Foodrise is taking the government to the Supreme Court

Environmental sector is uniting to express concern over upcoming Supreme Court judgement which could put environmental justice at risk

In 2023, Foodrise mounted a legal challenge to the government over the environmental impact of the UK-Australia trade deal, which gives Australian meat and dairy producers tariff-free access to the UK market, unfairly undercutting UK farmers who operate to higher environmental and welfare standards.

The High Court granted the case Aarhus costs protection, which sets a £10,000 cap on the costs to pay if we go to court and lose.

But the government successfully appealed the judge’s decision to grant the cost cap on the grounds the legislation being challenged was about tariffs rather than environmental issues – despite Foodrise bringing the case because of climate concerns.

The loss of the cost cap is extremely worrying for the wider environmental sector for two main reasons:

1. Without the financial safety net of the cost cap under the Aarhus convention, there is considerably more risk involved for civil society organisations and individuals to mount legal challenges to protect climate and nature. This could mean that whole categories of cases are effectively exempt from challenge because potential litigants, understandably, feel unable to take the risk of losing with an open-ended financial commitment.
2. The Court of Appeal’s decision to lift the cost cap on this particular case has now narrowed the scope of what classifies as an ‘environmental’ case under the Aarhus Convention going forward. From now on, only cases that challenge legislation that in some way regulates the environment will qualify for this type of environmental costs protection. Therefore, cases such as ours, which is based on a challenge to a law, act or failure to act that will have an impact on the environment will not qualify.

Essentially, legal routes to environmental justice are now at risk. 

For this reason, we are challenging the Court of Appeal’s decision at the Supreme Court on 11 June.  

We have taken this important step because accessing the legal system is a critical component of our work and the work of others on behalf of the needs and rights of wider society and nature.    

Ahead of the hearing, we’re issuing a public statement to highlight the significance of this issue and unite with organisations across environmental, climate and food sectors who share our concern. 

View the statement here 

If your community group or organisation is working for a better, greener UK, please join Foodrise and allies including by adding your name to the statement or contacting hello@foodrise.org.uk.

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Timeline of events

May 2023: Foodrise mounted a legal challenge against the UK government over inadequate assessment of the environmental impacts of the UK-Australia Free Trade Agreement, which gives Australian meat and dairy producers significant preferential access to the UK market, unfairly undercutting UK farmers who must operate to higher environmental and welfare standards. Represented by Leigh Day, Foodrise launched a judicial review.    

The key argument is that the government’s Impact Assessment concluded it was not possible to assess the impact of carbon leakage because data on relative carbon emissions associated with cattle meat was too “variable”.  The review is to understand if the government acted lawfully in deciding not to assess the relative carbon intensities of beef produced in the UK and Australia. Also, to test if the Trade Agreement risks the UK’s capacity to deliver on Net Zero targets.  This has important implications for future trade deals. More detail here   

July 2023: Judicial review filed. More detail here   

June 2024: Permission to bring the judicial review challenge with an Aarhus cost cap was granted.   

July 2024: The Conservative government filed an appeal against the judge’s decision to grant costs protection. 

May 2025: The decision was contested at the Court of Appeal by the Labour government (it was previously expected the new government would drop the attempted block). The appeal was won and the cost cap removed from Foodrise for the case. More detail here   

July 2025: Foodrise applied to the Supreme Court over the government’s bid to remove the cost cap in the trade deal challenge. More detail here   

June 11, 2026: Supreme Court date