DS Director Scott Leckie again taught his law school course on Human Rights and Climate Change at Melbourne Law School from 18-22 September 2017. Scott first designed this course in 2009 and has since, besides Melbourne Law School, taught it a range of leading law schools including the Australian National University, Monash Law and Mahidol University in Bangkok. Discussions are currently underway with several other universities which are considering also hosting the course. Laws70452 was honoured to host Barrister Michael Morehead who presented a lecture on the conferral of juristic person status to environmental entities, inspired by the Whanganui River case in New Zealand and other recent cases in India and beyond. The course was also delighted to host Pacific Affairs expert and journalist Nic McClellan who gave another great, but disheartening, talk on climate change and its growing impacts throughout the Pacific. The class was comprised of an extraordinary group of students hailing from every corner of the Planet – Seychelles, Pakistan, Hungary, Australia, Northern Ireland, New Zealand, Philippines, Kuwait, Iran, Zimbabwe and the British Virgin Islands – and all of them were highly engaged and excellent in every respect. Thanks to the University of Melbourne and to everyone who took the course this year – here’s hoping that with this class the message that human rights are being undermined by climate change and that any effective strategy for tackling climate change must place human rights concerns front and centre, will reach ever more decision-maker’s ears in the months and years to come.
