associated Essential Freshwater Instruments
Receive insight into the challenges being faced by councils, land users and the agricultural sector in implementing the NPS Freshwater.
Panelists:
Dave Allen, Manager, Natural Environment Strategy, Auckland Council
Anna Wilkes, Environmental and Policy Manager, Ravensdown Limited
Chris Allen, National Board Member, Federated Farmers of New Zealand
12.50pm to 1.35pm The Value of Overseer
A two-part presentation which firstly focusses on a review of Overseer from a practical perspective, where it’s heading and its value as a tool for farmers. The second part of the presentation will be a discussion of Overseer’s value as a regulatory tool – what it achieved, and didn’t achieve, and how the Government has assessed the effectiveness of Overseer as a regulatory tool moving forward. We also examine the challenges and possible alternatives to Overseer and what this means for practitioners.
Presented by Nicole Buxeda, Senior Solicitor, Louise Ford, Solicitor, Atkins Holm Majurey and Mike Manning, General Manager – Innovation & Strategy, Ravensdown Limited
1.35pm to 1.40pm Final Q+A and Closing Comments by the Chair
Learning Objectives:
- Consider how Environment Southland is improving freshwater quality in Southland
- Receive insight into the latest issues surrounding wetlands from an ecological, urban planning, council and legal perspective
- Stay up to date on the three waters review reform
- Examine the challenges being faced by councils, land users and the agricultural sector in implementing the NPS freshwater
- Discuss Overseer from a practical perspective, and consider its value as a regulatory too
Presenters
Natasha Garvan
Bell Gully partner Natasha Garvan is an environmental and resource management law specialist. Natasha provides environmental, policy, and resource management advice to infrastructure providers, public bodies, iwi, property and land developers, businesses, and community interest groups. Natasha has in-depth knowledge of freshwater management and related reforms. She is experienced in interpreting and applying the new National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management 2020 and National Environmental Standards for Freshwater 2020 to various projects and policy contexts. Natasha was a member of the Governance and Limits Working Group for the second report of the Land and Water Forum. She assisted the NZ Landcare Trust as co-author of the publication “Community-owned Rural Catchment Management: A guide for partners" and is a co-founder of 3F (Food, Farms, and Freshwater) - created to provide a pathway to enhancing the environment in a way that adds value to the New Zealand economy.
Lucy Hicks
Lucy moved from the UK in early 2016 and has worked in the public sector for more than 15 years, mostly in sustainability management roles and overseeing multi-disciplinary teams and project portfolios. Upon arrival in NZ, she worked at Wellington City Council as the Emergency and Continuity Manager spanning both the CDEM and Business Continuity arenas. In 2018 Lucy moved South to take up a role at Environment Southland as their Policy and Planning Manager. Since then she has been working in partnership to address the resource and environmental challenges Southland currently faces. This is through the management of the appeals to the Southland Water and Land Plan, as well as the review of the Regional Coastal and Air Plans. In addition she is also responsible for developing a consolidated approach to a hazard and climate change management.
Sally Gepp
Sally has practised as a barrister sole specialising in environmental law since 2019, following nine years with environmental NGO Forest & Bird. She has appeared as counsel in a number of high profile cases including in relation to the Ruataniwha Dam and the proposed East West Link, as well as plan-making processes from Whangarei to Invercargill. Sally was a trustee of the Biodiversity Collaborative Group tasked by the Minister for the Environment with developing a draft National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity, and was part of a working group for the first review of the National Environmental Standards on Plantation Forestry. She is President of RMLA (Te Kahui Ture Taiao / Association for Resource Management Practitioners) and a member of the New Zealand Conservation Authority.
Simon Pilkinton
Simon is a Partner in Russell McVeagh's Environment, Planning and Natural Resources team. He leads the firm's multi-disciplinary Three Waters sector group. Simon advises a range of clients including Watercare Services and other major infrastructure providers on their development projects, as well as on environmental and regulatory law and policy reform that may affect their existing operations and future development plans. He has a particular focus on Three Waters reform and the potential implications that will arise for water, wastewater and stormwater infrastructure providers.
