Ms O’CONNOR (Hobart) – Mr President, I rise today to speak about an area of evolving legal development, which is the rights of nature. In some ways my interest in this area of earth jurisprudence was sparked over the summer. I had the great privilege of canoeing down the mighty Whanganui River (ok) as part of a group of family and friends. The Maori people call the river Te Awa Tupua(ok). The Whanganui is quite a remarkable place because it is so utterly beautiful. It also has a unique legal framework around it that ensures its protection.
The Whanganui has what is called legal personhood. It is one of three places in New Zealand which now has its own specific set of rights. The Maori people are intrinsic to the recognition and protection of those rights. That too is embedded in the statutes which are now part of the New Zealand legal framework. The Te Urewera (Tbc) Forest is another part of New Zealand which has legal personhood, along with Mount Taranaki(TBC).
The act that protects and provides legal personhood for Te Urewera forest says:
- Te Urewera is a legal entity, and has all the rights, powers, duties, and liabilities of a legal person.
- However –
- the rights, powers, and duties of Te Urewera must be exercised and performed on behalf of, and in the name of, Te Urewera – (TBC)
There has been quite significant development in the area of the rights of nature. New Zealand began this journey in 2014. It was the result of a consultation process with indigenous peoples and the Crown. Bolivia enacted a framework set of laws in 2010 and 2012 to protect the rights of Mother Earth.
However, balancing development and environmental concerns remains problematic in practice, as it will, until we get these legal frameworks right. In 2022, Spain passed Europe’s first rights of nature law, declaring the legal personhood of the Mar Menor Lagoon.
The United States has a long history of trying to enact the rights of nature. In fact, that is where I first read of a river, I think in Colorado, that had been given legal personhood. At the moment, most of that legal development is at a local government level. Rights of nature have been subject to the subject of a number of proposals at the federal and provincial level in Canada, but these have not yet been implemented into law.
Ecuador is the only country that has recognised the rights of nature in its constitution, formally recognised in 2008. Courts since then have been developing jurisprudence, a legal framework, interpreting and implying the provisions. Since 2016, Colombia’s courts have recognised the rights of nature of various ecosystems against a backdrop of tension between the environment and development interests.
There will always be this tension, which is why it is so important that bodies like this go on this reform journey, recognising that nature does have these intrinsic rights, that there is a right to life of all living creatures on Earth, and that when we protect nature, we are protecting life itself, and protecting our own future.
In Australia the pace has been a bit slower. I would certainly love to have a discussion in here about legal personhood, for example, for beautiful kunanyi/Mt Wellington or timtumili minanya, the River Derwent – these significant, life‑giving natural entities that have such a deep spiritual importance to the palawa pakana of Tasmania.
In closing, I thought I would read out some of the clauses from the Universal Declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth. This was signed at the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Earth in April 2010:
(1) Mother Earth is a living being.
(2) Mother Earth is a unique, indivisible, self‑regulating community of interrelated beings that sustains, contains and reproduces all beings.
(3) Each being is defined by its relationships as an integral part of Mother Earth.
(4) The inherent rights of Mother Earth are inalienable in that they arise from the same source as existence.
(5) Mother Earth and all beings are entitled to all the inherent rights recognised in this declaration without distinction of any kind, such as made between organic and inorganic beings, species, origin, use to human beings, or any other status.
In closing, article 3 talks about other obligations as just one species that shares this Earth with all others, yet has such a profound and often very negative impact on nature. Every human being is responsible for protecting and living in harmony with Mother Earth. If governments around the world could adopt that philosophy, the Earth would be a much better place. I look forward to having an ongoing discussion with colleagues about this area of legal reform.
