Swiss Parliament Rejects ECHR Ruling That Country’s “Weak” Climate Policies Breached Human Rights
The Swiss Parliament has rejected a ‘landmark’ climate ruling from the European Court of Human Rights that claimed the country’s climate policies breached its citizens’ rights by being insufficiently severe. The Guardian has the story.
A panel of Strasbourg judges ruled in April that Switzerland had violated the human rights of older women through weak climate policies that leave them more vulnerable to heatwaves. Activists hailed the judgment as a breakthrough because it leaves all members of the Council of Europe exposed to legal challenges for sluggish efforts to clean up carbon-intensive economies.
But the Swiss Parliament’s lower house voted on Wednesday to disregard the ruling – with 111 votes in favour and 72 against – arguing that the judges had overstepped their bounds and that Switzerland had done enough. The declaration, which has been adopted by the upper house but does not bind the federal Government, accused the court of “inadmissible and disproportionate judicial activism”.
“This is terrible from a rule-of-law perspective,” said Corina Heri, a law researcher at the University of Zürich, adding that “the whole system would fall apart” if lots of states started to pick and choose which rulings they complied with. “The term ‘slippery slope’ is overused, obviously, but it is a dangerous precedent to create.”
The KlimaSeniorinnen – or Swiss female climate elders – are a group of 2,400 women over the age of 65 who took the Swiss Government to court for failing to do its fair share to stop the planet heating [sic] 1.5°C (2.7°F). After years of setbacks in regional and national courts, they escalated the case to Europe’s top human rights court and scored a partial victory.
But in a fiery debate on Wednesday, Swiss politicians attacked the court and mocked the women.
Jean-Luc Addor, from the Right-wing populist Swiss People’s Party, the largest in the federal assembly, said: “These ‘climate elder’ are just a bunch of apparently healthy ‘boomeuses’ [female boomers], who are trying to deny our children the living conditions they have enjoyed all their lives.”
You see, Tories. You can just ignore the European court and the sky doesn’t fall in. After all, it’s often just a bunch of souped-up Leftist activists with law degrees.
Worth reading in full.
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My heating came on this morning. It’s bloody June and I live in Southern England, not the Shetland Islands.
It’s the hottest spell of cold weather in June since 2000 years and 99 out of 100 climate experts agree that it might soon only rain hot soup, if at all.
Nice one 👍
Right now, my feet are like blocks of ice. The irony (stupidity?) of this group of women is that, as far as I am aware, is that all of Switzerland’s electricity generation comes from hydro (60%) and nuclear (40%).
Yep.
We are in the North West but the heating has been on all bloody day.
“This is terrible from a rule-of-law perspective,” said Corina Heri, a law researcher at the University of Zürich, adding that “the whole system would fall apart”
Should have her contract terminated immediately as she’s either completely incompetent or lying for political reasons. Switzerland is a sovereign state which means the only laws applicable to the government of Switzerland are Swiss laws created via the Swiss procedure for creating laws. It would be terrible from a rule-of-law perspective when random, international NGOs (like the ECHR) had a right to override national parliaments at a whim.
The stupid women who sued over their human rights or whatever are far more likely to be winter excess deaths living in Switzerland than summer ones. There is no reasoning with stupid I guess.
The Swiss Court is 100% right to reject the ECHR ruling. The ECHR set a dangerous precedent whereby any and all human activity could be deemed harmful to the planet and if a government does not pass laws to stop those activities they could be accused of “not doing enough” to protect citizens from any and all imagined harm from a “climate crisis” which exists mostly in fanciful un-validated climate models rather than in any observations of the real world.
“The Swiss Court is 100% right to reject the ECHR ruling”
Most definitely. Yet again another egregious example of the judiciary making law for their own ends.
Judges are not in place to make law. Their job is to apply laws already made.
Oh, for some common sense in this country.
