As the world celebrates the 50th anniversary of first Earth Day in 1970, here’s a look at what things looked like then and now.
Environmental Law Alert Blog
Through our Environmental Law Alert blog, West Coast keeps you up to date on the latest developments and issues in environmental law. This includes:
- proposed changes to the law that will weaken, or strengthen, environmental protection;
- stories and situations where existing environmental laws are failing to protect the environment; and
- emerging legal strategies that could be used to protect our environment.
If you have an environmental story that we should hear about, please e-mail Andrew Gage. We welcome your comments on any of the posts to this blog – but please keep in mind our policies on comments.
More and more Canadians are living in cities, and these days we’re spending a lot more time there. But we don’t have to escape the city to connect with nature.
In 1972, two years after the alarm bell of the first Earth Day, law professor Christopher Stone made the case for legal rights for nature in Should Trees Have Standing?
Despite having one the largest coastal and marine areas in North America, many people will be surprised to hear that British Columbia is one of the very few coastal jurisdictions on the continent that does not have a coastal protection strategy and law.
We are facing a climate emergency and a biodiversity crisis. Canadians are already experiencing floods, fires, ecological disruption and as our planet continues to warm, our collective well-being is deeply under threat.
This week a special subgroup of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) spoke out about the state of the world’s oceans and coasts. The facts are worrying – sea levels are rising, marine species hover on the brink of extinction, and ocean water quality is deteriorating.
H̓aíkḷa: To make things right – An opportunity for change
Efforts to protect BC’s northern coast go back half a century and are not to be taken lightly as the Senate considers killing Bill C-48.
At Confederation, Sir John A. Macdonald famously referred to Canada’s Senate as a chamber of sober second thought. One, he said, that “will never set itself in opposition against the deliberate and understood wishes of the people.”
Sir John A. should be turning in his grave.