Vides piesarnojums

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ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION
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LEGISLATION

• Legislation (or statutory law ") is law which
  has been promulgated (pasludinat) by a
  legislature (likumdeveja vara) or other governing
  body, or the process of making it.
• Another source of law is judge-made law or case
  law.
• Before of legislation becomes the law, it may be
  known as a bill (likumprojekts).
• Legislation can have many purposes to regulate,
  to authorize, to proscribe, to provide funds, as
  well as to sanction, to grant, to declare or to
  restrict.

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LEGISLATION

• Case law (precedentu tiesibas) is the set of
  reported judicial decisions of selected appellate
  courts which make new interpretations of the law
  and, therefore, can be cited as precedents in a
  process known as stare decisis (legal principle
  by which judges are obliged to respect the
  precedents established by prior decisions).
• These interpretations are distinguished from
  statutory law which are the statutes and codes
  enacted (ieviest) by legislative bodies.
• Regulatory law which are regulations established
  by government based on statutes.
• In some states, common law are the generally
  accepted laws carried to the colonies and former
  colonies of England (USA, Australia, etc.).
• Trials (tiesas process) and hearings
  (uzklausišana) which are not selected as courts
  of first impression do not have rulings (tiesas
  lemums) that become case law, therefore, these
  rulings cannot be precedents for future court
  decisions.

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LEGISLATION

• Statutory law (ar likumu noteikts) or statute law
  (parlamenta likumdošanas akts) is written law, as
  opposed to oral or customary (parasts) law, set
  down by a legislature or by a legislator (in the
  case of an absolute monarchy).
• Statutes (parlamenta likumdošanas akts) may
  originate with national, state legislatures or
  local municipalities. Statutes of lower
  jurisdictions are subordinate to the law of
  higher.
• An oral law is a code of conduct in use in a
  given culture, religion or community application,
  by which a body of rules of human behaviour is
  transmitted by oral tradition and effectively
  respected, or the single rule that is orally
  transmitted.

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LEGISLATION

• Legislation is regarded as one of the three main
  functions of government, which are often
  distinguished under the doctrine of the
  separation of powers.
• Those who have the formal power to create
  legislation are known as legislators.
• Judical branch of government will have the formal
  power to interpret legislation.
• The executive branch of government can act only
  within the powers and limits set by the law.

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LEGISLATION

• The Westminster system is a democratic
  parliamentary system of government, modelled
  after the politics of the United Kingdom. This
  term comes from the Palace of Westminster, the
  seat of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
• The system is a series of procedures for
  operating a legislature. It is used in the
  national legislatures and sub national
  legislatures of most Commonwealth and
  ex-Commonwealth nations upon being granted
  responsible government, beginning with the first
  of the Canadian provinces in 1848 and the six
  Australian colonies between 1855 and 1890.
• There are other parliamentary systems whose
  procedures differ considerably from the
  Westminster system.

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• The Houses of Parliament are situated within the
  Palace of Westminster, in London.

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• German Parliament (Reichstag) building in Berlin.
• The dedication Dem Deutschen Volke, meaning For
  the German people, can be seen on the architrave.

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ENVIRONMENTAL LAW
Environmental law means a body of legislative
provisions, regulating the public rules of
conduct in the area of environmental protection.
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ENVIRONMENTAL LAW
Environmental law belongs to public law, which
means that, to protect the environment, the state
prescribes for the public certain requirements
that must be followed.
If a person fails to comply with these
requirements, the state may use coercive
(piespiedu) measures against such a person,
imposing a corresponding penalty or ordering to
eliminate the adverse effects on the environment
resulting from the violation.
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SOURCES OF LAW
Environmental law consists of several types of
legal sources representing the written law
(legislation) and the unwritten law (general
legal principles and customary law).
The sources of environmental law can be divided
into the basic sources or laws and ancillary
(palig-) sources (case law or the rights of
judges and jurisprudence legal science or
jurists law).
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EU Parliament
Parliament building in Brussels
The EU Parliament in Strasbourg
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EU Parliaments parties

  EPP
SD
ALDE
ECR
G-EFA
GUE-NGL
EFD
Non-Inscrits


Socialists Democrats (SD) 185 European
Peoples Party (EPP) 265 European Conservatives
and Reformists (ECR) - 56 Alliance of Liberals
and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) 84 The Greens
European Free Alliance (Greens-EFA) 55 EU Left
Nordic Green Left Alliance (EUL-NGL)
35 European Alliance for Freedom (EAF) 27
(eurosceptics) Non-Inscrits - 29
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National apportionment of Members of the European
Parliament seats (total 736)

