Outdoor Walking Access Report to the Minister for Rural Affairs

3 Identified access issues

Consultation by the Panel in 2006, and by the Land Access Ministerial Reference Group in 2003, identified the following problems with existing access arrangements.

  • Existing water margin reservations consist of various different legal forms, with differing rights of access.
  • Existing water margin reservations are incomplete, so that a significant proportion (possibly half) of the water margin is private land.
  • Much of the water margin reservation has been affected by erosion and accretion so that either it does not now provide water margin access or the original reservation has become separated from the water margin.
  • There is a lack of authoritative and readily available information about the location of public access.
  • Voluntary access arrangements can lack endurance and certainty.

In an attempt to overcome these problems the Government proposed, in 2004, to provide for a deemed right of access over a five-metre strip of land adjoining water margins. The Panel recognises that this proposal failed to take sufficient account of the property rights of potentially affected landholders. Nevertheless, access problems remain, and the Panel has looked at how they might be addressed.

Many landholders said that there is already ample public land for recreational access (although some said that adequate information about its location needed to be provided). Many other submissions identified areas where access to or along water margins, to areas of public land or public resources such as sports fish and game, was not available, or only available at the discretion of the landholder. Consultation showed that access over private land was generally freely granted in the past, but there are claims that there is a growing tendency to deny access, often when there is a change of ownership of the property. Submitters claimed that legal access can be blocked by an adjoining landholder (for example, along unformed legal roads), and that the Department of Conservation (DOC) sometimes blocks access to land that it administers. There were also claims that, where practical access to sports fish and game was available only by crossing private land, exclusive commercial access arrangements were sometimes preventing the negotiation of reasonable non-commercial access arrangements.

Consultation showed that many people are unclear about the law applying to unformed legal roads (paper roads). This issue has been clarified by Hayes (2007a) in a paper commissioned by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF). Hayes’ paper provides a robust examination of the law, and the Panel has used it to help form its advice and proposals in this report.

The Panel’s terms of reference focus on walking access. Consultation showed concerns about access by vehicles (including motor vehicles and bicycles) and with firearms and dogs. Some reference was also made to access with horses. The Panel acknowledges that it is difficult to deal with walking access in isolation, but, in this report, “walking access” means access on foot and without firearms, dogs or horses, except where specifically referred to (note “walking access” includes access with disability-assist dogs and access with mobility devices).

Issues raised in the 2006 consultation

The key issues raised during the consultation process include:

  • public interest in access to land;
  • protection of private property;
  • possible functions and form of a proposed access organisation;
  • different types of access currently available to the public;
  • management of unformed legal roads (paper roads);
  • provision of information about existing access;
  • lack of differentiation on maps between private and public roads;
  • restoration and realignment of access that has been lost due to erosion or accretion;
  • methods to establish new access;
  • Māori land and Māori issues;
  • possible content and status of a code of responsible conduct for access;
  • extent of landholders’ liability to the public and suggestions for possible further limitations;
  • risk of fires and liability for the costs imposed by fires;
  • rural crime and security concerns;
  • biosecurity risks to plants, animals and people;
  • “exclusive capture” of access to sports fish and game and other public resources;
  • access with motor vehicles, horses, bicycles and dogs;
  • access for hunting;
  • difficulty in contacting landholders to ask permission for access