New Regional Plan

The Proposed Regional Plan for Northland has now been updated to include all provisions arising from the resolution of appeals to the Environment Court.

Download - Proposed Regional Plan - February 2024 (PDF 26.97 MB)

Now that all appeals have been resolved, Council is taking steps to make the Proposed Regional Plan fully operative. All rules in the Proposed Regional Plan must now be treated as operative, in accordance with Section 86F of the Resource Management Act (and any previous rule as inoperative).

As the Proposed Regional Plan is not yet operative, the objectives and policies of the Proposed Regional Plan and the objectives and policies of the operative regional plans must be considered. As the process for developing the Proposed Regional Plan is near completion and all appeals have been resolved, objectives and policies in the Proposed Regional Plan should be given greater weight in decision-making than the objectives and policies in the operative regional plans.

All Environment Court decisions relating to the Proposed Regional Plan for Northland and High Court decisions on the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management are available in the Consent Orders tab below.

Consent Orders

A consent order is an Environment Court order that endorses agreements reached by the parties during mediation and any subsequent negotiations. When appeals are resolved, consent orders will be issued by the Environment Court and will be recorded on the consent orders page. When a consent order contains rules, these rules must now be treated as operative (and any previous rule as inoperative).

Go to the current consent orders page

Marine protection areas

In May 2023 the Environment Court released its final decision on new marine protection rules for Mimiwhangata and Rakaumangamanga (Cape Brett).

The court decision directs Northland Regional Council to implement the new rules via our Regional Plan, as fishing was shown to have been causing significant disruption and deterioration to the ecosystems.

Get information, maps and frequently asked questions about the Marine Protection Areas

GMO Decision

On 16 June 2020, council agreed to settle the appeal seeking to include provisions in the Proposed Regional Plan regulating the use of genetically modified organisms in the coastal marine area. This was formally done via a consent order, which was signed off the the Environment Court on 05 August 2020.

Hard copies of all documents are available to purchase

Please contact us on the number above or at info@nrc.govt.nz to organise purchase.

For any further information, call the Policy and Planning Team on: Freephone 0800 002 004.