#071 The Law of the Land

Creating a regenerative system of law, with live panel

Decades of legal protection for the living world haven’t stopped it being progressively destroyed. So what do we need to do, and what’s currently being done, to regenerate the law of the land, and better protect and restore the living world?

Thinking about all this again in recent weeks prompted me to go back to a recording of a live panel event I produced on the topic at Melbourne’s Federation Square back in 2015 (billed Preventing Crimes Against Nature at the time). I was moved all over again by the conversation that night, featuring some of the major system changes at play, and the cultural changes so intertwined with them.

Anthony James, Nicola Rivers, Alessandro Pelizzon, Kate Auty & Michael Leunig. Pic: Chris Grose.

“As a lawyer we stand in court, and we talk about the law, and we articulate cases, and we represent people and things. But we don’t actually think about what those laws are there to achieve. And that conversation is profound, it’s important, but it’s not a conversation that only lawyers should have, or parliamentarians should have. It’s a conversation we should have.”

— Professor Kate Auty

You’ll hear:

Nicola Rivers, now co-CEO of Environmental Justice Australia, described as nature’s lawyers. Nicola came to this event directly from the first national conference of the Panel of Experts on Environmental Law deliberating on the 'next generation' of legislative frameworks for the protection of nature;
Dr Alessandro Pelizzon, now Senior Lecturer in the School of Law and Justice at Southern Cross University. He is one of the founding members of the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature and the Australian Earth Laws Alliance, has contributed to the establishment of the Earth Laws Network at SCU, and supported the drafting of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Geneva;
Professor Kate Auty, brilliant community figurehead, former Victorian and then ACT Commissioner of Sustainability and Environment, and now Chair of the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) Victoria. Kate has come to know Australia like few others over the years, with a wealth of work all over the country, including as a solicitor, barrister and magistrate; and
The one and only Michael Leunig, National Living Treasure, cartoonist, writer, painter, philosopher, poet and esteemed elder of the Understandascope, generating a wellspring of commentary on political, cultural and emotional life spanning more than forty years.

This event was organised a little on the fly, so while we tried to have a First Nations voice directly on this panel, it didn’t happen on this occasion (though my conversation with Tyson Yunkaporta for the previous episode 70 speaks straight into this one in many ways, as does an earlier conversation with Anne Poelina for episode 21).

You’ll hear a series of 10 minute presentations from each speaker (in the sequence above), before our all-in conversation.

Note: Ellen Sandell, MP for the seat of Melbourne where this event was held, sent a brief message in to the event, which is why you’ll hear her referred to in the conversation.

Title slide: Gantheaume Point, near Broome in the Kimberley region of WA (pic: Anthony James).

With thanks to Carly, James and the Understandascope team for co-creating this event, Chris Grose from Scout Films, and the National Sustainable Living Festival.

Get more:

You can hear the rest of our conversation with audience Q&A in an extra to this episode, The Coolamon Trees: Changing law at its core.

The Australian Story documentary on ABC TV featuring Charles Massy, the Haggerty’s and a little of your podcast host.

If you’re an Aussie, take vital action ahead of the federal government’s current bill reaching the Senate shortly.

With the growing movement asserting ‘First Law’, you can support this petition from the Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council in the Kimberley of Western Australia, where Anne Poelina is Chair.

Dr Alessandro Pelizzon.

Australian Panel of Experts on Environmental Law.

Environmental Justice Australia.

David Mowaljarlai and his brilliant book.

The Understandascope, building on the legacy of my old mate and mentor Frank Fisher.