Public Navigation Rights in NZ Coastal Waters

Hi Martin, thanks for the question. The consequences would be that temporarily anchoring, mooring or grounding of your boat, for more than 14 part days even, within large "enclosed water" such as the Bay of Islands, or Whangarei Hbr, will be a criminal offence. There is also a requirement in the proposed new rule that after your 14 days you would be required to remove your ship entirely from that sheltered waterway for 3 days, that is , all your navigation rights would be prohibited for 3days on the waterway. This would make it easy for the council to prosecute because they would only need to take a photo every two days to convict you. Although this proposed rule appears very much to be arbitrary and unlawful, it might enable them to seriously harass people.