People view the wares at the Feilding Sale Yards. The yard owners were fined $146,250 for discharging effluent into the Mangakino/Mākino Stream.

A fine issued after a stockyard pumped effluent into a significant Manawatū waterway will be used to improve water health.

Horizons Regional Council received a $131,000 windfall after it successfully prosecuted PGG Wrightson and Carrfields​, the owners of the Feilding Sale Yards.

The pair were collectively fined $146,250 for discharging effluent from the yards, which cover 70,000 square metres, into the Mangakino Stream, also known as the Mākino Stream, in 2018.

A blocked pipe meant waste from the yards went through a rainwater sump, which had no cap to close it during wash down after sales, and into the stream for at least 2½ hours.

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* Owners of Feilding Sale Yards fined more than $100,000 for letting effluent run into waterways

* Whanganui council fined $21,000 for putting human wastewater into stream

* Horizons Regional Council warns of health risk at Feilding waterways

The stream feeds into the Ōroua River, which has had a rāhui in place since the 1960s due to waste discharge.

Judge Brian Dwyer described the situation as "a recipe for disaster" and "systematic recklessness" when sentencing the companies.

Horizons unanimously voted on Tuesday to use the money on programmes to improve the health and wellbeing of the Mangakino/Mākino Stream.

Council strategy and regulation manager Nic Peet said $76,000 was left after paying prosecution costs ratepayers incurred.

"If you like, it's unexpected income."

The money could be folded into the general budget, but the judge had said he hoped it would be used to improve the health of the Mangakino/Mākino Stream, Peet said.

There were previous examples of that happening. The fine from a 2013 diesel spill caused by Ruapehu Alpine Lifts was used in community projects around the Mākōtuku Stream.

The work done around the Mangakino/Mākino Stream would include improving the Mangakino esplanade with planting, Mātauranga Māori education programmes and monitoring.

Ngāti Kauwhata spokesman Dennis Emery said using the money to improve the waterway was about kaitiakitanga – guardianship or protection – for the iwi.

The programme of work was a form of restorative justice for the iwi, dealing with the hurt and pain caused by the sale yard discharge, he said.

"We have to be seen to be doing something."

Councillor Jono Naylor said it made sense to use fines money to improve the affected waterways in each case. Fellow councillor Sam Ferguson said it was a "no-brainer".

"It's the right thing to do to attempt to make good."