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Legal cases are mounting as climate change devastation is
felt in places like the NSW south coast.
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She was again forced to evacuate by last year's catastrophic Black Summer fires that tore through her beloved Tathra, on the NSW south coast.
In the aftermath, Harris looked on in dismay as a cavalcade of "car after car, after car" hit town.
"I just assumed it was a major drugs bust," she says. "There were dudes with guns all over the place".
She later found out it was Scott Morrison's security detail, out in force during the prime minister's ill-fated trip to Cobargo.
"Platitudes, that's all we get from him," she says.
"That 2050 target is just an absolute slap in the face to everything that this community has gone through."
The frustration of Harris and others who have witnessed firsthand the devastation of natural disasters made worse by climate change, is naturally palpable.
Because of it, she joined the Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action.
The group recently had a monumental win in the NSW Land and Environment Court, with the help of the Environmental Defenders Office.
It was determined the NSW Environment Protection Authority had a duty to take serious action on greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.
"I was absolutely ecstatic," Harris says.
EDO Legal Strategy Director Elaine Johnson says many people like Harris are turning to the courts for redress as governments and corporations repeatedly fail to take proper action.
The body is fast gaining traction in this space since opening its doors in 1985 to assist those advocating for the environment.
She asserts the recent bushfire survivors' success on behalf of farmers, residents and firefighters was a significant moment.
"It's the first time an Australian court has ordered a government to take meaningful action on climate change," she says.
"What we're seeing around the world and in Australia is an explosion of climate litigation."
The caseload numbers continually grow as people experience in real-time, the impacts of severe bushfires, coastal erosion, loss of land and culture, Johnson says.
The EDO has come a long way since its first climate action case in 1994 on behalf of GreenPeace, challenging the approval of a Hunter Valley power station.
The court held that the law back then did not restrict the building of new power stations.
This week the EDO represented The Environment Centre NT against Federal Resources Minister Keith Pitt, over his granting of public money for gas exploration in the Northern Territory's Betaloo Basin.
While the extraction and consumption of gas from the precinct would equate to a 13 per cent increase on Australia's 2020 greenhouse gas emissions, according to one expert report, the minister made no inquiries into the project's climate change impact.
The Federal Court was told of accusations the contract was expedited to stymie the legal challenge and lock it in before it could be ruled unlawful.
Justice John Griffiths described the outcome as "a very dark day for the Commonwealth," with its lawyers accepting it represented "a departure from model litigant standards".
The first case to challenge government funding of a new gas and fossil fuel project is also a test case for public expenditure on the Morrison government's "gas-led recovery" from the pandemic.
Acting chief executive Rachel Walmsley, who has been with the EDO for more than 18 years, says climate change litigation requires stamina.
"Climate change debate in Australia at the moment is unfortunately 98 per cent about politics instead of 98 per cent about the science and innovative solutions," she says.
In 2008 when she headed off for maternity leave while the emissions trading scheme got underway, she couldn't have envisaged there would still be "squabbling over the details of legislation" in 2021.
In so many countries where there is real climate action and has been for years "the sky doesn't fall down," Walmsley adds.
She blames short-term election cycles thinking and political self-preservation.
But with environmental law lagging and "not fit for purpose," the EDO continues to bring successful cases against fossil fuel projects.
Johnson says a challenge of the Gloucester Valley's Rocky Hill coal mine, on the NSW mid north coast, was a watershed.
The EDO argued that if the state allowed a new greenfield coal mine to be developed in this day and age, the emissions that would arise from the burning of that coal would contribute unacceptably to global emissions.
"It was the first time really that on climate change that evidence and argument broke through, leading to a judgment that stopped that coalmine going ahead," Johnson says.
The seminal decision sits alongside another recent Federal Court ruling the EDO did not have a hand in - that federal Environment Minister Sussan Ley has a duty of care to protect children from future personal injury caused by climate change.
Eight children took action against Ley in 2020, challenging an expansion of NSW's Vickery coal mine project. She is appealing the historic decision.
This week Australia prominently positioned fossil fuel company Santos on its pavilion at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow.
The federal government's "hollow and empty" climate rhetoric was criticised by France and at home following confirmation it would not join some 90 countries in backing a pledge to reduce emissions of methane by 30 per cent by 2030.
As Harris meanwhile rebuilds while living in her fourth rental, she continues to rail against climate inaction and the "mood orientated" language leaders use.
"'Rebuilding', 'we're moving forward', 'you're recovering'. You know what? I was never sick," she says.
Through time Harris has realised her "small and personal" voice is what it's all about.
"It's pretty f***ing personal when your house burns down," she says.
Links
- Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action
- Environmental Defenders Office
- NSW Land and Environment Court
- (AU SMH) ‘Really Big Win’: NSW Environmental Watchdog Ordered To Address Climate Change
- (AU) Energy Giant Loses Bylong Coal Mine Appeal In Win For Anti-Coal Groups
- (AU ABC) 'Another Nail In The Coffin': Indian-Owned Australian Coal Mine Suffers Big Legal Reverse
- (AU ABC) Conservation Council Takes Legal Action Against NSW Government Over Water Sharing Plan
- (AU SMH) As Australia’s Climate Policy Disappoints, Hope Is Found In Court
- (AU ABC) Environment Minister Approves Vickery Coal Mine Extension After Teenagers' Climate Change Legal Challenge
- (AU SMH) ‘Walk Away’: Bylong Coal Mine Appeal Rejected
- Lethal Heating Legal Posts
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