We're taking the government to court
The government’s dangerous plans for aviation won’t do anything to bring down emissions.
We’ve tried everything else, and this is the only option left.
We’ve lodged a judicial review claim against the government because their “Jet Zero” strategy to decarbonise aviation would fail to reduce aviation’s climate impacts in line with the UK’s emissions commitments and would encourage a huge increase in flights.
When the plan was published, it was described as an “abdication of responsibility” that avoided “answering the difficult questions” and relied too heavily on “pie-in-the-sky technologies”. The Climate Change Committee, in their most recent 2022 progress report to Parliament, stated that the government needs to “implement a policy to manage aviation demand as soon as possible”.
If we want to limit emissions from aviation, we need to reduce the number of flights. It’s as simple as that.
This is why we’re taking the government to court
These are the grounds of our claim:
The strategy breaches the Climate Change Act as the Secretary of State failed to ensure that the strategy would enable the UK’s carbon budgets to be met and, as a result, its policies risk failing to deliver net zero.
The Secretary of State failed to give lawful reasons for departing from advice given by the Climate Change Committee that, given uncertainty around technological solutions to aviation emissions, a demand management policy framework is also needed.
The Secretary of State failed to consult, in a lawful manner, on the strategy because it was decided beforehand that demand management measures - moves to cut flight numbers - were not going to be included in the strategy.
There was also a failure to take account of the need to reduce emissions other than CO2 that are produced by flights, which, altogether, cause roughly twice the amount of heating.
We aren’t alone
The government strategy is so dangerous that we aren’t even the only ones taking the government to court.
The Group for Action on Leeds Bradford Airport (GALBA) has also filed a legal challenge against the government’s aviation emissions strategy. They’re bringing additional grounds which relate to how the strategy will feed into the local planning process for regional airports such as Leeds Bradford.
This is because the government’s strategy fails to ensure that total aviation impacts on the climate are considered as part of the planning proposals for regional airport expansion. GALBA is currently crowdfunding to raise £60,000 to fund their legal battle.
What can we do instead?
The good news is that there is a solution. We are calling for the introduction of a progressive tax on frequent flying to fairly reduce demand for flights, rather than taking the dangerous gamble that the industry can cut emissions while allowing continual growth in passenger numbers.
The frequent flyer levy, a policy which is both popular and fair, would manage demand by placing a progressively higher tax on the small group of people who fly frequently, with just 15% of people taking 70% of all UK flights. It is considered the most equitable and easily implementable method of reducing aviation demand.
Are you with us?
Aviation is highly polluting and very difficult to decarbonise, making it really dangerous that the government is encouraging huge growth in flights.
The climate crisis is here now, and the UK is already experiencing record-breaking heatwaves which melted runways this summer. The government refuses to listen to their own advisors on climate, who have repeatedly warned that we need to limit flights. We can’t allow the Department for Transport to crash our climate so that airports and airlines can keep cashing in as our world burns.
We’ll see the government in court. We hope you’ll stand with us to protect the climate.