In an era of climate crisis, the Government has chosen to protect the polluters. The question now is not whether this Government serves the people. It is whether our political system, as currently structured, is even capable of doing so.
THE GOVERNMENT'S decision to amend climate laws so that major emitters cannot be sued for the damage caused by their greenhouse gas emissions is more than a legal manoeuvre. It is a declaration of allegiance. And it is not to the public, nor to the land, nor to the future. It is to the corporations whose business model depends on treating the atmosphere as a dumping ground and the public as collateral damage.
What makes this episode so stark is not simply the substance of the decision, but the process behind it. Officials advised the Government not to intervene. A June 2025 briefing was explicit: keep the status quo, let the common law develop, and do not interfere while a landmark Supreme Court case is underway. “We recommend that no action be taken on the reform of the tort of public nuisance at this stage,” officials wrote, warning that premature intervention would distort the legal process and undermine the courts’ ability to clarify the responsibilities of major emitters.
The Government ignored that advice. It did not hesitate, it did not deliberate, and it certainly did not wait for the courts. Instead, it embraced the lobbying papers of Fonterra and Z Energy—two of the country’s largest emitters—who argued that they should be shielded from any attempt to hold them accountable for environmental harm. Their message was clear: let us pollute without consequence. And the Government’s response was just as clear: of course.
This is not policymaking. This is protectionism—corporate protectionism dressed up as legislative reform. It is the state stepping in to ensure that powerful industries remain insulated from the consequences of their own actions, even as the climate crisis accelerates and communities across New Zealand face rising seas, extreme weather, and ecological collapse.
The Supreme Court case that triggered this political panic was historic. For the first time, major emitters were being challenged in court for their contribution to climate change. It was an attempt—modest, overdue, and entirely reasonable—to test whether the law could recognise the harm caused by decades of emissions. The plaintiffs were not asking for the impossible. They were asking for accountability. They were asking whether those who profit from pollution should bear some responsibility for the damage it causes.
The Government’s intervention shuts that door. It tells the courts: you will not be allowed to decide. It tells the public: you will not be allowed to challenge. And it tells corporations: you will not be held to account.
Climate Activist Mike Smith, who took the case to court says: 'The core argument behind my case has always been straightforward. If corporations knowingly contribute to dangerous climate harm, then surely there must be some legal mechanism through which accountability can be tested. This isn’t a radical proposition. Courts exist precisely to examine difficult questions where public harm and private power intersect.'
But we are living in the era of late-stage capitalism. We have a political system so entangled with corporate interests that it no longer even pretends to serve the public good. We have a government that treats democratic institutions—courts, public submissions, official advice—as obstacles to be bypassed when they inconvenience the powerful. And we have a state that responds to climate breakdown not by regulating emissions, but by regulating the public’s ability to seek justice.
Representative democracy, we are told, is designed to ensure that governments act on behalf of the people. But this incident exposes the fiction at the heart of that claim. When officials advise caution, and corporations demand protection, it is not the public whose voice prevails. It is the lobbyists. It is the boardrooms. It is the industries whose profits depend on delaying climate action for as long as possible.
The Government’s decision is not an isolated misstep. It is part of a broader pattern in which climate policy is shaped not by science, not by public interest, and not by the lived reality of communities already facing climate impacts. It is shaped by the demands of industries that fear legal accountability more than they fear ecological collapse. These companies know that the tide is turning globally. Around the world, courts are increasingly willing to recognise climate harm and assign responsibility. Lawsuits are emerging in Europe, the United States, and the Pacific. The legal landscape is shifting, and major emitters are nervous.
In New Zealand, they need not be. The Government has stepped in to protect them before the courts could even speak.
This is not neutrality. It is not balance. It is not “regulatory certainty.” It is the state choosing sides—and choosing the side of those who contribute most to the crisis we all must live through.
The irony is that the Government’s own officials understood the stakes. They recognised that the courts have a crucial role in clarifying the responsibilities of emitters. They understood that intervening mid-case would undermine the integrity of the legal system. Furthermore, they saw the danger in pre-emptively shutting down a pathway to accountability. But their advice was discarded in favour of corporate lobbying.
If representative democracy means anything, it should mean that elected governments act in the interests of the public, not the industries that fund their campaigns or whisper in their ear. But this episode shows how hollow that promise has become. When the interests of the public collide with the interests of powerful corporations, it is the public who are told to wait, to compromise, to accept incrementalism. Corporations, meanwhile, receive immediate legislative protection.
'Over the past six months alone, communities across Aotearoa have been hammered by severe weather events, including flooding, slips, cyclones, and storms of increasing intensity. Cyclone Vaianu caused widespread flooding and destruction across the North Island. Northland communities were cut off by torrential rain and slips. Waikato, Bay of Plenty, Tairawhiti and Hawke’s Bay all experienced severe flooding, prompting state of emergency declarations. Mount Maunganui suffered catastrophic landslides after record rainfall. Wellington and Canterbury communities faced flooding damage to homes and infrastructure. Insurance claims from storms have surged as extreme weather becomes more frequent and more destructive. These incidents are becoming part of the new reality of life in this country.'
And yet, when confronted with a chance to allow the courts to test whether major emitters should bear responsibility for the harm they cause, the Government chose to intervene—not to protect the public, but to protect the polluters.
This is late-stage capitalism: a system in which the state no longer even pretends to be neutral, where the law bends not toward justice but toward power, and where the public is expected to absorb the costs of a crisis created by industries that remain shielded from accountability.
The question now is not whether this Government serves the people. It is whether our political system, as currently structured, is even capable of doing so.
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