30
July 2021
When the landmark
Climate Case was first heard in 2019, the court room looked a lot different
from other proceedings taking place that day.
It was, in the words
of Dr. Andrew Jackson, like “all of life was there” in the High Court.
All of the seats and
floor space was filled. There were Deliveroo drivers with their bags at the
door. An entire secondary school class of pupils had filed in. Barristers often
had to compete with babies and toddler’s voices while making their arguments. Crammed
together and at full attention, attendees seemed all too aware of how high the
stakes were.
The case itself had
been long in the making. It all started when Dr. Jackson, the lawyer who
instigated the case, saw a headline in 2015.
“Dutch Government taken
to court on climate change”, it read.
Dr. Jackson was
intrigued, and contacted a lawyer on the case the next day. They were generous
with their time and sharing information with him.
The partnership turned
out to be crucial as they became “pretty much a part of the team,” Climate Case
Ireland spokesperson Clodagh Daly recalled.
Fast forward two
years, and Dr. Jackson, Clodagh and others start building a case with Friends
of the Irish Environment. They established both the legal arguments and garnered
public support for what would become Climate Case Ireland.
By the time it made
its way to the High
Court in 2019, over 16,000 people had pledged their support through an
online petition. Support only continued to build when the case found itself in
the Supreme Court last summer.
You could count on one
hand the number of people physically before the Supreme Court when the ruling
was delivered remotely on 31 July 2020 due to the ongoing pandemic. One justice
after another voiced their judgment. The climate case had won unanimously in
the highest court of the land.
“A moment of hope and inspiration”
A year on, the legacy
spans well beyond the court ruling that the 2017 National Mitigation Plan fell
‘well short’ of what was required by law.
What campaigners
called a “surreal, moving, joyous, and powerful” decision recognised the
government’s responsibility to act on the climate crisis. It illustrated what is
possible when committed individuals come together. This was a massive win for the climate movement.
“We became the second
case in the world whereby the highest national court of law required the Government
to revise its climate policy and revise the ambition of its climate policy because
it was inadequate and the court decided that that was unlawful,” Clodagh told The
Green News.
Despite having known
for a very long time that it had a moral imperative to act on the climate
crisis, the Irish Government had “failed to take action”, according to Clodagh.
At the time, Ireland
was the second worst performing country in the EU regarding climate
action and had the third highest emissions per person. “It was really, really
dire,” Clodagh remembered.
So, motivated by poor
performance and inspired by the Dutch success in the courts, Clodagh said they
set out to see if “strategic litigation could really have a transformative role
in Ireland.”
Mounting a challenge
under the National Mitigation Plan was a time-sensitive opportunity.
“If a challenge wasn’t
brought up within three months of the plan being adopted, then it would
conceivably be another five years until another opportunity to mount a systemic
challenge would arise,” Dr. Jackson said.
The arguments they
presented were three-fold. First, they argued that the making of this plan
didn’t comply with the Climate Act of 2015. Secondly, it’s unconstitutional.
And thirdly, it breaches rights under the European Convention on Human Rights.
With these arguments
solidified, Friends of the Irish Environment (FIE) stepped up as a ligate. The
organisation’s Director, Tony Lowes, was crucial in backing the case as he said
there are “solicitors and barristers who really want
things to change, who really want this to happen, but who cannot go in on their
own. They need a litigate.”
Seeing an opportunity for a focal point for
the climate movement to coalesce, they made efforts to build a public campaign.
A website, social media and petition was made for people to show their support
of the case.
Armed with their
arguments, a litigate and growing public support, two additional legal
developments further aided their case.
First, the High Court
agreed with an argument in a different FIE case, that there can be a right read
into the constitution, consistent with human dignity.
Secondly the decision
in the Dutch case established an infringement on human rights. So Dr. Jackson
said, it went from being not just an inspiration but also potentially “a precedent
for the argument that we were making.”
Only the Urgenda case
in the Netherlands and the Dejusticia case in Colombia preceded Ireland in
bringing a climate case to the highest court, making Climate Case Ireland’s the
third of its kind in the world.
Ultimately, the case was won
the grounds that the National Mitigation Plan violated Ireland’s 2015 Climate
Act by failing to specify how emissions would be reduced. A new plan would have
to be drawn up and take its place.
The decision represented
the case’s “most rewarding moment and [its] happiest day,” according to Tony
Lowes.
What happens next
Since then,
campaigners say it has created momentum.
“There’s been a lot of moments where you
feel like there’s not a lot of hope or you feel like nothing is really changing
from like the Irish government standpoint and separate legislation.
So, when you see people came together and
made that happen on the national level, it just injects so much hope, momentum,
fire and it’s a spark,” youth climate activist Beth Doherty told The Green
News.
The experience of both
helping out with the case and learning from it has even inspired her to pursue
a career in law.
“I wanted to follow that path of creating change in this way and
start challenging what seems as the status quo and what’s accepted in order to
make a change,” Beth said.
Beyond inspiring
individuals, the case has international impacts. Most recently, the highest
court in Germany repeatedly cited the Irish case in its finding that the German
government must do more to address the climate crisis.
“We now see a firmly
established dialogue, I think, Europe’s highest courts in these systemic
climate cases, such that litigation that is today, hailed as landmark might
perhaps tomorrow be viewed as the routine application of climate law
principles,” Dr. Jackson noted.
Within Ireland, the
next step from the campaign is to see a Citizen’s Assembly in biodiversity and
work to give a constitutional right to the environment.
The Dáil declared a climate and biodiversity emergency in May 2019, and with that motion set its
intention to hold such an assembly. Over two years later, it still hasn’t
happened.
On an international
level, Ireland has co-signed to a statement to the UN Human Rights Council,
committed to the right to a ‘safe, clean, healthy and sustainable’
environment. Climate Case Ireland Argues
that the same conversation should be happening on a national level.
Friends of the Irish
Environment are also working for a Citizen’s Assembly and a constitutional
right, but since the landmark case, they’ve continued taking cases. Currently
they are working on several other cases related to Marine Protected Areas
(MPAs), peat removal, fisheries, legal aid to NGOs and policies on data
centres.
And although the Government
welcomed the decision from the supreme court at the time, they have yet
complied with the court’s decision, according to Climate Case Ireland, as they are
yet to see the new statutory plan as to how emissions will be reduced further
in the short term.
Further frustrations the
campaign has with the Government are related to weaknesses in the recently
passed Climate Bill. There are delays to reduce emissions in the short-term, as
the Climate Change Advisory Council is not in a position to make carbon budgets
until other regulations are in place.
Beth echoed these
frustrations with the legislation, citing the need for a better emphasis on
just transition, more ambitious targets and more engagement with people on the
ground.
“We need to be
focusing on improving it,” Beth Doherty urged. “The Climate Case happened for a
reason. It happened because our climate action legislation was not good enough.
So now we actually take that and improve it in good faith.”
So Climate Case
Ireland will continue its fight, according to Clodagh Daly, who said that they
will “continue to be holding the
government accountable in to deliver, actually commensurate with what’s
required in terms of science, but also in terms of justice and equity.”
The same applies to Dr.
Jackson. Six years have passed since he first read that fateful headline, and
his sights are already set on the next challenge.
“It’s really
heartening, I think, to see those ripple effects,” he said.
“But it’s still a huge
amount of work to do.”
By Sam Starkey
The post The ‘surreal’ Climate Case ruling, one year on appeared first on Green News Ireland.
