Climate Change is Not a 'Human Rights' Issue

As has been widely reported this week, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that the Swiss Government failed to respect the human rights of a group of frail, elderly women in the face of the ‘climate emergency’. The decision requires the Swiss Government to implement more radical policies to meet the country’s commitments to the Paris agreement, including increasing the tax on fossil fuels. But the implications of this new precedent affect every state that‘s a signatory of the European Convention on Human Rights, including the U.K. What evidence did the court draw from, and what drove its decisions?

The case was brought by five applicants, the first of which was Verein Klima Seniorinnen Schweiz (VKS) – Senior Women for Climate Protection Switzerland – a Swiss green NGO funded by Greenpeace and other philanthropic foundations. The other four applicants, members of VKS, were senior women whose testimony explains that their age-related medical conditions are exacerbated by heatwaves. One, who had chronic gout and a pacemaker, had twice fainted and had had to “adapt her lifestyle” to cope with hot weather. Another, who suffered from unspecified “cardiovascular health issues” had to stay at home “with the blinds down and the air conditioning turned on”. A third suffered from asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and was made to feel “isolated” during heatwaves. And the fourth, who suffered from asthma, “complained that the heatwaves had the effect of taking away all her energy” – which meant that “she could not face leaving her home and going for a swim”.

No doubt this is a shameful litany of torture at the hands of a cruelly indifferent Swiss Government. But what evidence is there of a ‘human rights’ violation, and how will the ECHR’s judgement improve things for Switzerland’s old ladies?

It is true, according to MeteoSwiss, that urban areas do see more heatwaves than in the past. The small city of Lucerne, for instance, now experiences between 10 and 15 days a year in which temperatures exceed 30 degrees centigrade – a significant increase, when compared to the 1980s and 90s.

But as terrible as that might seem, these warmer summers do not appear to be harbingers of death, according to the country’s mortality statistics. Since 1990, life expectancy for Svizzers has increased from 77.4 years to 84 years. A Swiss woman reaching 80 in 1990 had a 5.3% chance of dying that year, whereas that figure is now almost halved to 2.74% – and she likely has a decade ahead of her. in 1940, a Swiss woman of the same age had a 12.6% chance of dying that year.

Despite climate change, it would seem that Swiss women are living longer lives. But what about healthier lives? It turns out that climate change has not been catastrophic. In 1990, the mortality rate of chronic respiratory diseases was 37.8 per 100,000 people. Today it is 35.8. Cardiovascular diseases claimed 386 lives per 100,000 people in 1990, but 279 today. Lower respiratory infections killed 38.4 per 100,000 in 1990, but just 22.7 today. And so it goes on. If climate change is negatively affecting the lives of old Swiss women, it is not showing in mortality data.

Nonetheless, it is the discomfort of just four women and their fellow campaigners, convened by Greenpeace on behalf of green billionaires, that shall be imposed upon the entire nation of some 8.6 million people. The ECHR has ruled that not feeling able to go to the shops, or for a swim, or to see your friends at midday, is a violation of human rights. Switzerland has failed to “afford them effective protection against the effects of global warming”.

No matter the facts that so many more people are living so much longer, healthier, wealthier and safer lives in Switzerland and beyond, thanks to economic development, ‘despite’ some slightly warmer days. No matter that it is unlikely that even if Swiss CO₂ emissions had already been reduced to zero, these women would still not be any more comfortable. The court heard no substantive criticism of any claim that climate change and human rights are linked. Instead, it heard evidence from, among others, Greenpeace, Oxfam and climate lawfare activists, ClientEarth.

Under Swiss law, non-profit associations – verein – are not required to register or file accounts. And so we are unlikely to ever find out the full story of who turned these Swiss pensioners and their maladies into a puppet show. We know that Greenpeace was one of the extremely well-funded organisations underwriting the stunt. But in turn, organisations with names that might just as well be Mutterschaft und Apfelkuchen conceal the interests of their grantors, who are behind climate lawfare stunts throughout the world.

The countless millions of dollars that are behind that lawfare in nearly every jurisdiction are a concerted effort to circumvent democracy precisely because the cost of litigation excludes the public. There is virtually no organised opposition, yet to the green agenda at national or international levels, and what opposition does exist would have its resources exhausted within days.

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