Forest and Bird’s poster of the extent of land that could be under threat<\/a>.<\/p>\n![\"Map](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1781809090_812_4JMW1XI_00_Thumb__public_conservation_land_jpg.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
RNZ \/ Supplied<\/p>\n
But Potaka wielded his own props – printed out images of the sort of land DOC should not own, like the MetService building in Wellington.<\/p>\n
“[It has] very little, if any, conservation value,” he said.<\/p>\n
“There’s no real value, but DOC continues to hold on to it. Actually, we should sell that … in order to generate some money to invest in the very biodiversity that the opposition trumpets as the most important thing that we need to do now.”<\/p>\n
![\"Conservation](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/4JMTZX8_Screenshot_2026_06_18_164921_png.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Conservation Minister Tama Potaka told select committee only “bits and bobs” of land, such as this West Coast gravel reserve, would be sold.<\/p>\n
Supplied \/ Department of Conservation<\/p>\n
The back-and-forth grew feverish after Potaka alleged the former Labour government of failing to increase conservation funding to the level required – more than $2 billion.<\/p>\n
“That’s blatantly untrue, minister,” Labour’s Priyanca Radhakrishnan said, while Swarbrick raised a point of order.<\/p>\n
“He’s answering the question,” replied committee chair Catherine Wedd.<\/p>\n
Swarbrick: “But he’s lying!”<\/p>\n
Potaka: “Pardon? What did you say? …Okay, okay, hang on, she’s calling me a liar.”<\/p>\n
National MP Grant McCallum then piped up: “Hypocrite!”, while later in the hearing, Labour’s Rachel Brooking raised her finger to her lips and told Potaka to “shush”.<\/p>\n
![\"Chloe](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/4JR9K2R_260324_Bridge_24_March_8_jpg.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Green Party co-leader Chl\u00f6e Swarbrick said Conservation Minister Tama Potaka was lying in a scrutiny hearing at Parliament.<\/p>\n
RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone<\/p>\n
Once the room settled, Potaka made it clear he had no intention to sell off huge swathes of conservation land – just “bits and bobs”, pointing to the poster of the MetService building, and another of a gravel reserve surrounded by farmland on the West Coast.<\/p>\n
“There have been some very scandalous accusations made, madam chair, that I completely outrageously object to,” Potaka said.<\/p>\n
He said it was “spurious” to suggest he was trying to sell off 60 percent of the estate: “That’s highly ridiculous and fantasy land.”<\/p>\n
Brooking sought “comfort” from Potaka that the only land disposed of would be of low or no conservation value.<\/p>\n
“I’ve said that so many times,” Potaka exclaimed. “I’ve said ‘bits and bobs!'”<\/p>\n
The minister repeated that significant amounts of land would not be sold, and said anyone claiming that was in “the Olympic championships for exaggeration”.<\/p>\n
Potaka added there was a long way to go yet with the law, including clarifying disposal and transfer processes, which would play out during select committee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A scrutiny hearing at Parliament devolved into a rowdy spat with accusations of lying, cries of hypocrisy and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":484106,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-484105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=484105"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484105\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/484106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=484105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=484105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=484105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}