•  Germany 99 (13.5)
•  France 72 (9.8)
•  Italy 72 (9.8)
•  United Kingdom 72 (9.8)
•  Spain 50 (6.8)
•  Poland 50 (6.8)
•  Romania 33 (4.5)
•  Netherlands 25 (3.4)
•  Belgium 22 (3.0)
•  Czech Republic 22 (3.0)
•  Greece 22 (3.0)
•  Hungary 22 (3.0)
•  Portugal 22 (3.0)

Sweden 18 (2.4)  Austria 17 (2.3)  Bulgaria 17
(2.3)  Finland 13 (1.8)  Denmark 13
(1.8)  Slovakia 13 (1.8)  Ireland 12
(1.6)  Lithuania 12 (1.6)  Latvia 8
(1.1)  Slovenia 7 (1.0) Cyprus 6 (0.8) 
Estonia 6 (0.8) Luxembourg 6 (0.8)  Malta 5
(0.7)
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BASE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION LEGISLATION
EU legislation including regulations,
directives and decisions is binding to the
European Union Member States.
EU environmental legislation is developed mainly
in the form of directives that the Member States
must then integrate into their national law.
National environmental legal protection is also
based on international legislation. For the most
part, they are international agreements
(conventions, protocols) to which the Member
State is a party.
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THE EUROPEAN UNION ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION
Two core functional treaties, the Treaty on
European Union (originally signed in Maastriht
in 1992) and the Treaty on the Functioning of the
European Union (originally signed in Rome in 1958
as the Treaty establishing the European Economic
Community), lay out how the EU operates, and
there are a number of satellite treaties which
are interconnected with them.
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Treaties of the European Union
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Protocols, annexes and declarations

• There are 37 protocols, 2 annexes and 65
  declarations that are attached to the treaties to
  elaborate details, often in connection with a
  single country, without being in the full legal
  text.
• Protocols
• on the role of National Parliamentsin the EU,
• on the application of the principles of
  subsidiarity and proportionality ,
• on the statute of the Court of Justice of the EU,
  
• on the statute of the European System of Central
  Banks and of the European Central Bank,
• on the statute of the European Investment Bank,
• ...
• Annexes
• Annex I lists agricultural and marine produce
  covered by the Common Agriculture Policy and the
  Common Fisheries Policy.
• Annex II lists the overseas countries and
  territories associated with the EU.

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Acquis communautaire
Acquis communautaire is a French term referring
to the cumulative body of European Community
laws, comprising the ECs objectives, substantive
rules, policies and, in particular, the primary
and secondary legislation and case law all of
which form part of the legal order of the
European Union. This includes all the treaties,
regulations and directives passed by the European
institutions, as well as judgements laid down by
the European Court of Justice. The acquis is
dynamic, constantly developing as the Community
evolves, and fundamental. All Member States are
bound to comply with the acquis
communautaire. The term is most often used in
connection with preparations by candidate
countries to join the Union. They must adopt,
implement and enforce all the acquis to be
allowed to join the EU. As well as changing
national laws, this often means setting up or
changing the necessary administrative or judicial
bodies which oversee the legislation. That part
of the acquis communautaire, which is concerned
with regulation of employment and industrial
relations, constitutes the foundation for
Europeanisation of employment and industrial
relations in the Member States of the EU, and the
basis for a European system of employment and
industrial relations.
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European Court of Justice

• The European Court of Justice (officially the
  Court of Justice), is the highest court in the
  European Union in matters of European Union law.
• The Court of Justice of the European Union is
  tasked with interpreting EU law and ensuring its
  equal application across all EU member states.
• The Court was established in 1952 and is based in
  Luxembourg. It is composed of one judge per
  member state currently 28 although it
  normally hears cases in panels of three, five or
  thirteen judges.
• The court has been led by President.

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BASE OF THE NATIONAL LEGISLATION IN LATVIA
Hierarchy of the legislation in Latvia
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• Saeima - Parliament of the Republic of Latvia

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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AS ACONSTITUTIONAL NORM

• Article 115 of the Constitution of the Republic
  of Latvia stipulates
• The State shall protect the right of everyone to
• live in a benevolent environment by providing
• information on environmental conditions and by
• promoting the preservation and improvement of
• the environment.

