Native Affairs – A warning to Tongariro tourists

DOC's response to the story here: http://www.doc.govt.nz/news/media-releases/2017/misinformation-on-tongaririo-national-park-corrected/

Yeah we really need a right of way in NZ just like in the UK and Sweden… Sadly private property is too much protected, I think we don't put enough emphasis on the fact that no one actually "owns" a land but is merely borrowing it for some time…

How can you put a law on something no body owns? Therefore the crown is the owner? So somebody owns the land, it's a fact of life. There was an owner of the land before the crown too. Under those guidelines. So legally this must be taken into consideration to. Especially under the circumstances the crown took the land under its ownership in most cases. It's all owned just to different degrees. Everybody has an agenda, it's getting others to see ours that gets frustrating. I would love to cross farm to have access to my beloved pastime. But there's no way I'm letting the local kids access the local park via my backyard to access theirs. It's not the farmers or landholders fault, though it is frustrating and petty in many circumstances. It's Docs fault, it's all Docs fault.

is it the same concept of ownership? the crown manages the land for and on behalf of the people. they cant do as they like with parks, they are managed for the benefit of the plants animals and people. park management plans stipulate what they can and cant do in parks, the conservation dept have a mandate to conserve the land and the living things on it.

@Gaiters I do understand what you are saying; the idea of private ownership has become deeply embedded in our modern sensibility. By contrast the notion of the commons, something everyone as access to, and is managed by community consensus, has been progressively diminished over the past few centuries. Yet fundamentally is the reason WHY we go tramping not connected to this idea of the commons at some deep level? That sense of untrammelled wilderness, without proximate boundaries and constraints, a place where for a time we answer to no-one but ourselves ... is that not the reason why we are drawn to the hills? And yet increasingly this political concept that only private ownership matters is inevitably encroaching on this freedom. Which is why, regrettably, politics matters.

Historically, before the English came, land was mostly "used", not "owned". This is how they could "buy" masses of land in Australia from the aboriginal people, who didn't think that they owned anything, but merely used it, and didn't understand that whole idea of "owning land". @Gaiters : if you're afraid from the local kids, there's a whole lot more of issues here than just land… For the record, right of way has been something in some European countries for a long time and this haven't made them fall into complete chaos yet ;) And I agree with @PhilipW: tramping in the bush is one of those pleasures where you can (mostly) forget all about those silly rules and just be ourselves :)

my understanding of the law in NZ, you are not technically tresspassing until you are verbally told to leave a property by an occupier , if its a work property , an employee may be able to tell you to leave. no tresspassing signs have no legal validity, they cannot prosecute you until you refuse a verbal request to leave or a letter that has been addressed or handed to you. but having said that, obviously when theres a no trespassers sign, you know you're going to be asked to leave if you are spotted... not good practice to ignore a no trespassing sign, but the law doesnt stop you from ignoring a sign..

"How can you put a law on something no body owns?" By mutual agreement between people in a given region on a constitutional framework of government to define law for that region which they collectively inhabit? Also with guns and stuff.

also guns and stuff. I like it haha. Don't forget morters and cannons draggd through the mud for days. That's worth a decent coastal plain haha.

Heh. It's not too distant from the truth, really. We live relatively peacefully but only so long as there's an ability, or diplomacy, or a total lack of interest to stop someone invading and taking it all. Crown land is called crown land for convenience, but the whole 'ownership' thing is an abstract concept defined by law. When you're a land-owner, you really just have a Title to give you rights over the land under the agreed legal framework. The law defines what it means to "own" land. Owners don't. The rights granted for private land don't guarantee exclusive control of the land, either. There are heaps of exceptions and rules. For example, clause 328 of the Property Law Act requires that if you have land-locked neighbours, those neighbours can apply to a court for access. The court then considers everything and might force you to grant the neighbours reasonable access over your land. (Ref: http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2007/0091/latest/whole.html#DLM969585 ) That's an example of the type of thing I wish we had in law for public land, along with people who were conditioned to think of it as normal... and that's the hardest bit. Still, Parliament saw fit to make sure that private land-owners could reach their land even if it was annoying for neighbours, but so far there's been no ensuring that the rest of us can reasonably get to public land that's meant to be for collective benefit of everyone. The consequence is lots of public land that's meant to be accessible for everyone's benefit, but for which reasonable access is often at the whim of benevolent land-owners who might some day change their mind, on a moment's notice, for any number of reasons. And they do.