Safeguarding the public interest? Public access to the South Island High Country

The Crown Pastoral Land Bill was introduced to Parliament in 1995, with the intention of reviewing the Land Act (1948). The Land Act controls the use of the South Island high country through the establishment of the pastoral lease. One of the key features of the Bill is that it would establish a statutory basis for the review of existing pastoral leases. Crown land held under pastoral leases contains many values other than for pastoral farming, for instance; nature conservation, recreation, cultural, heritage and historical values. However, the Crown has alienated its rights to leasehold land through the pastoral lease and as such, public access to these other values has always been at the discretion of the leaseholder. Tenure review presents the opportunity to establish formal public rights of access to reviewable land, through the use of protective mechanisms. At the same time, tenure review also allows leaseholders to diversify into other activities through acquiring freehold ownership of productive land. While tenure review occurs at present, it does not have a statutory basis in the Land Act. The purpose of this report was to investigate the issue of public access to reviewable land in the South Island high country with regard to the Crown Pastoral Land Bill. In particular, the study investigated how legislative review of the Land Act (1948) might impact on the tenure review process of Crown pastoral leasehold land, and assessed what implications the proposed tenure review process might have on public access, if the Bill were enacted in its present form. To assess the protective mechanisms offered in the Bill, criteria for public rights of access were established. The research showed that while public rights of access over freehold land would be created as a result of the proposed tenure review process, the protective mechanisms used to create those rights of access would be more restrictive than the current non-statutory tenure review process.