Protect the Planet supports lawsuit for the future
Together with over 54,000 co-plaintiffs, Greenpeace and Germanwatch have today filed a new constitutional complaint against the Federal Government’s inadequate climate policy. For the first time, all people living in Germany aged 14 and over were able to join the constitutional complaint for a climate-friendly future over a period of around ten weeks. The plaintiffs are calling for a Federal Climate Change Act that is constitutionally compliant and steps to reduce CO2 emissions in transport.
‘The German government is delaying effective and socially just climate protection measures and is thus violating civil liberties and equality rights,‘ says the plaintiffs’ lawyer, Roda Verheyen. ‘In order to safeguard our fundamental rights, emission reductions must be introduced and implemented in good time – the amendment to the Federal Climate Change Act of July 2024 achieves exactly the opposite.’
Protect the Planet supports constitutional complaint
Protect the Planet and the Dorothea-Laura-Janina Sick-Umweltstiftung are supporting Germanwatch’s and Greenpeace’s so-called ‘lawsuit for the future’. Protect the Planet was already involved in 2019 as a supporter of the first constitutional complaint, which ultimately led to the Federal Constitutional Court’s historic Climate Protection Order in 2021. The plaintiffs had successfully argued in Karlsruhe that climate protection is constitutionally required and must not be postponed at the expense of young people.
Despite this climate resolution, the German government is not on track to achieve its binding climate targets. The 2021 complainants, together with 54,584 people, are therefore once again taking legal action against the violation of their fundamental rights. In particular, the Federal Ministry of Transport under Volker Wissing (FDP) is being criticised for failing to meet its climate targets since 2021 and preventing quickly effective measures such as a speed limit. If the German government continues to postpone climate protection measures in the transport sector, there is a threat of severe cuts and even driving bans for combustion engines as early as the 2030s. This is shown by a study published last week by Greenpeace and Germanwatch from the New Climate Institute. People with low incomes, who live in rural areas without public transport connections or who have physical disabilities would be particularly affected.
Two further constitutional complaints filed
This constitutional complaint is one of three complaints submitted by five German environmental organisations together with complainants against the Federal Government’s inadequate climate policy and, in particular, the weakening of the Climate Change Act. In addition to Greenpeace and Germanwatch, Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH) and the Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland (BUND), together with the Solarenergie-Förderverein Deutschland (SFV), are each lodging a complaint.
