MP roasts Tegel decision

 

Northland National Party MP Matt King has lambasted the decision by government ministers to decline Tegel Chicken a resource consent for a broiler chicken farm near Dargaville.

He describes the decision as politically motivated and a slap in the face for regional development in Kaipara.

Tegel applied for resource consents to set up a broiler chicken farm at Arapohue, near Dargaville, with a capacity to stock up to 1.3 million chickens. 

The farm could have provided jobs for 28 people and would have had a major trickle-down effect for the community, Mr King said.

However, Land Information Minister Eugenie Sage and Associate Finance Minister David Clark declined the consent under the Overseas Investment Act.

“Minister Clark and I considered that the land sale was not likely to result in substantial and identifiable benefits to New Zealand, so we declined the application,” Sage said.

Matt King says he is baffled by the rationale behind the decision.

“It would have provided jobs in Northland and potentially a major benefit to the local economy,” he said. “So, I can’t see how that is not a substantial and identifiable benefit to New Zealand.”

Mr King says the decision is another example of Kaipara District being put “on the backburner” by the coalition government.

“For all their talk about investment in Northland, very little of it has come into Kaipara. They just don’t seem to be interested. It has taken them a year in office to send even one minister to the district. Clearly, the people of Kaipara are low on the priority list for the government, and the Tegel decision reinforces that.”