It wants to be seen as a government of action and growth.
It is staking a lot on the Bill and the projects.
On Sunday’s project list announcement, Minister for Infrastructure Chris Bishop said the projects would help rebuild the economy, fix the housing crisis, improve energy security and address the country’s infrastructure deficit.
"It’s about getting NZ moving and cutting through the red tape", he said. "It’s about jobs and growth."
There is both support and horror at this process and the associated attitudes.
Naturally, environmental groups are alarmed, and rightly so in several cases. Projects that have gone through or were going through the Resource Management Act and appeals have reappeared despite earlier rejections or likely rejection.
Notably, the Trans-Tasman Resources’ seabed mining off the Taranaki coast and the West Coast Waitaha Hydro Project have re-emerged.
The hydro application was declined by the then Environment Minister, David Parker, in 2019 because it posed too great a threat to the character of the near-pristine area and people’s enjoyment of it.
A Bathurst West Coast coal mining project is also on the list.
Once the Bill is law, those behind listed projects can apply to the Environmental Protection Authority.
Its "expert" panels will assess each project and apply any relevant environmental protections.
The government wisely backed off earlier plans to place final approvals in the hands of three ministers.
It also changed its stance to involve the Minister for the Environment in the referral mechanism.
The expert panels, Mr Bishop says, will include members with technical expertise relevant to a project, expertise in environmental matters (and where relevant conservation), and the Treaty of Waitangi.
Crucial, nonetheless, are the criteria under which the panels make decisions and their chosen make-up.
The balance is swung towards development. This will, at times be at a significant expense to the environment, a trade-off the government is willing to make for the sake of growth and what it sees as the path to prosperity.
The Fast-track Approvals Bill itself is due to be passed later this year. Mr Bishop expects the first of the approvals to take place next year.
He said the process should be reduced from years to months.
Nineteen of the 28 Otago and 14 Southland projects from the original 384 nationwide applications have made it to the final 149 recommended by ministers. Just because projects are on the list does not mean they will proceed to the panels.
Projects to build more than 5000 homes around Queenstown are included.
As mayor Glyn Lewers said, there were also infrastructure issues to be addressed on what was an "important" day for the district.
As with any consents, much also rides on the conditions set.
The new proposed gold mine at Bendigo will test the system. It could cover a large area with major impacts.
The two wind farms listed could push against local opposition, and two open-ocean salmon farms will raise substantial environmental questions.
A lack of trust clouds the whole process, partly because of large donations among the applicants to coalition partners and partly because of the government’s record on other matters.
The government is, in effect, smashing through the Resource Management Act and thinking big for development from the second half of the 2020s. Minister Shane Jones, for example, sees the Bill and the 11 mining projects (including an expansion of the Macraes mine) as a means to help double the value of mineral exports to $2 billion by 2035.
The Think Big schemes of the early 1980s under Prime Minister Robert Muldoon saw the government borrowing to pay for large-scale industrial projects.
The present think big sees the government endeavouring to clear the way for private and public developments.
