In From Rights to Wrongs I took aim at the current Labour government’s plans to ride roughshod over the human rights of anyone objecting to national infrastructure projects. I suggested that there is some inconsistency in a government led by a former human rights lawyer being so happy to trample over human rights. There is, however, another aspect to this exercise in hypocrisy.
Last month the BBC website published an article with the title “International law ‘at heart’ of Starmer’s foreign policy, says Hermer”. And while the heading referred to foreign policy, the content of the article very much suggested (as it should) that the government’s respect for international law also extends to how it deals with domestic issues:
He [Hermer] continued: “Is international law important to this government and to this prime minister? Of course it is.
“It’s important in and of itself, but it’s also important because it goes absolutely to the heart of what we’re trying to achieve, which is to make life better for people in this country.
“And so I am absolutely convinced, and I think the government is completely united on this, that actually by ensuring that we are complying with all forms of law – domestic law and international law – we serve the national interest.”
The Aarhus Convention (to which the UK is a signatory) seems to be something to which the UK government only pays lip service when it comes to the environmental impact of its rushed proposals to impose massive renewable energy programmes on communities up and down the country. That Convention, which dates back to June 1998, purports to be a convention on access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in environmental matters.
Article 6 (which deals with public participation in decisions on specific activities) confirms (via its paragraph 1(a)) that it applies to the activities proposed in Annex I. Unfortunately Annex I seems to be massively out of date, given the glaring absence of renewable energy infrastructure projects from the annex. In referring to the enrgy sector, it refers to mineral oil and gas refineries; installations for gasification and liquefaction; thermal power stations; coke ovens; and nuclear power stations (including their dismantling and decommissioning, reprocessing of nuclear fuel etc). It also cpvers production and processing of metals; mineral and chemical industries; waste management and waste-water treatment plants; various industrial plants; transport links including roads, railways, waterways and ports; groundwater extraction etc, including dams; extraction of petroleum and natural gas, including pipelines and storage connected therewith; quarries and opencast mining; agricultural processing and so on.
The absence of renewable energy projects seems to constitute a glaring omission. Is this because in 1998 large-scale renewable energy projects were barely a glint in the eye of legislators? Is it because they were always intended to have a free pass (as I fear may be the case with the Scottish Ecocide Bill)?
Fortunately, a couple of paragraphs within the Annex suggest that renewable energy developments should perhaps be caught by the Treaty nevertheless. Paragraph 17 of the Annex covers “Construction of overhead electrical power lines with a voltage of 220 kV or more and a length of more than 15 km.” And paragraph 20 covers “Any activity not covered by paragraphs 1-19 above where public participation is provided for under an environmental impact assessment procedure in accordance with national legislation.”
Having come to power only in July 2024, Sir Keir Starmer’s government can’t really be blamed for the fact that last year the Compliance Committee to the Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (Aarhus Convention) its “First progress review of the implementation of decision VII/8s on compliance by United Kingdom with its obligations under the Convention” in terms which were less than satisfactory. However, the final paragraph of that review required action, and it insisted on it by 1st October 2024:
The Committee reminds the Party concerned that all measures necessary to implement decision VII/8s must be completed by, and reported upon, by no later than 1 October 2024, as that will be the final opportunity for the Party concerned to demonstrate to the Committee that it has fully met the requirements of decision VII/8s.
That date has been and gone almost ten months ago. Given the UK government’s apparent determination to comply with all forms of law, including international law, one might have expected to discover what its proposals are to correct the UK’s shortcomings with regard to compliance with the Aarhus Convention. Yet, so far as I have been able to ascertain, the best it has managed is a Call for Evidence which ran from 30th September 2024 to 9th December 2024:
The UK is one of 47 Parties to the Aarhus Convention, an international treaty under the auspices of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe. The Convention sets out obligations on Parties to make provisions for the public to access environmental information, to participate in environmental decision-making and to access justice when challenging environmental decisions. One of the Convention’s core aims is to ensure access to justice in environmental matters. The Convention’s monitoring body, the Aarhus Convention’s Compliance Committee, has found the UK to be non-compliant with the Convention and has made several recommendations about matters on which the UK must take action to bring its policies into compliance with the Convention.
