Accusations of bias were levelled against the Central Otago District Council yesterday by a planning hearing submitter who said the council was seen as a ''strong supporter'' of the Highlands Motorsport Park.
The submitter, Alan McKay, of Cromwell, asked to raise some issues at the start of the hearing into whether the motorsport park should be allowed to change one of its resource consent conditions.
The council's hearing panel, made up of independent commissioner John Lane and Cr Martin McPherson, heard the matter.
Usually they are joined by Cr Neil Gillespie and independent commissioner Terry Emmitt, both of Cromwell, but yesterday the Cromwell men took no part in the hearing.
Messrs Lane and Emmitt were councillors who lost their seats at the last election and have been reappointed by the council to the panel.
Mr McKay said the resource consents for the park were heard by a commissioner who was independent of the council and that would have been the appropriate way to deal with the variation to the consents.
The council was seen as a ''strong supporter'' of the motorsport park.
It sold the land to the initial developers of the project, offered interest-free finance at the start and promoted the park.
Mr McKay claimed there had been a reluctance by the council to enforce conditions of the park's resource consents and he said Mr Lane was a councillor throughout the duration of the consent process.
Lawyer Phil Page, appearing for the motorsport park trust, said the resource consent was handled by an independent commissioner because the council had ''a financial interest'' in the outcome of that hearing, as it had sold land to the park developers.
''They're not in that position now,'' he said.