Cheers——–Nothing to do with energy and climate that gets done by the Political Class all over the western world (except Trump) can remotely have the tag of common sense attached to it. ——-It is ideological tyranny, where the goals of the UN and WEF are imposed on us all via the traitorous politicians that we all vote for. Since I know that to be the case I will be voting Reform as they are the only party saying they will ditch Net Zero. If they were ever in government the full force of the International Community of planet savers would come down on them like 100 tons of bricks as they did with Trump, but this climate and energy eco socialist scam is my main concern today politically and the Conservatives leave me no choice but to abandon them.
The same can be said of Physicists. And their Laws are made by an even higher authority.
If wou allow all industry to flourish in your country regardless of emissions then pretty soon you wil arrive at cleaner alternatives anyway. The point is that you have to let it breathe. All of this coal and gas and oil was put there so that we would pick it up and exploit it and then move beyond it.
The Swiss are very similar to the Norwegians – a fine people but utterly lacking in any sense of self-confidence. Humility is a fine path but it has its limits. You need to know when to stand up and get knocked in the head. It might be a blow on a level you didn’t expect. The time that we are moving into is one where a lot of people will want you to hold their hand. If they have lost the life impulse then you simply can’t help them. As Jesus said, let the dead bury the dead.
As Brits we just say stick it up your arse. I’m fine with that if fellow Brits think this way, I don’t want to be fighting alongside materuialists and people who have al to to lose. Don’t ask for my assistance and don’t assume your own comnfort.
“You see, Tories. You can just ignore the European court and the sky doesn’t fall in. After all, it’s often just a bunch of souped-up Leftist activists with law degrees.”
Exactly.
A point I have been making here at DS for months.
Common sense at last from some parliamentarians.
There’s an attribution study from 2023 behind this based on (link available in the Guardian article). Estimating the rate of heath deaths in Swiss cantons between 1990 and 2017. Calculating estimated heat-based mortality in 2022 based on observed mortality and the estimated heat death rate. Estimating a hyptothetical mean summer temperature in Switzerland in 2022 based on modelling climate without the estimated effects of antrophogenic warming. Estimating how many estimated death wouldn’t have happened had the hypothetical 2022 scenario been real. Claiming that the difference between these two estimates represents “climate change deaths” in Switzerland in Summer 2022. That’s only the abstract and – believe it or not – I’ve heavily decircumlocuted this. Interesting detail: This attack on the sovereignity of Switzerland was at least partially funded by the EU. In plain (American) English, this could sound like: We invented a bullshit death rate, calculated bullshit deaths based on it, invented a bullshit alternate summer 2022, invented a different bullshit death rate for the alternate bullshit summer to calculate a different number of bullshit deaths and based on the bullshit difference between the two sets of bullshits deaths, we came to the true-as-gold Follow The Science® conclusion that it was… Read more »
We’re certain that fewer people would have died because our spreadsheet says so.
All this tripe from Swiss old lasses scared of a 1.5°C temperature rise must take the biscuit for stupidity. Not surprising that the ECHR team, no doubt well financed by their Davos chums, ruled in their favour.
It has been pointed out very many times how much more dangerous cold is than “heat”. If +1.5°C is a worry, then the old biddies need only climb a hundred metres or so up the nearest mountain (easily found in Switzerland) and they will be back to “normal” temperatures.
Alternatively, for those who prefer to stay at home, why not hire a punkah-wallah? Plenty of good looking immigrants in Switzerland who will doubtless be very happy to assist.
Go Switzerland. We should adopt their parliamentary system and processes in this country. Referendums for all major issues. NOW!
Jean-Luc Addor, from the Right-wing populist Swiss People’s Party, the largest in the federal assembly, said: “These ‘climate elder’ are just a bunch of apparently healthy ‘boomeuses’ [female boomers], who are trying to deny our children the living conditions they have enjoyed all their lives.”
Excellent statement and so true. And these old women live in Switzerland – one of the richest countries (the richest?) in the world. They should be so ashamed of their destructive ignorance.
is it heat waves or hot flushes these women are complaining about?