The ACT could become the first Australian jurisdiction to recognise the human right to a healthy environment. Legislation before the legislative assembly would add it to the list of human rights the government has to consider when it makes decisions. Environmentalists hope it becomes a model for a similar approach nationally.
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00:00 Recognised last year by the United Nations, the right to a healthy environment could soon
00:07 be enshrined in the nation's capital.
00:10 This will be really quite powerful right across all agencies of government in how they're
00:16 considering this right in their everyday work.
00:20 The definition of a healthy environment includes a few key elements - clean air, clean water,
00:26 a safe climate, sustainably produced food and healthy ecosystems and biodiversity.
00:32 The bill would add it to the Territory's Human Rights Act, which helps shape other government
00:37 decisions.
00:38 But that could make for a delicate balancing act on some issues.
00:42 No human right is absolute, so rights interact with other rights and they're also subject
00:49 to a public interest test.
00:51 Still, environmental advocates have welcomed the Australian first move.
00:55 I think we would all hope that the human right to a healthy environment is recognised in
00:59 all Australian laws and that's something that we would like to see replicated nationally.
01:05 Anjali Sharma was the teenage litigant who argued the Federal Environment Minister had
01:10 a duty of care to protect young people from climate change.
01:14 I would like to think that if there had been this human right in legislation that the appeal
01:19 against the duty of care would not have been successful.
01:22 Now a university student in Canberra, she's pleased the ACT is leading the way.
01:28 Often with radical policy mechanisms like this we see that jurisdictions and governments
01:33 are scared to step up, scared to be the first one.
01:36 What's still unclear is how the right to a healthy environment will stack up against
01:41 other rights when they inevitably collide.
01:44 It's a question that may yet involve the Territory's Human Rights Commission or even the courts.
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