Applicants wanting to use water in the upper Waitaki catchment have been declined a final say on the issue - at least at this stage - by an Environment Canterbury panel.
The panel is considering 110 applications for water, mainly for irrigation, in the upper catchment west of the Waitaki dam.
It has completed a hearing process and is now waiting for proposed conditions for resource consents before making final decisions.
That process has taken considerably longer than envisaged, delaying decisions on the resource consent applications until next year.
The delay led to panel chairman Paul Rogers early last month putting in place a timetable with deadlines to make sure the process formulating the conditions was completed before Christmas.
That timetable included a provision for submitters who were involved in the hearing, which included proposals to establish 16 dairy farms with a total of up to 17,850 cows on three properties in the Ohau and Omarama areas, to get a chance to comment on proposed conditions formulated by applicants.
However, the counsel representing six major applicants for water, Kelvin Reid, objected to all submitters being involved in that process.
He did not believe that was required and he asked the panel to drop that from the process.
Mr Reid understood the process allowed only submitters who had given expert evidence on cumulative water quality issues to be involved in development of the conditions.
"Any opening up of the process [to all submitters] at this point has the potential to significantly complicate matters and result in further delay," he said.
However, the panel has now rejected that request, and said it was always the intention to enable all submitters to be included in developing the conditions.
That was important as a matter of "fair process", because conditions were not available to submitters before they presented their evidence.