Warrants for Enforcement Officers

Sometimes people come in contact with so-called warranted officers. The classic example is the Enforcement Officer of the Local Authority (in our area the Tasman District Council) who wants to visit your private property. In those instances you will see 2 different documents.

The first document shows who the person is (e.g. an appointed Enforcement Officer). It is called the Warrant of Appointment, specifying the identity and role of the person.

The second document shows what this person is entitled to do (e.g. enter private land under section 332 of the Resource Management Act 1991). It is called the Warrant of Authority specifying the particular provision relevant for the action that the person would like to perform.

Section 332 of the Resource Management Act 1991 states:

Every enforcement officer who exercises any power of entry under this section shall produce for inspection his or her warrant of appointment and written authorisation upon initial entry and in response to any later reasonable request.

Ideally, they show both documents proactively “upon initial entry”. If not, you can request to see them, before they do any inspection or enforcement action.

This is confirmed in the Appointment Register of the Tasman District Council:

A warrant of authority and evidence of the officer’s identity must be produced upon any request to do so. If an officer is entering private land for purposes that may lead to enforcement action being taken, they should always present their warrant to avoid any argument later that evidence was collected unlawfully and is therefore inadmissible.

We requested under LGOIMA the release of the TDC Appointment Register. We received this document, unfortunately, heavily redacted. The last two pages of the Appointment Register contain a template for the identity card (warrant of appointment or “who is the person“) and also a template of the Warrant of Authority (“what can this person do“).

The Tasman District Council completely redacted these templates providing withholding of this information would be necessary to “prevent the disclosure or use of official information for improper gain or improper advantage.”

We cannot disagree more with that statement. Seeing these templates would not be in any form an “improper gain or improper advantage“, instead it would empower people to ascertain the validity of certain documents, if presented to them (e.g. an Enforcement Officer enters private land).

However, we found a copy of a Warrant of Appointment and a Warrant of Authority online, see below. They were part of a TDC presentation during the Environmental Compliance Conference 2019 in Christchurch and show the documents that TDC staff needs to produce when entering private land.

Warrants for Enforcement Officers

Discussion about closed workshops during Motueka Community Board meeting

The persistence game at Tasman District Council