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Resource Management Act 1991

Standards, policy statements, and plans - National direction - National environmental standards

43E: Relationship between national environmental standards and bylaws

You could also call this:

“Local rules can sometimes be stricter or more relaxed than national rules, depending on what the national rules say.”

When a national environmental standard is created, it might allow bylaws to be stricter or more lenient than the standard. A bylaw is a rule made under any law.

If the national standard says a bylaw can be stricter, and the bylaw stops something that the standard allows, then the bylaw is followed instead of the standard.

If the national standard says a bylaw can be more lenient, and the bylaw allows something that the standard doesn’t allow, then the bylaw is followed instead of the standard.

These rules help you understand when to follow a bylaw and when to follow a national environmental standard if they say different things.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM233327.

Topics:
Environment and resources > Conservation
Environment and resources > Town planning
Government and voting > Local councils
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43D: Relationship between national environmental standards and designations, or

“This explains how national environmental rules work with special land use plans, and which one is more important in different situations.”

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43F: Description of discharges in national environmental standards for discharges, or

“This rule explains how the government can describe different types of pollution in their environmental rules.”

Part 5 Standards, policy statements, and plans
National direction: National environmental standards

43ERelationship between national environmental standards and bylaws

  1. A bylaw that is more stringent than a national environmental standard prevails over the standard, if the standard expressly says that a bylaw may be more stringent than it.

  2. For the purposes of subsection (1), a bylaw is more stringent than a standard if it prohibits or restricts an activity that the standard permits or authorises.

  3. A bylaw may be more lenient than a national environmental standard if the standard expressly specifies that the bylaw may be more lenient.

  4. For the purposes of subsection (3), a bylaw is more lenient than a standard if it permits or authorises an activity that the standard prohibits or restricts.

  5. In this section, bylaw means a bylaw made under any enactment.

Notes
  • Section 43E: replaced, on , by section 29 of the Resource Management Amendment Act 2005 (2005 No 87).
  • Section 43E(3): replaced, on , by section 31 of the Resource Legislation Amendment Act 2017 (2017 No 15).