Maintaining SuperNatural BC for Our Children - CoalWatch Comox ...

cycles, structures, functions and its processes in evolution.Every person, people, community or nationality, will be able todemand the recognitions of rights for nature before the publicorganisms.The Ecuadorian model is consistent with the Indigenous law of many BC FirstNations.More limited rights exist in other Canadian jurisdictions. The NorthwestTerritories protects residents from the release of harmful contaminants. Inthe Yukon, private citizens are empowered to take on the role of the AttorneyGeneral and prosecute environmental offences. Ontario citizens enjoy anEnvironmental Bill of Rights, enshrining every resident’s right to a healthyenvironment. Included in the bill are rights to access information, publicparticipatory rights in ministerial decision making, and opportunities to accessjustice in cases of environmental harm.Legislated environmental rights could take the form of an EnvironmentalBill of Rights like that of Ontario. Such legislation might help counterbalancethe law’s current tilt in favour of private property rights. Such a law shouldprioritize the principles of transparency, access to information, accountability,public participation in decision making and adequate enforcement.Government should consider legislation that would:• Include freestanding environmental right provisions that require theprotection, conservation and restoration of the environment for the benefitof future generations. The rights must be enforceable to be effective;• Impose a duty on the government to hold the environment in trust for thepublic;• Legislate public participatory rights in ministerial decision making wheredecisions have potential effects on the environment, including the right toinformation, participation in decisions and access to the courts;• Empower individuals to bring their own proceedings against polluters;• Establish an environmental tribunal to hear public complaints;• Establish a Commissioner of the Environment to oversee the facilitation ofenvironmental rights into existing ministries;• Include whistleblower and anti-SLAPP protection provisions to preventreprisal for conscientious citizens; and• Reflect established environmental principles such as the precautionaryprinciple, intergenerational equity and the polluter pay principle.Environmental rights like these can be powerful. In countries from Argentinaand Costa Rica to Finland and France, environmental rights have resultedin improved air quality, safer drinking water, the clean up and restorationof contaminated sites, the rejection of ecologically destructive developmentproposals and enhanced protection for species ranging from scarlet macaws tosea turtles.British Columbia must act now to conserve the integrity of our environmentMaintaining SuperNatural BC: Selected Law Reform Proposals 135