The government is committed to ensuring that the UK upholds its international law obligations under the Aarhus Convention. In publishing this call for evidence, the Government aims to gather views on the Compliance Committee’s recommendations regarding access to justice to determine the best way to reach compliance. The government is seeking views on whether the recommendations should be implemented in England and Wales in light of the potential implications, or whether there are suitable alternatives which could better deliver the desired effect of bringing the UK into compliance.
As is the way of these things, the Call for Evidence document runs to 42 pages. I have been unable to discover the outcome of this process. So much for the claim that “The government is committed to ensuring that the UK upholds its international law obligations under the Aarhus Convention.”
Meanwhile, the same lack of urgency appears to apply north of the border at Holyrood (where the Scottish government has responsibility for ensuring compliance). The Equalities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee held a session on 12th November 2024 as to what should be done to ensure compliance. It concluded that “The Committee will consider the evidence it has heard at today’s session in private and agree on next steps.” Since then the issue appears to have been kicked into the long grass, with silence prevailing.
It’s all a bit of a mystery. A Scottish government that wishes to get back into the EU fold, happily ignoring a Treaty that is very dear to the European Commission. A UK government that claims to be committed to complying with all forms of law quietly ignoring a finding of breach of an international treaty, a finding that is almost a year old. One might almost think that the interests of renewable energy companies are more important than compliance with international law. The “green blob”, it appears, trumps the public’s legal rights.
Climate Scepticism 
In fairness to the current Labour government, compliance with the Aarhus Convention is an issue that has long been ignored:
“Argyll grandmother takes UK and EU to the United Nations over plans to turn Scotland into windfarm ‘hedgehog'”
https://aarhusclearinghouse.unece.org/news/argyll-grandmother-takes-uk-and-eu-to-united-nations-over-plans-to-turn-scotland-into-windfarm
A community councillor from Argyll is mounting a landmark legal challenge against the UK and the EU at the United Nations in Geneva this week over their renewables policies, on the grounds that the public is being denied the truth about the alleged benefits, and the adverse impact, of wind power.
Christine Metcalfe, who represents Avich and Kilchrenan Community Council, claims that the UK Government and the EU have breached a fundamental tenet of citizens’ rights under the UN’s Åarhus Convention, and she will appear before the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe to explain why....
Sadly it made no difference. Scotland has been turned into a windfarm hedgehog.
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Important update. In the article I said I was unaware that the UK Government had done anything further with regard to complying with the Aarhus Convention, following the closure of its Call for Evidence on 9th December last year. It turns out that I was wrong – on 29th May 2025 it sent a letter to the Legal Officer and Secretary to the Aarhus Convention Compliance Committee:
https://unece.org/sites/default/files/2025-05/frPartyVII.8s_29.05.2025_update_Redacted.pdf
Following the adoption of Decision VII/8s at the Aarhus Convention Meeting of the Parties in
September 2021, which highlighted the UK was non-compliant with elements of the Aarhus
Convention of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe; I am writing to confirm the
steps the UK is taking to ensure compliance in relation to our access to justice obligations under
the Convention in England and Wales.
For ease, I have attached a paper which provides a summary of these steps. Should you require
any additional information please do not hesitate to write.
This Government is committed to ensuring access to environmental justice and addressing the
UK’s non-compliance. Upholding the rule of law underpins the UK’s foreign policy and adhering to
international legal obligations is crucial for creating stability and fostering economic growth
globally. That is why I would like to take the opportunity to reaffirm the UK’s commitment to
adhering to our international obligations, including those under the Aarhus Convention.…
…The ACCC recommendations considered here fall into four categories: (i) extending the scope of
the ECPR; (ii) providing additional clarity for parties regarding how much they will be liable to pay
in adverse costs if they lose; (iii) amending how the ECPR currently operates; and (iv) amending
the time limit for judicial reviews of planning decisions. Most of the recommendations made by the
ACCC for the UK to give effect to the decision of the Meeting of the Parties focus on ensuring that
the allocation of costs is fair, equitable and not prohibitively expensive...
