News

JUDGMENT

Art 34 • Victim • Locus standi • Separate key criteria set out for establishing victim status of individual applicants and locus standi (representation) of associations in climate-change context • Need for effective protection of Convention rights taking into account special features of this phenomenon without undermining the exclusion of actio popularis from the Convention system • In case-circumstances victim-status criteria not fulfilled by individual applicants • Especially high threshold for fulfilling criteria not met (incompatible ratione personae) • Applicant association fulfilled relevant criteria (locus standi) and thus had standing to act on behalf of its members • Importance of collective action and intergenerational burden-sharing in climate-change context

Art 8 • Positive obligations • Private and family life • Respondent State’s failure to comply with positive obligation to implement sufficient measures to combat climate change • Art 8 applicable • Art 8 encompassing a right for individuals to effective protection by the State authorities from the serious adverse effects of climate change on their lives, health, well-being and quality of life • Need to develop a more appropriate and tailored approach as regards the various Convention issues arising in the climate-change context not addressed by Court’s existing environmental case-law • Importance of intergenerational burden‑sharing • Reduced margin of appreciation as regards State’s commitment combating climate change, its adverse effects and the setting of aims and objectives in this respect • Wide margin of appreciation as to the choice of means designed to achieve those objectives • Contracting State’s primary duty to adopt, and to effectively apply in practice, regulations and measures capable of mitigating the existing and potentially irreversible, future effects of climate change • Enumeration of requirements to which competent authorities need to have due regard • Need for domestic procedural safeguards • Mitigation measures to be supplemented by adaptation measures aimed at alleviating the most serious or imminent consequences of climate-change • Existence of critical lacunae in Swiss authorities’ process of putting in place the relevant domestic regulatory framework • Failure to quantify, through a carbon budget or otherwise, national GHG emission limitations • Failure to act in good time and in an appropriate and consistent manner regarding the devising, development and implementation of the relevant legislative and administrative framework • Wide margin of appreciation exceeded

Art 6 § 1 (civil) • Access to court • Applicability of civil limb concerning the effective implementation of mitigation measures under domestic law • Domestic courts’ failure to engage seriously or at all with applicant association’s action • Lack of convincing reasons for non-examination of merits of complaints • Failure to consider compelling scientific evidence concerning climate change and to examine applicant association’s legal standing • Lack of further legal avenues or safeguards • Very essence of right of access to court impaired • Emphasis on domestic courts’ key role in climate-change litigation and of access to justice in this field

Art 46 • Execution of judgment • General measures • Respondent State to assess specific measures to be taken with the assistance of the Committee of Ministers

Prepared by the Registry. Does not bind the Court.

Abstract

Con la recente sentenza Locascia et alteri c. Italia la Corte europea dei diritti dell’uomo aggiunge un ulteriore tassello alla giurisprudenza che si è interessata dei gravi episodi di inquinamento che si sono verificati negli ultimi decenni soprattutto nell’Italia meridionale. Rispetto ad altri casi precedenti, la Corte ha esaminato e accolto la tesi della violazione dell’art. 8 CEDU (vita privata e familiare) rilevando in tal caso non solo la situazione di degrado ambientale in sé considerata, ma anche la sostanziale assenza di interventi concreti da parte delle autorità locali al fine di contenere gli effetti delle emissioni nocive derivanti dalla mancata raccolta dei rifiuti urbani nelle aree interessate. Tali interventi, infatti, hanno costretto la cittadinanza e le persone a ridurre in modo consistente l’esercizio delle proprie libertà costituzionalmente e internazionalmente garantite. In una condizione di grave esposizione a pericolo per la salute, tali interventi rappresentano un ulteriore elemento che fa emergere la lesione del bene tutelato all’art. 8 CEDU. Alla luce di tali elementi, la Corte ha constatato l’impossibilità da parte sua di attingere al criterio secondo cui la compressione di una libertà tutelata dalla Convenzione può essere valutata alla luce delle esigenze della “società nel suo complesso”, ciò che avrebbe potuto eventualmente consentirle di raggiungere una conclusione differente rispetto a quella contenuta nella sentenza in esame.