Now well into the second half of the year, we continue to see many changes in the Resource Management space. This website update provides a brief explanation of the following recent developments:
- Going for Housing Growth programme: The Government’s three-pillar plan to address the New Zealand housing supply shortage and how this works within the new resource management system.
- Government consults on national direction: The Government has sought feedback on four packages of proposed amendments to national direction, which will have implications across the infrastructure, primary industry, freshwater and housing/development sectors.
- Updates to Auckland’s intensification Plan Change 78 (PC78): Auckland Council has now been given the statutory ability to withdraw PC78 and replace that with a new intensification plan change. What does that process entail?
Going for Housing Growth programme
On 18 June 2025, Chris Bishop announced the Government’s further initiatives to support housing growth under the ‘Going for Housing Growth’ programme, aimed at progressing regulatory changes to address Aotearoa’s housing crisis. ‘Going for Housing Growth’ has three pillars:
- Pillar 1 – Freeing up land for urban development, including removing unnecessary planning barriers.
- Pillar 2 – Improving infrastructure funding and financing to support urban growth.
- Pillar 3 – Providing incentives for communities and councils to support growth.
Pillar 1 was initially meant to be among the suite of changes introduced in ‘Phase 2’ of the Government’s RMA reform programme and involved amending the National Policy Statement on Urban Development (NPS-UD). However, in March 2025, it was announced that these changes would now largely be given effect through ‘Phase 3’ of the RMA reform programme (the introduction of replacement environmental/planning legislation), which is scheduled to be rolled out in 2026.
Despite this, Pillar 1 will still be focused on increasing development in urban areas. The Pillar 1 proposals seek to increase development capacity for both housing and business purposes by ensuring that councils are providing an abundance of development capacity, specifically in areas where there is a high demand for growth. The proposals are also intended to provide more certainty for councils and communities about such requirements.
The Government has signaled what the Pillar 1 proposals are likely to entail, through consultation on topics such as:
- How spatial planning requirements could be designed to promote good housing and urban outcomes in the new resource management system.
- New housing growth targets, which would require relevant councils to enable at least 30 years of housing capacity in district plans using ‘high’ household growth projections.
- How the new resource management system can be responsive to unanticipated or out of sequence developments.
- Prohibiting councils from imposing rural-urban boundary lines in planning documents.
- Strengthening the existing NPS-UD intensification requirements, including requirements for councils to:
- Enable intensification (and greater building heights) along key public transport corridors;
- Measure walkable catchments using a more prescribed methodology;
- Offset development capacity lost due to some qualifying matters, such as ‘special character’; and
- Enable intensification across urban areas in line with demand and accessibility.
- Enabling a greater mix of uses (such as allowing dairies and cafes close to where people live) across urban environments.
- Removing district plan controls that don’t relate to effects on other people or the environment, or which have a disproportionate impact on development feasibility, such as balcony requirements and minimum floor areas.
- Whether changes are required to the current approach of using ‘tiers’ of urban environments to apply policies to particular areas.
- The impacts of ‘Going for Housing Growth’ proposals on Māori.
- Whether councils should be required to continue implementing existing NPS-UD requirements ahead of the new resource management system.
Public submissions on the proposals closed at 11:59pm, 17 August 2025. Feedback received in response to the discussion document will be used to inform officials’ thinking on policy development for Phase 3 of resource management reform. So it will be useful to review the summary of submissions received to see the likely direction of future RMA reform, when this is made available.
Government consults on national direction
National direction refers to a range of national directives including national environmental standards (NES), national policy statements (NPS) and the national planning standards which play a central role in supporting local authorities’ ability to implement the RMA.
The Government has sought feedback on four consultation packages. Consultation for the first three packages ran from Thursday 29 May until 11.59pm on Sunday 27 July. Consultation on package 4 ran from Wednesday 18 June until 11.59pm Sunday 17 August 2025.
The packages can be summarised as follows:
- Package 1: Infrastructure and development – the creation of four new national direction instruments (infrastructure, granny flats, papakāinga, and natural hazards) and amendments to four existing instruments (renewable electricity generation, electricity transmission (both NPS and NES), and telecommunication facilities) with the aim of making it easier for councils to plan and deliver infrastructure.
- Package 2: Primary industry – amendments to a total of eight existing national direction instruments (marine aquaculture, commercial forestry, highly productive land, stock exclusion regulations, New Zealand Coastal Policy Statement, and the quarrying and mining provisions in three other national direction instruments) to enable growth in the primary sector.
- Package 3: Freshwater – amendments to reflect the “interest of water users” and whether it is appropriate to implement the changes under the existing RMA or under new resource management legislation.
- Package 4: Going for Housing Growth – feedback specifically sought on Pillar 1 of changes related to freeing up land/removing planning barriers and how this would slot into the new resource management system (as discussed in more detail above).
The next steps in respect of the feedback on Package 4 has been addressed above. The feedback on Packages 1 to 3 will be used by officials to make recommendations to Ministers about what changes should be made to national direction instruments and when. So expect to see further announcements and developments in each of the infrastructure, primary industry and freshwater sectors over the next few months (and we will prepare further updates as those occur).
As these proposed changes could impact project planning and consenting specifically relating infrastructure and housing, it is important to consider how the proposed changes may impact your project. If you have any questions about the particular proposals and their potential impacts – please contact us.
Auckland’s intensification plan change – goodbye PC78, hello new plan change process
PC78 was Auckland’s intensification plan change, which was focused on enabling more housing and development, allowing for greater building heights and density in specific zones. The plan change responded to the NPS-UD, as well as legislative changes made in 2021 to incorporate the Medium Density Residential Standards (MDRS) into all residential zones for Tier 1 local authorities (which include Auckland Council).
As we identified in an earlier website update, see here, the Resource Management (Consenting and Other System Changes) Amendment Bill (Bill) was introduced in 2024. As introduced, the Bill was intended to allow councils to opt out of MDRS, provided they could demonstrate that existing planning rules already provided capacity for 30 years of housing growth. Therefore, Tier 1 Councils could decide whether to retain, alter, or remove MDRS from planning instruments – even if a plan change to introduce MDRS had already been completed. When the Bill was first introduced, Auckland Council was (and remains) one of the few councils that had yet to implement its intensification plan change.
But on 11 June 2025, the Government announced it has agreed to change the Bill to introduce a bespoke intensification process for each of Auckland and Christchurch City Councils (the two key Tier 1 councils still yet to complete intensification plan changes). As now enacted, the Resource Management (Consenting and Other System Changes) Amendment Act (Act) allows Auckland Council to withdraw the parts of PC78 that have not yet become operative (effectively the entire plan change, other than as it applies to the Auckland CBD).
But in exchange, the Council must seek Ministerial approval to introduce a replacement intensification plan change by 10 October 2025. And the new plan change must enable housing capacity equal to or greater than that would have been enabled by PC78, if that plan change had been made operative as notified. The new plan change must also address natural hazard risks, a decision-making area that was inhibited by the original PC78 and deliver greater density around key stations that will benefit from City Rail Link – in particular, Mount Eden, Kingsland, and Morningside. In determining the Council’s request to introduce a replacement plan change, the Minister will also set the timeframes for notification and processing of that instrument.
Auckland Council is well progressed in considering what the form of its replacement intensification plan change will look like, with staff recommendations being put to an extraordinary meeting of the Council’s Policy and Planning Committee for endorsement on 21 August 2025. Clearly, these changes are likely to significantly impact development plans and land use potential going forward – and again, we will provide further information in this regard as details become available.
If you have any questions about the changes discussed in this article, please reach out.