UK's green plan faces legal challenge

An environmental law group in the United Kingdom has launched a formal legal challenge against the British government's plans for a "green recovery" from the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Campaigners claim the plans are inadequate and "clearly unlawful" in light of the UK's obligations to reduce emissions.

Climate campaign group Plan B submitted a "pre-action" letter to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak on Tuesday.

The chancellor has set out 3 billion pounds ($3.8 billion) of "green spending", focusing on improving energy efficiency around the country.

But some other European governments have committed a greater amount in order to help their economies emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic into a less polluting society.

Plan B, along with many environmental groups, has said the government's plans are outweighed by billions of pounds committed to propping up airlines and car manufacturers, and funds for fossil fuels, as part of the recovery.

The pressure group says the government was missing an historic opportunity to avoid catastrophe.

Tim Crosland, the director of Plan B, said: "The government can either follow the scientific and economic advice and take a decisive step towards a cleaner, fairer and more sustainable economy, creating vast number of new jobs－or it can ignore that advice by prioritizing its corporate sponsors and locking us into the path to climate breakdown and a future that is grim beyond words.

"It seems that Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings are set on choosing the second option, but we can't let that happen."

The legal challenge started at the beginning of this month, and Tuesday's letter is the next stage.

Earlier this month, Plan B said: "The proposed approach is quite clearly unlawful… it is no more than a fig leaf for the government's new deal for polluters." It gave the government until July 17 to respond.

The Guardian newspaper reported that the government did not respond to the original letter. At the time, a spokesperson defended the package and said the government "continued to take our environmental responsibilities seriously and remain committed to meeting our climate change and wider environmental targets, including net zero (greenhouse gas emissions) by 2050".

The campaigners say the UK's green recovery plans fail to take account of its obligations under the 2015 Paris Agreement and the UK's own net zero 2050 emissions target.

Lawyers for green campaigners were successful with a legal challenge, in February, against a third runway at Heathrow Airport. They say this sets a precedent that forces ministers to assess the impact of their COVID-19 stimulus plans on the climate crisis.

The government's approval of the Heathrow third runway was deemed unlawful by judges because it failed to take into account the UK's obligations under the Paris Agreement.