Having just got back from the 30th annual Skope Classic meeting in Christchurch – and having thoroughly enjoyed my time working at it with the good buggers from both the SAS Autoparts MSC Tasman Cup NZ F5000 Revival Series and Archibald’s Historic Touring Car Series – you’d think I’d have plenty to write about this week.
Particularly when the meeting was again such an unqualified success. I will too (write about it) but more important this week – I think anyway – is to make as many people in the greater motorsport community as possible aware of potential ‘trouble at mill’ should one of our events fall foul of the Resource Management Act.
The reason I raise the issue is because – as I mentioned in my column last week – I actually have a ‘proper’ job, editing NZ4WD magazine.
I actually quite like having a ‘proper’ (you know, like all the other ‘grown-up’s do) job, for no better reason that I can enjoy my involvement in motorsport, as a journo and publicist of long-ish standing of a weekend then do something (nominally) completely different during the week.
“Perspective,’ I think is the word I am looking for here. It gives me ‘perspective.’
It also gives me the opportunity to benchmark one activity against the other. Which I am about to do now.
I am, because of what I can only describe as my civic duty. But that’s more than enough preamble.
At issue here is, as I see it, is the ‘right’ most of us have in this cool, little island nation of ours to – within reason, the law, and our ability to fund it – do pretty much anything we like.
Of course we all face general-style restrictions, but by way of an example close to my own heart, if I decided to organise a grass roots drift event I would expect that the cars entered would be ‘rowdy as hell’ and that at some point the area I had hired would be wreathed in billowing clouds of dense, white tyre smoke.
As someone with an intimate knowledge of the sport I would not only acknowledge and accept this unequivocally, I’d also think it was a bit of a hoot, and if anyone had the temerity to seek me out and complain I’d be quick to tell them to pack up their kit bag and find some other person – one who cared, for instance – to complain to.
Unfortunately a recent decision made by a judge in the High Court in Wellington over a 4×4 Trial event in 2018 appears to ride rough-shod over the quaint notion that as long as we are not hurting each other we can ‘do what we damn well like….’ In this particular case to the environment.
Or, if we do, we can expect the same sort of ‘punishment’ meted out to the Valley 4WD Club which organised the event at which the breach occurred – a fine of a cool $60,000 (plus costs) Or to the New Zealand Four Wheel Drive Association (the ’national body’ to which the Valley 4WD Club is affiliated) a fine of a further $38,000 ..plus costs.
According to NZ4WD magazine’s event manager, and author of the article I ran in the February issue of the mag, Ashley Lucas; ‘the New Zealand Four Wheel Drive Association (NZFWDA) and Valley 4WD Club were both fined in the Wellington District Court (late last year) for offences arising from two charges relating to breaches of the Resource Management Act during the Deadwood Safari National Trial in November 2018 which resulted in damage to a tributary of the Mangaroa River and (the resulting) unconsented discharge of sediment into a river system.”
Never mind that Mother Nature regularly floods low-lying riverbanks and surrounding land area with millions of tonnes of sediment in times of flood.
If someone in a 4×4 does it, the message appears clear, you are fair game from everyone from a Teva sandal-wearing tramper with way too much time on his or her hands, or a Terrace or Featherston Street-based environment lawyer with expensive tastes in suits, SUVs and skiing trips to Whistler!
As Neville Dunton, NZFWDA President, said in a statement issued to members; “In convicting the NZFWDA, the Judge made the point that he expected all 4WD clubs to be on notice to ensure their rules, processes and behaviours pay due regard to environmental risks and comply with all relevant legislation and Regional and District Council rules.
“The NZFWDA,” he went on to say, “reminds every NZFWDA club and member, and indeed every person who drives off-road, that they must comply with Regional and District Council rules pertaining to water bodies, streams and rivers as well as to the wider environment. If there is any doubt about the interpretation or extent of these rules, best practice is to seek advice before acting”.
The damage occurred during the holding of the NZFWDA’s National Trial on 10th November 2018 on a property in Whiteman’s Valley, Wellington.
And – in my humble opinion, anyway, making matters immeasurably worse was the fact that it would appear that the event organisers were outed by one of their own.
In another press release, prepared on behalf of the Greater Wellington Regional Council for instance, it stated that ‘the GWRC was called in to investigate concerns expressed by an attendee about vehicles in the tributary waterway.
“On checking out the venue for themselves, investigating council officers concluded that there was significant damage to the bed and banks and that sediment (silt) discharge occurred for at least 48 hours afterwards.
All because “43 high-powered 4WD “buggies” (sic) drove a course around the property and in at least 13 places drove across or along the stream. The tyres damaged the bed and banks, bow waves from vehicles in the water undercut the banks and loss of traction in the bed further exacerbated the release of sediment.”
By pleading guilty to the offences, the NZFWDA obviously could not offer up any defence or extenuating circumstances that may have occurred at the time.
Which is all very well and good but what about the precedent that that decision sets?
Not just for someone in (or not as the case may be) a 4×4 club who wants to organise a Mud plug or 4×4 Trial.
What about someone in a ‘car club’ who wants or organise a grass gymkhana in a paddock by a river….and torrential rain the morning after sluices some of the cut-up grass and dirt into a contributory?
Or what if – as I said earlier – I hire the Hampton Downs club circuit for a grass roots drift day and a ‘well-meaning member of the public’ rings the local council to complain ‘because right now everything is tinder dry and I thought there was a total fire ban so how come ‘those guys’ can make all that smoke when I’m not even allowed to crank up the BBQ at home”….etc.
Speaking strictly personally here I’m not quite sure where this particular set of circumstances will go.
But I raise the issue here because – particularly in the current hyper-real regulatory environment we live in – forewarned is very much forearmed.
Or as the robot in cult 60s TV show, Lost in Space, used to blurt out at some stage in each and every episode.…. Danger Will Robinson, Danger!
Comments