What is the Overseas Investment Amendment Bill and why have you barely heard of it?

While many people are winding down for the holidays, the Luxon Government has quietly put a “for sale” sign up on Aotearoa’s most precious land. It is now easier for foreign corporations to buy conservation areas, offshore islands, lakebeds, coastal zones, and wāhi tapu sites.

If you haven’t heard about it until now, you’re not alone. David Seymour’s Overseas Investment Amendment Bill passed around 11pm on a Friday night in December. With no media attention.

Its implications are significant – and long-lasting.

Before this amendment bill, the government had to run a bunch of tests and checks before approving the sale of sensitive land to offshore buyers. It  could veto the sale or impose basic cultural and ecological conditions on it before approving it.  

But the Government has now removed almost all those safeguards. Now it is easier for offshore billionaires and foreign corporations to buy up ‘sensitive land’ in Aotearoa, which includes:

  • Conservation land
  • Lakebeds
  • Coastal and marine areas
  • Offshore islands
  • Wāhi tapu and other culturally significant sites
  • Land adjoining these areas

In other words, some of the most irreplaceable places in Aotearoa. Here’s exactly what they did to the law:

Basic criminal checks removed

You wouldn’t rent your home to someone without checking their references. But the Government removed the requirement to run even the most basic criminal check on corporations that want to buy sensitive land.

That means multinational corporations with a history of criminal activity – like breaking environmental laws, labour abuses, or tax evasion overseas can now buy sensitive land in Aotearoa without the Government being required to properly vet them.

Vetoing sales on environmental or cultural grounds is now impossible

The Benefit to New Zealand test is removed. This was a safeguard that required overseas buyers to show clear benefits before being allowed to buy sensitive land.

It also gave the Government a basis to impose conditions like:

  • protecting biodiversity
  • preserving heritage values
  • maintaining public access

Overseas buyers no longer need to demonstrate public benefit. The Government has less ability to decline sales or attach conditions that protect what makes these places special.

Forestry and water bottling corporations get less scrutiny

The Government has scrapped the special forestry test. This was – another safeguard that applied extra scrutiny to overseas forestry investments and allowed the government to impose conditions on the sale.

This matters because offshore forestry companies have already caused enormous harm in Aotearoa. After Cyclone Gabrielle, forestry slash destroyed homes, damaged infrastructure, polluted rivers, and left communities traumatised.

Treasury estimates that up to 70 percent of New Zealand’s plantation forestry is already foreign-owned. Some of the country’s largest forestry landowners are offshore corporations, including firms registered in tax havens like the Cayman Islands.

Despite that track record, the Government has decided offshore forestry investments now deserve less scrutiny, not more.

The water extraction and bottling provisions were also scrapped – the Government used to  be obliged to take into account whether the sale was likely to result in a negative impact on water quality or sustainability. That meant they could decline the sale of land overlying an important aquifer to a water bottling corporation. Now, they can’t.

Who does this law really serve and what can we do about it?

These changes do not serve New Zealanders. They serve multinational corporations and offshore shareholders. These changes make it easier for them to buy up sensitive land, exploit it, and send profits overseas, while New Zealanders pay the environmental, cultural, and social costs.

Aotearoa’s most sensitive lands are not just assets on a balance sheet. They are part of who we are,  places of immense ecological value and cultural significance.

If this Government is serious about protecting New Zealand’s future, it should be strengthening safeguards on overseas investment, not dismantling them in the dead of the night.

NZ First has already helped pass one of David Seymour’s ideological projects – the Regulatory Standards Act – only to withdraw its support weeks later after a public outcry.  It now faces a similar choice.

If you don’t want New Zealand’s most precious places sold off with fewer checks and fewer protections, now is the time to act. Email your MP. Email Winston Peters. Call for these changes to be repealed and for strong environmental and cultural safeguards to be restored.