This is the latest ride on the merry-go-round of legal shit-fuckery that penalises community groups who dare to face off in opposition to the rape and pillage of the environment. Less than a decade ago, voluntary community organisations were able to apply for Government financed grants, now no longer available, when challenging the likes of Councils, big-moneyed developers, international consortiums and Government agencies in respect of environmental concerns. In almost all but the most frivolous of cases, legal costs were never awarded against community groups but left to lie where they may. This was in the interests of justice being seen to be done in both quasi and full legal proceedings that were being tested by those who were committed to upholding the incrementally unfolding joke of ‘A Clean Green New Zealand’ by their works and deeds. Up and down the country, these communities of voluntary environmental workers and supporters of the notion that we are only caretakers of the land for future generations attempted to mount cases on hard come by donations fund raising efforts and their own knowledge and informational resources that are now regarded as unqualified opinions in hearings, even if they are unpaid witnesses or presenters who are acknowledged experts in their fields. These usually unheralded challengers of 'the system' are rapidly learning that you don’t fuck with rapacious wealth accumulators, Councils, and Government without risking eye-wateringly heavy sanctions and financial penalties. With stuff-all resources, the would-be protectors now not only have to somehow engage expensive lawyers and 'experts' but will be denigrated during hearings by the paid liars who the vested interests can munificently reward, the snide demeaning attitudes of the assembled ‘specialist’ legal teams of the ‘I want brigade’ and usually associated local bodies, various intended beneficiaries of the primary parties and, as in the Coromandel case, the Government, all of who are backed by very deep pockets, often, in part, paid for by the various charges, rates or taxes of the challengers. This could end up a long dissertation of examples and bitter experience from the bottom end of the disenchanted 'protest' chain but no doubt, the shit-fuckery and perversion of environmental legal protection is already sufficiently evident!