Students for Climate Solutions members (from left) Lachlan Craig and Rilke "Ri" Comer, and Sophie Handford from social enterprise group Inspiring Stories. Photo / Inspiring Stories
Students for Climate Solutions members (from left) Lachlan Craig and Rilke "Ri" Comer, and Sophie Handford from social enterprise group Inspiring Stories. Photo / Inspiring Stories
A student group set up to seek solutions to climate change says a failed mission in the High Court has propelled it to dig deeper.
"This is just the beginning," Students for Climate Solutions Incorporated told Open Justice, after the group failed in seeking a judicial review of decisions to grant petroleum exploration permits to Greymouth Gas Turangi Ltd and Riverside Energy Ltd.
"We don't have a choice but to keep fighting, so that's what we're going to do. We refuse to accept that decisions like these, actions that blatantly sell-out our futures, can be allowed," the group said in a joint statement.
The organisation, which included a number of law students, was established specifically to challenge the permits granted by the Minister of Energy and Resources under a section of the Crown Minerals Act.
Its goal was to win and establish a precedent in Aotearoa New Zealand that enshrined climate change at the forefront of decision-making.
"We wanted these permits to be declared illegal and unreasonable; to keep fossil fuels in the ground so that our generation and generations to come can move one step closer to having a habitable planet," the students said.
A student group who challenged a Government decision to issue petroleum exploration permits said they were young people acting out of necessity. Photo / 123RF
The High Court this week declined their application for a review, on the grounds the permits had been granted lawfully.
It pointed out that the challenge related to permits granted for exploration, and not prospecting or mining.
Exploration permits allowed for drilling in a defined area to determine whether it might be commercially viable for petroleum production, whereas prospecting permits were often issued over large regional areas which may contain hydrocarbons.
Prospecting permits could involve the gathering of data, but did not allow drilling. There were no petroleum prospecting permits currently in force in New Zealand, the High Court noted.
The group was now exploring possible next steps.
"This judgment has not closed every door of our challenge and has only shown the urgency we must act under if we are to avoid the worst of the climate crisis," the students said.
The group argued that the decision-maker (the Minister of Energy and Resources) failed to substantively consider the climate change implications of the decision as "mandatory relevant considerations"; that for similar reasons the decision was unreasonable; and that there was a failure to have proper regard to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.
In the decision released on Wednesday, Justice Francis Cooke acknowledged the group's efforts, but the court was satisfied the decisions to issue the permits had been lawfully made, and therefore the application for judicial review was dismissed.
The students said discovering the decisions were legal was upsetting in its own way.
"It's shown us that the law is not made for us, that it does not safeguard our futures, and that it needs to be changed."
Students for Climate Solutions co-founder and law student Rilke "Ri" Comer said a brush with the judicial review process has been a good learning experience. Photo / Supplied
Justice Cooke said the challenge ultimately turned on how two areas of legislative enactment related to one another - that concerning mining under the Crown Minerals Act, and that concerning climate change, principally addressed under the Climate Change Response Act.
He said the significant issues about climate change deserved heightened scrutiny, but in the context of the reasons why the permits were issued, climate change issues were not for the Minister to address.
Justice Cooke said they could be addressed in other ways, including in relation to other statutory powers.
"No one can doubt the importance of climate change issues. They may be the most significant issues of our time.
"The applicant represents those who are greatly concerned that not enough is being done.
"It is significant that they seek to represent those who are part of the next generation," Justice Cooke said.
Students for Climate Change Solutions co-founder, president and chair, Rilke Comer, who was among the law students in the group, told Open Justice the decision was not entirely surprising, yet still disappointing.
She said they were unhappy with the explanation around why the challenge failed, including that it had been argued too generally.
"We knew it would be difficult and the trial itself was quite a difficult experience with lots of ups and downs.
"We're still processing to see where we can go from here but it's important to remember that we're young people doing this out of necessity; bringing cases like this out of necessity for having a liveable planet.
"It feels clichéd every time I say it but it's very much our life's work. This is just the beginning."
Comer said the small group survived on the donations offered by a few, and the legal challenge was helped by pro bono legal representation.
She said it was a valuable learning exercise for all, especially the law students among them.
"Absolutely, we were well positioned to take a case like this, and we were heavily involved in the process of submissions.
"Our counsel worked very closely with us and given the judgment, it's been an interesting lesson around the shapings of the judicial review process in New Zealand," said American-born Comer.
