In-house interview: Gita Parihar, Friends of the Earth

In the fight against climate change, much of the talk is about the practical ways of limiting the effects of global warming on our planet. But from an office building in south London, a small group of lawyers are trying to use their skills to help those affected by humanity’s impact on the planet.

At the UN Climate Change Conference in Paris last November,195 countries signed a landmark agreement to make greater efforts to cut global warming. Although the agreement is not yet binding – it is subject to ratification by those countries who collectively produce more than 55 per cent of greenhouse gases – it was nevertheless a major legal step forward.

Friends of the Earth’s (FOE) head of legal Gita Parihar was one of those who, together with her legal and campaigning colleagues from a coalition of environmental organisations, successfully argued that the Paris Agreement should include the concept of “loss and damage” as a standalone section.

Previously, the issue of how to deal with the impact of climate change on the most-affected countries and communities was included in any discussion as a sub-section. After Paris, it is set to be dealt with as a key issue.

“This is an area where there’s been no formal legal framework, so getting an article that deals with loss and damage written into the Paris Agreement was an important step forward,” says Parihar.

A full-time legal team of two

The success was just one of a series of triumphs for FOE’s small legal team. Parihar is one of two full-time lawyers at the non-governmental organisation (NGO).

She joined FOE almost a decade ago, to back up then-head of legal Phil Michaels.

Michaels had recently launched the Rights & Justice Centre, an initiative that provides free legal advice and support to communities and campaign groups over environmental issues. With a raft of major cases and challenges to the Government also ongoing he needed support – and for Parihar, the job was exactly the sort of thing she had been looking for.

Parihar qualified into the employment and charities group at Bates Wells Braithwaite, but it was while studying for a masters in international law that she began to realise how the law could help in the fight against climate change.

“Climate change was what was really grabbing me as an area that needed attention and legal engagement,” she explains.

She moved to FOE after a stint at Public Interest Lawyers in Birmingham. When Michaels left the NGO in 2010 to set up a solar energy company with his brother, Parihar became head of legal. She was joined in 2012 by Jake White, recruited from an in-house role at the Department of Energy & Climate Change.

Together, Parihar and White have a broad remit – to support communities and challenge the Government in a bid to protect the environment.

A lot of their time is spent engaging with local communities on issues that affect them directly, such as the battle over the extraction of shale gas in the UK.

“Jake leads on UK climate work and he’s spent a lot of time in recent years working on fracking,” says Parihar, describing the team’s work. “It’s a cutting-edge area, the legal framework is unclear. He’s played a leading role to make sure environmental considerations are taken into account.”

Win some, lose some

Not every case and issue taken on by FOE is successful. Last year, the NGO challenged the Government in an application to judicially review its authorisation of the use of emergency pesticides to protect oil seed rape against two pests. FOE argued that the Government did not give proper consideration to the authorisation, against the backdrop of a fight to stop the decline in bee numbers.

FOE lost, with Mrs Justice Patterson ruling that the Government had made appropriate decisions. Nevertheless, Parihar does not regret bringing the case, saying such challenges can help the authorities and interested parties better understand the legal framework in which they are working.

The NGO was more successful in other cases last year. It launched a legal challenge against plans to remove wild beavers from Devon, a case that was won in January 2015 when Natural England issued a licence to reintroduce the animals.

Other recent campaigns on which the legal team have played a key role include a fight against Government proposals to end the feed-in-tariff for solar energy.

Meanwhile, with the referendum over UK membership of the EU fast-approaching, FOE is campaigning to remain in the union.

“I’m proud of the way we manage to cover a wide field and make important strategic interventions”

“What kind of environmental law framework we are going to have after June is a question on everyone’s lips,” says Parihar. She says that, from the legal and environmental standpoint, staying in the EU would be preferable. Until the result of the vote is in, the shape of the future framework remains in doubt.

FOE does much of its work in-house but on occasion outsources cases to firms such as Leigh Day and Bindmans. The spread of counsel it instructs includes 39 Essex Chambers and Monckton, and individuals such as Matrix Chambers’ David Wolfe QC.

“I’m proud of the way we manage to cover quite a wide field and make important strategic interventions,” says Parihar of the scope of her work.

Next-generation eco-lawyers

The support of others is also a major element in FOE’s work. The organisation regularly teams up with like-minded NGOs such as Greenpeace, Liberty and the World Wide Fund for Nature to bring campaigns.

The Rights & Justice Centre and FOE’s legal advice line are supported by individual lawyers who volunteer their time to help the public. For a number of years, FOE has also run a voluntary internship scheme.

That is now being expanded to a paid internship programme in memory of Michaels who died in 2014 aged just 42 after a battle with cancer. FOE is fundraising to support six six-month internships over a period of three years, and is half way to its target.

Parihar believes that funding the internship will widen the pool of potential candidates and make sure that young lawyers from all walks of life can apply, instead of only those who can afford to work for free.

“I’m very much hoping that if people are exposed to the type of work we do and how law can be a tool for positive change at an early stage in their legal careers, this will be a force that sits with them throughout their careers,” she explains.

Certainly, the use of the law to make a positive change to the world is something that has grabbed Parihar.

As the global community buys into concepts such as mitigating climate change damage, the need to develop the next generation of environmental lawyers like the FOE team is crucial.