The Call for Evidence received 27 substantive responses from “across the environmental and public sector bodies.” That’s not a lot, so it’s difficult to see why it took almost 6 months for the government to proceed to write a letter. Of course, writing a letter isn’t the same as taking action. So far as that is concerned:
To effectively address the decision of the Meeting of the Parties, most of the actions we are taking
will involve changing the ECPR [Environmental Costs Protection Regime]. To do so, we are engaging with the Civil Procedure Rules Committee (CPRC) on our proposed changes. Our objective is to ensure that parties have certainty regarding their adverse costs liability at the outset of proceedings. This is both in terms of the way the current costs protection framework is implemented, and also the broader scope of the ECPR.
No rush. Take your time.
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This was twelve years ago. Sadly the headline proved to be inaccurate (or at least, wasn’t borne out by subsequent events):
“Exclusive: UN ruling puts future of UK wind farms in jeopardy
Tribunal warns that the Government acted illegally by denying public participation”
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/exclusive-un-ruling-puts-future-of-uk-wind-farms-in-jeopardy-8786831.html
Plans for future wind farms in Britain could be in jeopardy after a United Nations legal tribunal ruled that the UK Government acted illegally by denying the public decision-making powers over their approval and the “necessary information” over their benefits or adverse effects.
The new ruling, agreed by a United Nations committee in Geneva, calls into question the legal validity of any further planning consent for all future wind-farm developments based on current policy, both onshore and offshore.
The United Nations Economic Commission Europe has declared that the UK flouted Article 7 of the Aarhus Convention, which requires full and effective public participation on all environmental issues and demands that citizens are given the right to participate in the process.
The UNECE committee has also recommended that the UK must in the future submit all plans and programmes similar in nature to the National Renewable Energy Action Plan to public participation, as required by Article 7….
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Hi Mark, I supported Christine Metcalfe and her sadly-deceased colleague Susan Crossthwaite in their fight of 15 years ago to invoke the Aarhus Convention against never-justified wind farms. The establishment simply steam-rollered their way ahead. Hopefully the establishment will soon get their comeuppance when they belatedly realise that wind power is fundamentally incompatible with the way the national grid was designed to operate. Hopefully most of these early wind farms will never be replaced when they fall to bits.
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Doug Brodie,
Thanks for that. It really is quite depressing, isn’t it? All those years ago, much talk then that the Convention would prevent renewable energy from taking off – fat chance. The Convention has been quietly ignored by the powers-that-be. And while I have taken a pop at the current Labour government, since their hypocrisy is particularly egregious, the fact is that all politicians are tarred with the same brush – Tony Blair and Gordon Brown’s Labour governments, the Tory/Lib Dem coalition, and latterly the Tories alone. All have ignored the Aarhus Convention.
Why do politicians sign up to international treaties if they have no intention of abiding by them? Is it virtue-signalling? A desire to strut about on the world stage? Stupidity?
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There are a few articles against which I could have placed what follows. e.g.:
https://cliscep.com/2021/06/08/__trashed-2/
https://cliscep.com/2022/11/18/gimme-gimme-gimme/
https://cliscep.com/2023/12/08/the-sins-of-the-fathers/
However, I am putting it here, because this is about our Labour government’s supposed commitment to international law. I await their response when the first country tries to sue the UK by relying on this judgment, based either on our historic emissions, our oil and gas industry (what’s left of it) or generally:
“Top UN court says countries can sue each other over climate change”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce379k4v3pwo
A landmark decision by a top UN court has cleared the way for countries to sue each other over climate change, including over historic emissions of planet-warming gases.
