Summarised by Centrist
Resources Minister Shane Jones is warning that the Green Party’s vow to cancel fast-track mining consents if it returns to power would amount to “economic treason” and turn New Zealand into a high-risk, low-trust destination for investors.
The Greens have pledged to revoke consents for seven named coal, hard rock gold and seabed mining projects approved under the Government’s fast track regime, even if those consents have already been granted.
Green co-leader Marama Davidson told companies their fast-track permits “are not safe and not secure,” a line Jones says openly undermines the rule of law and private property rights.
On Duncan Garner’s podcast, Jones said investors who hear that kind of rhetoric would “run a mile from New Zealand,” likening the policy to expropriation and warning it would expose the Crown to huge compensation claims and international arbitration.
Jones also said big mining projects are among the few serious economic drivers left in provincial New Zealand and that if the Greens succeed in scaring off capital, Kiwis will simply cross the Tasman to work in Australian mines while New Zealand carries the environmental and economic cost of doing nothing.
He urged voters and Labour to confront the Greens over whether they are comfortable with a policy that signals New Zealand is “shut for business” and that hard-won permits are only valid until “the next political mood swing.”
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Image: Stuartyeates
