The lead applicants in a class action by Torres Strait Islanders have detailed their argument for why the federal government has a duty of care to protect them from the effects of climate change, following a Full Court judgment that shot down the duty of care argument in a class action by Australian teenagers.
Australia ranks second in the world for climate-related lawsuits, and the threat of climate litigation looms larger than ever for Australian companies across all sectors, a new report has found.
The Full Federal Court has overturned a historic judgment that found the federal minister for the environment owed a duty of care to Australians under 18 to protect them from ‘catastrophic’ harm caused by the approval of the Vickery coal mine expansion.
A Tasmanian environmental group is taking the state and federal governments to court over a mining company’s plan to dump toxic waste into Tarkine rainforest in the island’s north west, which the group says could lead to the extinction of the Tasmanian masked owl.
The WA Supreme Court has thrown out challenges to Woodside Energy’s proposals to expand its Scarborough LNG project, finding there were no errors in the state EPA’s approval.
The Morrison government has rejected class action claims that it owes a duty of care to Torres Strait Islanders to protect them against the negative effects of climate change, claiming the alleged duty cannot apply to high level government policy.
Jam Land, the company co-owned by energy minister Angus Taylor, is contesting an order made by the federal Environment Department to restore 28.5 hectares of illegally poisoned native grassland.
A judge has voided contracts between the Morrison government and a subsidiary of Empire Energy for gas exploration in the Beetaloo Basin after finding the decision to enter the agreement in the midst of litigation was “legally unreasonable or capricious”.
Woodside Energy has been sued over its $16.5 billion Scarborough gas field development, with an environmental group alleging the project’s approval was invalid because the government of Western Australia failed to properly account for its impact on climate change.
A judge overseeing a climate change class action against the government will be invited to visit the Torres Strait to see the alleged erosion of sacred sites, but before then the Commonwealth is seeking details on when it allegedly knew of the effects of global warming and the scope of its alleged duty of care.