A Federated Farmers' leader has questioned whether the latest fine imposed on a Crafar family farm for effluent breaches is in the public interest.
Allan Crafar and his farm company's sharemilker, Hermann Kibler, were fined $45,000 on Friday for discharging effluent onto land where it entered a waterway at a farm at Scotts Ferry near Bulls.
The Crafar family owes more than $200 million to PGG Wrightson, Westpac and RaboBank after its central North Island farm holdings went into receivership in October last year.
The prosecution was brought by the Manawatu-Whanganui regional council, Horizons.
The receivers who now control the Crafar family businesses, entered a guilty plea on the Crafars' behalf.
However, Federated Farmers national dairy chair, Lachlan McKenzie has questioned why the regional council persisted with the case.
He says the Crafars have no means of paying up, so fine and court costs will fall on the business. These will be added to the list of unsecured creditors who may now have even less chance of getting the money they're owed, he says.
Mr McKenzie says ratepayers will also lose out, and that was recognised by the Waikato Regional Council when it decided not to continue with an earlier effluent case against the Crafars.
Allan Crafar says the Environment Court conviction is part of a campaign to discredit farmers who work hard to support the country.
Regional council spokesperson Greg Carlyon says the sharemilker allowed hectares of land to be covered in effluent up to 60cm deep in 2008. He says staff found that less than 5% of the appropriate effluent storage was in place.
Crafar refuses to leave farm
A relocation offer by receivers of six months' free rent in Rotorua expired on Friday, but Mr Crafar insists he won't leave his farm home at Reporoa.
Receivers KordaMentha had made the offer to Mr Crafar on condition that his family leave the farm at Reporoa.
The receiver, Michael Stiassny, says he is disappointed that the offer was not accepted. The receivers will have to consider what to do next, he says, but in the meantime there will be no raids to evict Mr Crafar from the land.
