OceanaGold senior vice-president Alison Paul said a decision by Doc last month to decline an application to clear about 6ha of lizard habitat at the gold mine northwest of Dunedin would have forced mining to stop early next year.
Yesterday’s reversal was a relief and "exactly" what it was hoping for as a result of its letter to the director-general, Ms Paul said.
Resources Minister Shane Jones said declining the company’s application could have been "catastrophic" for jobs in the region and raised questions about bureaucrats stymieing the will of Cabinet ministers.
"We’ve received feedback that when we asked for more information from [OceanaGold] about their lizard management plan, there was a miscommunication, and we weren’t clear enough about what we were looking for and moved to decline the application too quickly without clarifying with [OceanaGold].
"We acknowledge our process wasn’t as customer-focused as it could have been and we will work closely with [OceanaGold] to progress their application swiftly and pragmatically, alongside the other applications in our system.
"The Minister of Conservation has been very clear that he expects the department to clear the permissions backlog — we have seen the number of applications awaiting decisions drop from around 1300 to now under 550."
Doc declined to release the letter its director-general and several ministers had received from the company.
Ms Paul also declined to release the "very long technical" letter.
However, she said it made it clear that without permits in hand by the start of October, work would be suspended for 700 direct employees at the mine and more than 200 contractors and their staff, "leading to layoffs".
"We felt the need to point out that without timely processing of our wildlife permit applications, then we would need to stop operating.
"If we can’t clear this pretty small area, it’s the area we have to start with, the application itself was for a bigger area, but if we can’t do part of it starting in October, we can’t go on operating our plant from a pretty early date next year.
"We are confident that we have habitats ready and suitable to move relocated lizards into."
The applications were for the same proposed "phase 4" expansion the company had lodged resource consent applications with the Otago Regional Council for, she said.
Mr Jones has previously criticised the regional council for recommending the consent applications be declined in full.
Yesterday, he was equally critical of Doc.
"We’ve got to have a showdown," he said.
"Who’s running the country? Is it the cabinet ministers or the permanent state?
"It’s either the cabinet ministers or the bureaucratic serpents.
"They are more of a threat than the slithering lizards."
