Court challenges to major building projects will be limited under plans announced by the prime minister yesterday. In a press release, Downing Street said:
Data shows that over half – 58% – of all decisions on major infrastructure were taken to court, getting in the way of the government’s central mission to grow the economy, and put more money in hardworking people’s pockets.
The government today confirms this will be overhauled, with just one attempt at legal challenge for cynical cases lodged purely to cause delay rather than three.
What effect will this have on the process of judicial review? Would we be losing an important check on the powers of government? Should judges in the High Court block appeals if the law is changed?
These are among the questions addressed by two guests on the latest edition of my podcast, A Lawyer Talks. Nigel Pleming KC and Stephanie David are among the editors of a new book called The Law of Net Zero and Nature Positive, to be launched at 39 Essex Chambers on 18 February. The book — believed to be the first of its kind anywhere in the world — is available from the publishers, London Publishing Partnership, at a remarkably modest price for a legal textbook of some 1,200 pages.
It covers cases that were decided as recently as two months ago. When I dropped in to see the two co-editors yesterday, we discussed the most recent developments in environmental law, including the groundbreaking KlimaSeniorinnen ruling from the European Court of Human Rights that I reported here last April.
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