Interpreting Environmental Offences: The Need for Certainty

(Paperback)

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This book analyses the interpretation of environmental offences contained in the waste, contaminated land, and habitats protection regimes. It concludes that the current purposive approach to interpretation has produced an unacceptable degree of uncertainty. Such uncertainty threatens compliance with rule of law values, inhibits predictability, and therefore produces a scenario which is unacceptable to the wider legal and business community. The author proposes that a primarily linguistic approach to interpretation of the relevant rules should be adopted. In so doing, the book analyses the appropriate judicial role in an area of high levels of scientific and administrative complexity. The book provides a framework for interpretation of these offences. The key elements that ought to be included in this frameworkthe language of the provision, the harm tackled as drafted, regulatory context, explanatory notes and preamble, and finally, purpose in a broader senseare considered in this book. Through this framework, a solution to the certainty problem is provided.

Reviews

Lees makes a significant contribution to environmental law discourse, which is academically stimulating and has the potential to be practically important. -- Neil Parpworth Principal Lecturer in Law, De Montfort Law School * Environmental Law and Management *

Author Bio

Emma Lees is a University Lecturer in Property and Environmental Law in the Department of Land Economy, University of Cambridge.