Select Committee endorses retrospective law shielding polluters from climate lawsuit
Today, the Justice Select Committee has today recommended that the Climate Tort Prohibition Bill proceed: legislation that would retrospectively extinguish Smith v Fonterra, the live climate proceeding the Supreme Court unanimously allowed to go to trial in 2024, and bar all New Zealanders from ever holding emitters liable in tort for climate-related harm.
“Today’s report is a further blow to the rule of law in Aotearoa. Parliament is being asked to reach into an ongoing proceeding and hand the defendants a win before full arguments could ever be heard, using a rushed legislative process with no good reason.”
The recommendation from the Select Committee comes just two weeks after the Climate Change Commission's 2026 emissions reduction monitoring report found that New Zealand’s current plans and policies are insufficient and New Zealand must more than double the current pace of decarbonisation to meet its emissions budgets and the 2050 target.
There has been a storm every eight days in New Zealand in the last year. Individuals, communities, councils, farmers and businesses and the New Zealand taxpayer are already paying for climate damage. Our current legislative framework does not determine who will be responsible for remedying this damage, and nor has it been effective in lowering emissions. This Bill removes the only current accountability mechanism, and provides no legislative replacement or alternative.
It also carries risk for New Zealand's trading relationships. Removing the only available avenue for accountability for contribution to climate-related harm, with no legislative alternative, would arguably "weaken or reduce" environmental protection contrary to the commitments in the NZ-EU and NZ-UK free trade agreements. The Government’s approach to climate has already drawn scrutiny from our trading partners, unnecessarily putting New Zealand companies’ access to these markets at risk.