Dave Allen
Dave has over 30 years experience in natural resource management. He undertook academic studies in biological sciences, with interests in island conservation biology and marine biology. Specifically, he has over 20 years experience managing fisheries through the upper North Island, but also in the freshwater environment. Dave was part of the considerable legislative and operational transformation witnessed in the fisheries portfolio over recent decades, including some key frameworks, judicial decisions, and discussions between various competing interests. Subsequently, he ran his own consultancy business for five years advising on natural resource management issues, particularly as it related to Waikato River issues, and more generally for parties such as the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. His focus at Auckland Council over the last seven years has been to further develop and implement strategies to better embed environmental outcomes into council business. A significant part of that work has involved providing feedback to central government on its national work programme for freshwater and coastal initiatives. Dave is a member of the regional sector’s Resource Managers Group – representing natural resource managers from unitary and regional councils. This forum provides a good basis to partner with central government managers to provide feedback about the system wide responses needed to achieve better environmental outcomes.
Anna Wilkes
Anna is the Environmental & Policy Manager for Ravensdown, a farmer-owned co-operative that exists to enable smarter farming for a better New Zealand. Ravensdown strives to achieve this by providing products, expertise and technology to help farmers reduce environmental impact and optimise value from the land. Anna has over 15 years’ experience in environmental science and resource management. Anna joined Ravensdown in 2017 as Environmental Policy Specialist, following 12 years as an environmental consultant with a focus on water quality and resource management planning. In addition to the policy role which involves guiding Ravensdown’s submissions on regional plan changes and central government policy discussion documents, she also manages Ravensdown’s team of environmental consultants. The consultancy helps our shareholders comply with regulatory requirements in the form of nutrient budgets, Farm Environment Plans and resource consents. While seeking good environmental outcomes is Anna’s primary motivation, it is important that environmental needs are balanced with the other fundamentals of the Resource Management Act, namely that resources are managed in a way that also enables the social, economic and cultural needs of the community to be met.
Chris Allen
Since 1994 Chris and his wife Anne-Marie have been farming a 360 hectare irrigated, sheep, beef and cropping property in Mid Canterbury. The property has water consents that were renewed under the new RMA -This meant an immediate and rapid lesson in the understanding of the (resource management Act) RMA. The farm is fully spray irrigated with some stored on farm water. We use real time telemetry on irrigation to monitor water Direct involvement with Farming issues. Chris was Federated Farmers Mid Canterbury Provincial President for three years from 2011. Since 2014 Chris has been appointed to the Ashburton Water Management Zone Committee as a community member. Since 2014 Farmers National board of Federated Farmers with responsibility for Water & Environment. 2015 Chris has been on governance of Farming Good Management Practices project in Canterbury. 2017 with Forest and Bird set up the Bio Diversity Collaborative Group. 2019 Canterbury water management strategy interim targets project.
Nicole Buxeda
Nicole has been at AHM since 2015 with a year-long gap for travelling. She has been involved in numerous complex issues for local authorities and for private sector clients who have had to engage in local authority issues. In addition to resource management and other environmental issues Nicole is particularly experienced in matters concerning local government governance and policy development, and the primary sector.
Louise Ford
Louise has been at AHM since 2019 and has developed a particular expertise in plan and plan change processes including the litigation that is associated with those processes, at national and regional levels. Louise’s knowledge has been grounded in the primary sector with much of that work being for Horticulture New Zealand, a background in the primary sector and an earth science degree.
Mike Manning
Mike has a vast experience in the Fertiliser Industry with some 40 years of direct involvement commencing in the field services role working directly with farmers to then enjoying several senior management positions within Ravensdown. Mike currently has responsibility for the Innovation investments by Ravensdown, the company owned leading soil and plant diagnostic laboratory ARL, the Ravensdown Environmental Consulting team and the Regional Council policy team. There are two key components Mike has successfully demonstrated in his role of GM Innovation and Strategy. The first is that Mike has ensured that Ravensdown continues to lead with the provision of robust science translated into real value when implemented by farmers. Secondly Mike has a wide view of the agricultural innovations currently under development which if coupled with appropriate investment and commercial acumen leads to further technological advancements for Ravensdown shareholders.
Ella Tennent
Ella has approximately 17 years’ experience in planning. Much of that time has been as a planning consultant which provided her with varied opportunities in resource consents, policy and work within the conservation estate. In 2019 Ella joined Toi Moana as a Principal Advisor for the Consents team. Ella is the lead for the Consents team in regards to implementation of the NES for Freshwater and is part of a wetlands working group with MfE and other councils.