A group of business and property owners are meeting at Papamoa's Bluebiyou restaurant tonight to plan a class action against the owners of the Rena.

It's the only way many small businesses and private property owners can get any recompense for losses caused by the Rena's grounding and subsequent oil spill and break up on Astrolabe Reef.

The Rena wreck has caused loss of business for people in the Bay of Plenty. Photo: LOC.

'From the New Zealand law side of things the businesses are pretty screwed,” says organiser Nevan Lancaster.

'The $12 million statutory cap – basically we have to share that if the insurance company applies to have that cap applied.

'We'll have to share it with the government, Maritime NZ's clean-up costs; so we are looking at other options.”

The group, which has been meeting for the last couple of months, has been put in touch with a UK law firm which has agreed to take on the case on a contingency basis.

'In the UK we are not restricted by New Zealand law, and we can also apply for damages,” says Nevan.

'Robert at Environmental Law has been talking to a litigator in London who has been saying ‘you guys do have a case, we will take it on contingency', which means no money up front, you only pay if win.”

The next step is to get an idea of the losses incurred by affected businesses, iwi and property owners.

'You don't hear about business compensation; there's nothing about iwi or landowners' compensation.

'It's all about clean-up costs; it's pretty much nothing, so from our point of view, we need to get as many businesses to line up as possible.

'It's the businesses that have been shut down and people are struggling to make mortgage payments. It's a tough time.”

The insurers count on the fact that the losses for many individual businesses are only several thousand dollars and that many can't be bothered with the grief and stress of trying to claim it, says Nevan.

But the figures mount up.

'We can get some figures together and work out how much businesses are losing,” says Nevan.

'Then there are those intangibles, like the effect on beach front property values.

'You can make an economic case for these numbers which are quite large.

'At the end of the day the insurers basically need to come and talk to us at the table.

'I have talked to their representative and he said there's that $12 million limit and what can they do… He's had three weeks to do that, and he hasn't got back to me.”

New Zealand does not have a litigation culture.

In the US within two weeks of the Gulf Horizon spill, BP had put $20 billion on the table, says Nevan.

In Queensland following the Pacific Adventure spill at Stradbroke Island in 2009, Nevan says the Queensland government paid out for the oil spill clean-up costs and then recovered the costs from the insurers.

'So the idea is we just to get it out that there that there is something happening.”

Nevan can be contacted either on 021 572 207, or Nevan@hotmail.com

The meeting at Papamoa's Bluebiyou restaurant tonight starts at 7pm.