But the judge at the International Court of Justice in the Hague, Netherlands on Wednesday said that untangling who caused which part of climate change could be difficult….
A few choice quotes from the BBC article:
…developed countries, including the UK, argued that existing climate agreements, including the landmark UN Paris deal of 2015, are sufficient and no further legal obligations should be imposed.
On Wednesday the court rejected that argument
Judge Iwasawa Yuji also said that if countries do not develop the most ambitious possible plans to tackle climate change this would constitute a breach of their promises in the Paris Agreement.
He added that broader international law applies, which means that countries which are not signed up to the Paris Agreement – or want to leave, like the US – are still required to protect the environment, including the climate system.
The court’s opinion is advisory, but previous ICJ decisions have been implemented by governments, including when the UK agreed to hand back the Chagos Islands to Mauritius last year…..
...It is not clear how much an individual country could have to pay in damages if any claim was successful.
But previous analysis published in Nature, estimated that between 2000 and 2019 there were $2.8 trillion losses from climate change – or $16 million per hour.…
…As well as compensation, the court also ruled that governments were responsible for the climate impact of companies operating in their countries.
It said specifically that subsidising the fossil fuel industry or approving new oil and gas licenses could be in breach of a country’s obligations.
Developing countries are already exploring bringing new cases seeking compensation for historic contributions to climate change against richer, high emitting nations citing the ICJ opinion, according to lawyers the BBC spoke to.
If a country wants to bring a case back to the ICJ to make a ruling on compensation then it can only do so against countries which have agreed to its jurisdiction, which includes the likes of the UK, but not US or China….
Whither now, Starmer, Hermer and MIliband?
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Thank god we have a few ex lawyer’s in the room, only bit that stood out/makes sense –
“If a country wants to bring a case back to the ICJ to make a ruling on compensation then it can only do so against countries which have agreed to its jurisdiction, which includes the likes of the UK, but not US or China“
Soft touch UK with Lammy maybe?
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The ICJ decision is the natural result of decades over which Western governments have become increasingly weak and more and more ashamed about their countries’ pasts. Well, if you constantly tell everyone that the world is going to end, and that you help cause it all, small wonder that fingers begin to point at you demanding recompense.
It’s sad to think that, given different circumstances, our leaders could have been shouting the virtues of the Industrial Revolution from the rooftops, and helping other countries become wealthy, rather than crawling around on their knees and begging for forgiveness for daring to live in a developed democracy. By repudiating the “primitive” forebears who brought them the wealth they are now squandering, they are now in a trap of their own making, and there is no self-consistent escape that does not involve impoverishing their citizens to pay for fantasy damages to island paradises on the other side of the world.
I think it’s so serious that this judgement deserves an article of its own.
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Jit,
I agree that the ICJ judgment deserves its own article. I would like to write it, but am short of time at the moment. Feel free to go for it, but perhaps you could let me know privately if you are doing so. Thanks.
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An interesting aspect of historical emissions which gets little attention is their attribution/allocation. I have no details but it seems likely that a substantial, if not majority, portion of our past emissions arose from our then-role as the “Workshop of the World”.
An alternative approach would be to distribute historic emissions according to the consumption/use of the goods produced. The UK’s “share” would be relatively small, I suspect!
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And so it starts (or perhaps I should say continues, but with the pressure being ramped up):
“Caribbean leaders hail ICJ climate ruling as ‘historic’ win for small island states
PM of St Vincent and the Grenadines says ruling will strengthen the Caribbean’s negotiating power when it comes to climate change reparations”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/25/caribbean-leaders-hail-icj-climate-ruling-as-historic-win-for-small-island-states
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“UN probes Scots judge-led body’s ‘breach’ of international law”
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/25342776.un-probes-scots-judges-led-bodys-breach-international-law/
A United Nations committee has begun a probe into a complaint that a publicly-funded judge-led body is at the centre of an alleged breach in the law that protects the nation’s precious landscape, environment and wildlife.
