Tougher stand on dirty dairying penalties
Fed up with dirty dairy farmers getting off lightly, Environment Waikato is set to appeal the next lenient penalty issued by a District Court judge.
It wants the High Court to establish case law to align fines with much higher penalties allowed by an overhaul of the Resource Management Act.
The regional council has decided against launching a High Court appeal over an Ohaupo farmer’s $2000 fine. It had hoped it would prompt guidance from the court over new maximum penalties for breaches of the act.
Changes to the act last year introduced maximum $600,000 penalties for breaches by corporates and took the maximum fine for individuals from $200,000 to $300,000. The two-year maximum jail term for individuals was unchanged.
The council wants to prompt judicial reference to the new regime to replace case law.
The council was given authority by the solicitor-general to appeal Alan Worsnop’s recent $2000 fine over effluent ponding on his paddocks two years ago because of a broken irrigator.
Mr Worsnop’s fine had earlier been described by staff as “extraordinarily low”. The council had planned to appeal to prompt sentencing direction and guidance in dairy effluent cases.
But council investigations and complaints programme manager Patrick Lynch said the Worsnop offence fell before the law change.
Council would wait for a case where the offending fell under the new regime to seek a benchmarking judgment.
A North Waikato dairy farming operation, Young Wah Chong Dairy Ltd and its manager Garry Box, have just been fined $50,000 after admitting an effluent spill on their land last year. They had received a warning in 2006.
Mr Lynch said another seven prosecutions for stock effluent breaches were before the courts. Two included alleged offending after the new penalties came into effect.
Source: http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/farming/3827008/Tougher-stand-on-dirty-dairying-penalties
