Federated Farmers is opposing a proposal for transmission buffer zones in the Western Bay of Plenty.

The organisation made submissions on the district plan last week, saying the plan will allow Transpower to take over the property rights on vast swathes of land, adversely affecting many farm businesses throughout the district.

'Federated Farmers strongly opposed the transmission buffer zones in the Western Bay of Plenty District Plan, because we do not think they are necessary and because they will seriously impede farmers' ability to use their land,” says Federated Farmers Bay of Plenty, Te Puke branch chairperson Steve Bailey.

'The zones are unnecessary for safety because this is already covered in the Code of Practice for Electrical Safety Distances. The state-owned enterprise already has access to carry out maintenance on lines.

'Pressure from Federated Farmers and the individual submitters had already resulted in some changes to the proposed buffer zones and rules before the hearing.”

However, Federated Farmers says the zones should be deleted or reduced to only 12 metres total to be consistent with the code, which already includes safety distances for buildings, earthworks and machinery working near lines.

'Our submission also said landowners should have the ability to directly negotiate with Transpower rather than having to go through the council, which also should not be put to the expense and trouble of enforcing someone else's rules.”
He says this move will simply shift Transpower's costs onto the local district council.

'We have grave concerns that Transpower is trying to use the district plan to avoid negotiating individual easement agreements and pay compensation,” says Steve.

'It was great to see our submission backed up by a number of individual submitters who not only braved the hearing, but took time out of their working day to prepare and present their submissions to the commissioner.

'These submitters were able to get across to the commissioner what it is like to own land that has public infrastructure built on it.”
He says submitters reinforced the message that landowners want the ability to negotiate with Transpower directly and that rules in the district plan should not replace this.

The full submission is on the Federated Farmers website at www.fedfarm.org.nz/bayofplenty