The development has come after the Environmental Rights Centre for Scotland (ERCS) submitted a complaint over the nation’s key civil courts body headed by the most senior judge in Scotland, Lord Pentland, over breaching a right to a public consultation before crucial decision making over unaffordable court costs in Scotland which are considered to be in breach of international law….
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All being well, the full Herald article can be accessed here:
https://archive.ph/CAJ6a
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Slightly O/T, but vaguely relevant. Sadly, behind a paywall, but the headline gives the gist:
“Palestine pledge could break the law, top lawyers warn Starmer
A letter, signed by 40 peers, explains that the recognition of the territory could break the terms laid out for statehood in the Montevideo Convention”
The Independent also has the story, where it can be read:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/keir-starmer-palestine-hamas-house-of-lords-israel-b2799216.html
Some 38 members of the House of Lords, including some of the UK’s most eminent lawyers, have written to Attorney General Lord Hermer about the Prime Minister’s announcement.
As first reported by the Times newspaper, the peers warned that Sir Keir’s pledge to recognise Palestine may breach international law as the territory may not meet the criteria for statehood under the Montevideo Convention, a treaty signed in 1933….
...In their letter to Lord Hermer, the peers said Palestine “does not meet the international law criteria for recognition of a state, namely, defined territory, a permanent population, an effective government and the capacity to enter into relations with other states”.
There is no certainty over the borders of Palestine they said, and no single government, as Hamas and Fatah are enemies….
It’s also relevant to Robin’s comment on another thread:
https://cliscep.com/2025/06/24/the-case-against-net-zero-an-eleventh-update/#comment-161515
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“Starmer asks Conservative peer to write planning bill to block judicial reviews
Exclusive: One option could be to leave treaty that allows legal claims against projects such as Heathrow expansion”
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/sep/27/starmer-asks-conservative-peer-write-planning-bill-block-judicial-reviews
Keir Starmer has tasked a Conservative peer with writing a new planning bill to remove the ability for environmental groups to delay projects such as Heathrow’s third runway with judicial reviews.
The Guardian understands that leaving the Aarhus convention is being discussed as an option. This is an international treaty signed up to by the EU and other countries in Europe, which protects the right for campaigners to bring legal claims against large infrastructure projects such as waste plants, nuclear power stations and motorways.
Doing this would “destabilise Britain’s constitution” and silence legitimate objections, leading planning lawyers have warned….
…Charles Banner KC has been asked by the prime minister to find a way to remove the cap on costs for groups bringing a judicial review. He has previously worked on human rights cases with Starmer, and is considered an expert on judicial reviews. He has worked on cases involving Heathrow and Stansted airports, as well as Thames Water’s Abingdon reservoir.
The Aarhus convention, signed in 1998, enshrines the right for citizens to challenge environmental decisions and defend their right to a healthy environment, including by capping the legal costs a losing claimant can be forced to pay. Individual claimants only have to pay £5,000, while groups such as Friends of the Earth have to pay £10,000.
Lord Banner, who was made a peer by the then prime minister, Rishi Sunak, last year, has said it would be impossible to remove these cost caps without leaving Aarhus. He wrote in a review that: “For so long as the UK remains a member of the Aarhus convention, there is no case for amending the rules in relation to cost caps in order to reduce the number of challenges to nationally significant infrastructure projects.” The provisions ministers want to include in the bill would make leaving Aarhus a requirement, as they would contravene the convention….
…A government spokesperson said: “We are legislating in the planning and infrastructure bill to prevent meritless claims against nationally significant infrastructure projects from being dragged through numerous appeals in the court, ensuring there can only be one attempt at legal challenge if the court considers a case to be totally without merit. We are also working with the judiciary to ensure challenges against these major infrastructure projects are dealt with more quickly and efficiently, and will keep the process under review.”
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