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• Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Latvia

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• Riga Town Hall

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AIMS OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION POLICY IN
LATVIA
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LEGISLATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
For the purpose of the law, the environment is
taken to mean an aggregate of natural,
anthropogenic and societal factors. Obviously,
the environment includes not only natural
factors (the natural environment), but also human
beings and their impact on the natural
environment.
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UNDERSTANDING OF THE LAW
The countries that belong to the continental
European civil law system have codified laws,
which are often referred to as codes. In several
countries, there are civil and criminal as well
as environmental law codifications. For
example, Germany, France and Sweden have
environmental codes. Latvian environmental
regulatory standards are included not just in one
but in several laws the Environmental Protection
Law, the Law on Pollution, the Law on the
Conservation of Species and Biotopes, the Law on
Specially Protected Nature Territories, the
Protection Zone Law, the Waste Management Law.
The laws of such countries as the United Kingdom
and United States, in turn, belong to another
group of Western law the English-Saxon common
law system. In this group of laws, the basic
recognised sources of law are both the laws
adopted by the parliament (legislative statutes)
and judicial precedents. Therefore, in these
countries, the so called rights of judges have
significantly greater weight than in continental
Europe.
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UNDERSTANDING OF THE LAW
Human behaviour is governed by different types of
rules from etiquette and morality to legal
provisions. However, only the legal provisions
are contained in the sources of law and are
binding.
Environmental laws are primarily focused on
solving environmental problems and include
measures that should be taken in order to prevent
known environmental problems. Compliance with
the requirements of legal provisions makes
possible to eliminate environmental damage or to
reduce its impact.
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STRATEGICAL CHARACTER OF RIGHTS AND
RESPONSIBILITIES
To prevent human-created environmental problems
successfully, we need to develop a strategy to
change human behaviour, making it more
environment-friendly.
Since law is the most effective regulator of
social behaviour, it is widely applied in order
to change social behaviour patterns in the use of
the environment.
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STRATHEGICAL METHODS FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF LAWS
The desired behaviour can be achieved with two
kinds of methods, working as a pie or a whip.
These measures have to be such that the
disadvantageous consequences of environ mentally
unfriendly actions would inhibit people from
these actions. The whip strategy is most
commonly used in the provisions that impose
penalties or other coercive measures for
non-compliance with environmental protection
requirements.
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IMPLEMENTATION OF LAWS AND REGULATIONS
Unlike it is with other social norms, the
compliance with legal provisions can be enforced
by compulsion. Therefore, only the law has a
specific implementation process the legal
provision.
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LEGAL PROVISION
Legal provision is a mechanism for ensuring
the compliance with legal provisions or their
fulfilment.
The coercion mechanism grants the state (the law
enforcement bodies) the lawful right to apply
coercive measures against the violators or
non-observers of the law. The coercive measures
themselves are established by the law, and they
are quite different.
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CONTROL OF THE COMPLIANCE WITH ENVIRONMENTAL
LEGISLATION
The state has the right to monitor the compliance
with environmental legislation. Such control can
be exercised by state environmental inspectors.
Although the law also provides for criminal
liability for environmental legislation offences,
in practice the environmental regulatory
violations are classified primarily as less
serious violations. The most common punishment
for environmental violation is an administrative
fine, whose amount is usually fixed by the law.
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LAW AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
Although the environmental science and law are
quite different areas, they are at the same time
closely related. Regulation of social relations
in such a way that human activity would not have
any destructive environmental impact is possible
only if both the legislature and general public
have an understanding of the processes in the
environment and their causes.
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LAW AND ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS
Regulating social relations, the law as such is
silent on ethical issues
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CONCEPTIONS OF ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS
Environmental law is based on two main
conceptions of environmental ethics
anthropocentrism and ecocentrism.
Contemporary environmental law is primarily
anthropocentric !
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LEGAL PRINCIPLES OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
Environmental protection principles are guiding
ideas on the basis of which the state develops
its environmental policy.
Compared with legal provisions as sufficiently
clear rules of conduct, the environmental
protection principles are more abstract.
Principles are often considered as an
intermediate stage between environmental policy
and environmental law.
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PRECAUTIONARY PRINCIPLE
The precautionary principle does not allow to
start on an environment-affecting action until
the information has been obtained as to how high
a risk exists and what measures have to be taken
to reduce it. The aim of the precautionary
principle is not to permit certain actions only
when the risk to the environment or human health
is equated to zero, but to assess the magnitude
of the risk and, in case of need, take the
necessary measures.
If the research process reveals a threat, the
precautionary principle calls for precautionary
measures, despite the fact that there is some
uncertainty as to whether the risk is indeed real.
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THE PRINCIPLE OF PREVENTIVE ACTION
The principle of preventive action requires to
prevent pollution or other harmful impacts on the
environment or human health as much as
possible, or, if it is unfeasible, then at least
to prevent further spreading of these harmful
effects and their negative consequences.
The principle of prevention combines two EU
environmental protection principles the
principle of preventive action and the principle
of causation.
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THE ASSESSMENT PRINCIPLE
The assessment principle prescribes if the
consequences of an action or project can
significantly affect the environment or human
health, they must be assessed before such an
action or project is permitted (commenced).
The expected positive result for society as a
whole may be related to the implementation
of economic interests, such as the construction
of roads, dams, pipelines, nuclear power plants.
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THE POLLUTER PAYS PRINCIPLE
The polluter pays principle requires that the
costs of assessment, prevention and mitigation of
pollution as well as the costs of elimination of
its effects are borne by the person whose
activity has caused the pollution in question.
Persons individuals or companies whose
actions have caused harm to the environment,
i.e., such detectable changes in the environment
that are likely to have significant negative
impacts on both human health and also the
environment (e.g., waters, specially protected
areas, species, habitats) are required to restore
the previous state of the environment, covering
the pollution removal and environment restoration
costs.
If the actual polluter does not exist anymore,
and the contaminated site does not have another
owner, the clean-up of the contaminated site has
to be covered from the state budget.
To put the polluter pays principle into effect,
it is important to determine who is the polluter
and for what the polluter must pay.
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• Deepwater Horizon off-shore drilling rig on fire,
  Gulf of Mexico, 2010.

