12 MAY 2011 NEW ZEALAND GAZETTE, No. 64 1485

OBJECTIVE B3
To improve and maximise the efficient allocation and efficient use of water.

OBJECTIVE B4
To protect significant values of wetlands.

POLICY B1
By every regional council making or changing regional plans to the extent needed to ensure the plans establish freshwater objectives and set environmental flows and/or levels for all bodies of fresh water in its region (except ponds and naturally ephemeral water bodies) to give effect to the objectives in this national policy statement, having regard to at least the following:

(a) The reasonably foreseeable impacts of climate change;

(b) the connection between water bodies.

POLICY B2
By every regional council making or changing regional plans to the extent needed to provide for the efficient allocation of fresh water to activities, within the limits set to give effect to Policy B1.

POLICY B3
By every regional council making or changing regional plans to the extent needed to ensure the plans state criteria by which applications for approval of transfers of water take permits are to be decided, including to improve and maximise the efficient allocation of water.

POLICY B4
By every regional council identifying methods in regional plans to encourage the efficient use of water.

POLICY B5
By every regional council ensuring that no decision will likely result in future over-allocation – including managing fresh water so that the aggregate of all amounts of fresh water in a water body that are authorised to be taken, used, dammed or diverted does not over-allocate the water in the water body.

POLICY B6
By every regional council setting a defined timeframe and methods in regional plans by which over-allocation must be phased out, including by reviewing water permits and consents to help ensure the total amount of water allocated in the water body is reduced to the level set to give effect to Policy B1.

POLICY B7 AND DIRECTION (UNDER SECTION 55) TO REGIONAL COUNCILS
By every regional council amending regional plans (without using the process in Schedule 1) to the extent needed to ensure the plans include the following policy to apply until any changes under Schedule 1 to give effect to Policy B1 (allocation limits), Policy B2 (allocation), and Policy B6 (over-allocation) have become operative:

“1. When considering any application the consent authority must have regard to the following matters:

(a) The extent to which the change would adversely affect safeguarding the life-supporting capacity of fresh water and of any associated ecosystem and

(b) the extent to which it is feasible and dependable that any adverse effect on the life-supporting capacity of fresh water and of any associated ecosystem resulting from the change would be avoided.

2. This policy applies to:

(a) any new activity and

(b) any change in the character, intensity or scale of any established activity -
that involves any taking, using, damming or diverting of fresh water or draining of any wetland which is likely to result in any more than minor adverse change in the natural variability of flows or level of any fresh water, compared to that which immediately preceded the commencement of the new activity or the change in the established activity (or in the case of a change in an intermittent or seasonal activity, compared to that on the last occasion on which the activity was carried out).

3. This policy does not apply to any application for consent first lodged before the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management takes effect on 1 July 2011.”

C. INTEGRATED MANAGEMENT

OBJECTIVE C1
To improve integrated management of fresh water and the use and development of land in whole catchments, including the interactions between fresh water, land, associated ecosystems and the coastal environment.

POLICY C1
By every regional council managing fresh water and land use and development in catchments in an integrated and sustainable way, so as to avoid, remedy or mitigate adverse effects, including cumulative effects.

POLICY C2
By every regional council making or changing regional policy statements to the extent needed to provide for the integrated management of the effects of the use and development of land on fresh water, including encouraging the co-ordination and sequencing of regional and/or urban growth, land use and development and the provision of infrastructure.

D. TANGATA WHENUA ROLES AND INTERESTS

OBJECTIVE D1
To provide for the involvement of iwi and hapū, and to ensure that tangata whenua values and interests are identified and reflected in the management of fresh water including associated ecosystems, and decision-making regarding freshwater planning, including on how all other objectives of this national policy statement are given effect to.