Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 21 May 2024
163. Deputy Catherine Connolly asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications to detail the legal provisions in place to ensure the State is in compliance with Article 3(8) of the Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters; and if he would make a statement on the issue. [22672/24]
View answerIreland ratified the Aarhus Convention in June 2012. Irish law contains a number of safeguards to implement Article 3(8) of the Aarhus Convention, so that members of the public exercising their rights in conformity with the provisions of the Convention are not penalised, persecuted, or harassed for their involvement in relevant processes.
Section 50B of the Planning and Development Act 2000 as amended, provides that a court may award costs against a party, in proceedings to which that section applies, if the court considers that a claim or counterclaim by the party is frivolous or vexatious, or because of the manner in which the party has conducted the proceedings.
Other legal provisions in place to protect members of the public exercising their rights in conformity with the provisions of the Convention include the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act 1997, the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 and the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission Act, 2014.
Irish courts hold an inherent power to dismiss proceedings which constitute an abuse of process which is exercised with great caution. The concepts that an action may be frivolous or vexatious are inherent in the tort of abuse of process. The courts are willing to strike out proceedings at their own discretion where the claim is bound to fail and/or no cause of action is disclosed.
Further to these safeguards, as an expression of solidarity with environmental defenders and of Ireland’s commitment to protecting their rights, in 2021 we committed, along with Austria, to provide funding of €85,000 per year for four years to support the Rapid Response Mechanism established under the Aarhus Convention to safeguard environmental defenders. This is the first international mechanism to specifically safeguard environmental defenders to be established within a legally binding framework either under the United Nations system or other intergovernmental structure.