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LEGAL REGULATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
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DEVELOPMENT OF THE APPROACHES
All three approaches are used in the normative
regulation of environmental protection. However,
going back to the beginnings of environmental
laws, it is possible to trace their changes and
developments over time.
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LEGAL REGULATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
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ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION INSTRUMENTS
Binding regulatory requirements are also called
standards. Often they are regarded as the core of
environmental law, because they, as the means of
command and control, directly set forth certain
requirements (standards) for environment-polluting
activities, substances and products, as well as
for the implementation and application of
environmental regulations.
There are several categories of standards
emission standards for the permissible pollution
that can be released from the end-of-pipe of
industrial facilities into the environment the
environmental quality standards for such
environmental components as air, surface and
ground water and soil standards for different
processes, requiring the use or abandonment of
specific technologies, materials or practices.
For example, there are requirements to use the
best available technologies or specific fishing
gear and dragnets with specific mesh sizes in
fishery.
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ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION INSTRUMENTS
Voluntarily made commitments (self-regulation).
Self-regulation is rooted in the idea that
enterprises voluntarily assume additional
commitment for environ mental protection.

• Another forms of self-regulation are
• environmental audit, which is carried out within
  the framework of the environmental management and
  audit system established by law
• eco-labelling, which provide consumers with
  information on the environmental impact of
  products.

In Europe, a transition to a new public
management model took place in the 90s of the
20th century. In accordance with this model,
public management takes over the management style
typical to the private sector, i.e. it is aimed
at economy and effciency.
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ECO-LABELLING
Ecoproduct by Latvia
Scandinavian eco-label
Nordic Swan Scandinavian eco-label by Nordic
Council
European Union official eco-label
Blue Angel German environmental label
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DIALOGUE WITH SOCIETY
Public pressure often expedites the drafting and
adoption of laws.
There are such legal provisions today, whose
implementation is not even possible without
public activities. A vivid example is the Aarhus
Convention on public rights in environmental
matters. Aarhus Convention deals with
environmental protection in close relation with
human rights.
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Aarhus Convention
The Aarhus Convention is particularly
significant, as it not so much prescribes mutual
obligations for the participating countries than
determines the basic principles how to form
relations between the state and the public in the
area of environmental protection, establishing an
internationally recognised standard.
The Aarhus Convention is based on the idea that
if the public is active and well-informed, it can
be a powerful force in sustainable and
environment-friendly development. Therefore, the
members of society are not required to provide
reasons as to why they need any specific
environmental information.
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PUBLIC RIGHT TO HAVE ENVIRONMENTAL INFORMATION
Exercising their rights to participation, members
of the public may express their opinions and
concerns with regard to the proposed plans,
projects or activities.
The institution that takes the decision, in turn,
has an obligation to take into account and
evaluate these opinions and concerns.
Furthermore, if the institution rejected the
peoples protest against the proposed project, it
is obliged to give reasons for such rejection.
If these public rights are violated, everyone,
including non-governmental organisations
(environmental associations), is entitled to
apply to court to protect the infringed public
rights.
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THANK YOU FOR ATTENTION !