Conservation groups worry Govt will privatise high country

The Government is rubbishing claims it is planning a wide-scale privatisation of the South Island high country.

Conservation and recreation groups said recent comments by Agriculture Minister David Carter indicated more Crown pastoral leases would be freeholded, with only covenants to protect conservation values.

"He hasn't said it in so many words, but he has certainly said that in the intent of what he said," Forest and Bird general manager Mike Britton said yesterday.

A ministerial official had separately told Forest and Bird that no more high country land would be signed over to the Department of Conservation.

But Associate Conservation Minister Kate Wilkinson said Forest and Bird's claim was "complete rubbish".

"The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment recommended we look at using a number of different tools, including covenants, to find a better way forward for tenure review," she said.

"This Government is taking a collaborative rather than antagonistic approach to negotiations with leaseholders".

Mr Carter last week told a Federated Farmers' meeting in Auckland that "it's a matter of who you believe can do the best job -- farming families who live and breathe the high country, or a government department run by Wellington bureaucrats".

"National backs the farmers any day," he said.

Mr Carter is now in Europe, but on his return is expected to take to cabinet a paper that will set the parameters for National's high country policies.

Conservationists were also concerned about acting lands minister Maurice Williamson's plan to make greater use of covenant protection rather than buying out leaseholders through tenure review, Mr Britton said.

Mr Williamson said last month the Government was reviewing legislative requirements before recognising leaseholders as stewards of the land and ensuring rents were "aligned more closely with the earning capacity of properties".

Mr Britton said good progress in protecting iconic high country landscapes and wildlife could be lost if the Government relied on covenants to protect conservation values.