The United Nations recently declared that access to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment is a universal human right.
October 17, 2022
The United Nations recently declared that access to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment is a universal human right.
The declaration was the result of a hard-fought global campaign, coming hot on the heels of the UN Human Rights Council’s recognition of the right last year. It’s been a long road to get here, as the right was first recognized 50 years ago in the landmark Stockholm Declaration.
You might hear this news and wonder what it will mean. After all, UN member states don’t have to comply with the resolution. But in fact, it’s better news than it sounds.
When the UN passed a resolution in 2010 recognizing the human right to water, countries around the world set to work changing their constitutions and introducing new programs to improve water management.
So will Australia join the rest of the world and introduce the right?
These resolutions are catalysts
As David Boyd, the UN’s independent expert on human rights and the environment explains: “These resolutions may seem abstract, but they are a catalyst for action, and they empower ordinary people to hold their governments accountable in a way that is very powerful.”
While most countries have already recognized the right to a healthy environment under law, Australia is one of the last 37 holdouts.
Although Australia did vote in favor of the declaration, the government hasn’t yet released an official statement in response or included mention of the right under the new Climate Change Act 2022.
If Australia refuses to implement the right under domestic law, it will become even more of a global outlier.
It will also cast into the international spotlight, yet again, the government’s failure to create a federal human rights act –and leave the government with the awkward task of reporting to the international community on its lack of progress.
Australia’s record on environmental and human rights protection is already the subject of global scrutiny, thanks to the UN human rights committee’s recent finding that Australia failed to protect Torres Strait Islanders against the impacts of climate change and violated their human rights.
