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https://reneweconomy.com.au/court-agrees-government-paid-scant-regard-to-climate-threat-throws-out-lawsuit-anyway/>
"The Federal Court has dismissed a class action lawsuit brought by Torres
Strait Islanders against the Australian government, alleging it breached a duty
of care by failing to properly address climate change.
In a summary of the landmark decision delivered to a court in Cairns on
Tuesday, Justice Michael Wigney found that climate change was “an existential
threat to the whole of humanity.”
The judge said the Australian government had failed to properly engage with
climate science when setting emissions targets in 2015, 2020 and 2021, and that
climate change was battering the islands in the Torres Strait where the
applicants lived.
The two lead applicants, Uncle Pabai Pabai and Uncle Paul Kabai, live in
Zenadth Kes (the name in language for the Torres Strait and the people who live
there) where climate change induced sea level rise is swallowing the islands.
In some areas, low-lying food producing areas have already been inundated and
members of the community have described having to dive to recover the remains
of their ancestors after a king tide. Left unchecked, the communities on these
islands will be forced to leave their homes as climate refugees, severing their
connection to their thousands-year-old culture.
Unlike other recent cases that argue individual fossil fuel producers owe
liability for climate harms arising when the oil, gas and coal they produce is
burned,
Pabai Pabai v The Commonwealth took aim at the government for failing
to act.
The case alleged the Australian government had acted negligently when it failed
to take meaningful action on climate change, by setting emissions reductions
targets too low and failing to properly engage with the science.
Over the course of the hearings, the court heard from climate scientists and
government officials.
In one hearing in Melbourne, lawyers for the applicants cross examined a public
servant, Kelly Pearce, who led a taskforce to advise the Australian government
on options for emissions reduction targets in anticipation of negotiations in
Paris that would become the Paris Climate Agreement.
Pearce confirmed in evidence that the taskforce did not consider the impacts of
climate change on the Torres Strait, or any other community, apart from broadly
acknowledging that there would be some sort of impact from extreme weather
events.
Justice Wigney said he accepted the evidence about the scale and reality of
climate change, the harm it was causing to the Torres Strait and ruled the
government had failed to engage with the science on climate change when setting
climate policy.
He found that the government’s engagement showed “scant, if any, regard to the
best available science” and that its failure to address the threat,
particularly for the Torres Strait Islands, “has been wanting”.
“The main reason for the failure of the applicant’s primary case was not that
they were unable to prove the main factual elements of their case against the
Commonwealth,” Wigney said.
“Indeed, as I have already explained, I have accepted many of the key factual
allegations upon which the applicant’s case was based.”
Justice Wigney said the law prevented him from ruling in the applicant’s
favour, saying the law currently “provides no real or effective legal avenue
through which individuals and communities like those in the Torres Strait
Islands can claim damages or other relief” for harms from climate change that
were the result of government policy."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
