Protesters Block Miners from Coromandel Harbour

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6n_coromandel_301013

30th Octo­ber New Zealand – A group of Coro­man­del pro­test­ers are cur­rent­ly blockad­ing the town’s har­bour in an attempt to stop Sea Hold­ings from tak­ing sam­ples.

The area is part of Sched­ule 4, where the Gov­ern­ment gave con­sent for min­er­al prospect­ing ear­li­er this year, despite promis­ing in 2010 no min­ing would be allowed.

Green MP Cather­ine Delahunty is at the “peace­ful protest”, tweet­ing: “Min­ers have head­ed back to motel try­ing to work how to get around Coro­man­del com­mu­ni­ty but it’s not work­ing!”.

The Gov­ern­ment had orig­i­nal­ly pro­posed min­er­al explo­ration in 7000ha of con­ser­va­tion land in the Coro­man­del, Great Bar­ri­er Island and Paparoa Nation­al Park.

How­ev­er, the Gov­ern­ment did a U‑turn in 2010 and said it will not remove any land from Sched­ule 4 for min­ing pur­pos­es.

But, in March this year it issued eight con­sents to prospect and explore for coal and oth­er min­er­als in Coro­man­del and Paparoa Nation­al Park.