Every year on April 22, Earth Day encourages governments, businesses and individuals to protect the environment. In recent years, citizen groups around the world have taken their governments to court over insufficient environmental action. In Switzerland, Montana, Belgium, Ireland and the Netherlands, courts have ordered governments to take greater environmental initiatives to better respect the rights of their populations. Similar lawsuits have also been filed in Quebec and Canada. But what rights are they based on?
In Quebec, every person has the right to live in a healthy environment. This includes the right to have access to clean drinking water and unpolluted air and land. It’s a fundamental human right protected by the most important law of the province: Quebec’s Charter of human rights and freedoms. And across Canada, everyone has the right to life, safety and equality. In the last few years, several groups of Canadian citizens have started class actions against the government and businesses based on these rights.
Right to a healthy environment
In Quebec, many class actions on climate issues accuse businesses and the government of failing to respect the right to a healthy environment. Here are two notable examples.
In a case known as “Dieselgate”, an environmental protection organization introduced a class action against Volkswagen. The car company was accused of violating Quebecers’ right to a healthy environment by selling cars with software designed to cheat nitrogen oxide emissions tests. The case was settled out of court, and Volkswagen agreed to pay $6.7 million to fund environmental projects in Quebec.
In 2018, ENvironnement JEUnesse introduced a class action against the government of Canada. In this case, people aged 35 and under asked the government to make more environmental efforts to respect their right to life, equality and a healthy environment. However, the court decided not to move forward with the case before it ever went to trial.
Right to life, safety and equality
Elsewhere in Canada, two other groups are arguing that governments are failing to protect their right to life, safety and equality in the face of climate change. These groups are also made up of young people, including many indigenous participants. They argue that the governmental inaction on climate change puts their life at risk and affects them more negatively than the rest of the population.
In the Mathur case, a group of young people is challenging an Ontario law that lowered the province’s target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from 37% to 30%. In October 2024, Ontario’s highest court allowed the case to move forward to trial and confirmed that governments must respect human rights, even in their climate decisions. The trial was scheduled to start in December 2025, but the Ontario government removed the contested part of the law just days before trial began. For this reason, the case is currently on hold.
In the La Rose case, another group of young people is suing the government of Canada over its overall approach to climate change. They argue that the government isn’t respecting their rights by supporting fossil fuels and not doing enough to reduce the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. The trial is scheduled to begin in October 2026 and will last eight days. Stay tuned!