Tina Schirr

Published: January 27, 2020

Submitting To: Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE)

Issue for Business: Specifically, BEC wishes to comment on the role and purpose statement of the Crown Minerals Act 1991 (referred to as ‘the Crown Minerals Act’ or ‘the CMA’), as addressed in chapter 1 of the discussion document. We agree that a “clear, coherent, and fair regulatory regime” for the extraction of mineral resources is desirable. We note that the CMA is one of many legislative puzzle pieces that facilitates efficient, effective, and safe mineral extraction industries. We caution using the CMA as a vehicle for significant reform at a time where other parts of this legislative framework are also undergoing first-principles reform (for example the Resource Management Act 1991). While BEC is supportive of efforts to improve overall wellbeing, BEC suggests that explicit addition of specific wellbeing indicators and ‘capitals’ into the purpose statement is inappropriate with the potential of acting as a catalyst for unnecessary complexity.