Press Release

07 July, 2025                                                        

Bream Bay community demanding investigation into mining breaches

                             
The Bream Bay Guardians Society is meeting with Auckland Council this afternoon, demanding a full investigation into sand mining giant McCallum Brothers Ltd.

The community group wants the Council to hold McCallum Brothers Ltd to account for breaching multiple consent conditions while dredging at Pakiri, north of Auckland.

McCallum Bros has been extracting sand offshore from Mangawhai and Pakiri for decades and had its consent renewal declined by Auckland Council. It was found to have dredged trenches of up to 2.7 metres deep, 15 metres wide and 3 kilometres long. Its also alleged to have dredged in non-permitted areas including Northland waters.

“Auckland Council neglected its duty as a regulator to oversee the extraction process with no regular checks and audits. It now has the opportunity to put things right with an option of enforcement,” said Bream Bay Guardians Society spokesperson, Malcolm Morrison.

 McCallum Brothers is proposing to mine more than 8 million cubic metres of sand, north of Pakiri in Bream Bay under the Fast Track Law.

“Without Auckland Council holding them to account, McCallum Bros Ltd is claiming that they have a clean track record on their fast track application form,” said Mr Morrison.

“We won’t accept Auckland Council minimising the significance of the trenches. Given the evidence and findings presented to the Environment Court against McCallum Brothers Ltd, it  would be reasonable to expect the Council to carry out a full review into its compliance matters and an investigation into the McCallum Bros breaches which could result in a range of actions from remediation notices to prosecution,” said Mr Morrison.

Mr Morrison will be meeting with the Council’s Manager of Environmental Monitoring and staff at 1pm.

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Contact Helen@Castlescomms.co.nz
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