Climate Activism in the UK

Date:: 9 December 2025, 6:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Venue:: Room 9.04 Fawcett House Building, Clement's Inn, LSE Campus, London, WC2A 2AZ and online

Legal Voices for the Future presents the December 2025 Knowledge Session on The Legal Landscape for Climate Action, hosted in partnership with the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and led by LVF members Carol Yuen, Tanvi Ajmera and Orla Heatley.

Presentation
The session will begin with a brief introduction to the legal frameworks for climate protest, including a summary of recent reforms and developments in case law. Topics of interest include:

the creation of specific new offences for direct-action methods (such as “locking-on”),
so-called “persons unknown” injunctions
the legal significance of offenders’ conscientious motivation,
the right to expression on the streets and in the workplace, and
where climate litigation fits into this wider architecture of activism.

Panel interview
We are delighted to be joined by a diverse panel with expertise spanning the full spectrum of these issues:

Owen Greenhall is a barrister at Garden Court Chambers,
Sarah Finch is an activist and was claimant in a landmark planning-environmental case in the Supreme Court,
David Whyte is a professor at Queen Mary University,
Clive Dolphin is an activist and spokesperson for Defend Our Juries.

The panel discussion will review the range of challenges faced by climate protesters in the UK today, and attempt to chart a way forward for activists. We will hear about the criminalisation of protest and the various means through which citizens are trying to safely express their concern for a warming planet.

Creative content
Each of our monthly knowledge sessions will include a small group discussion of ‘creative content’. This month, we will view a short clip from documentary film “The Line We Crossed“, directed by Liz Smith and featuring Clive Dolphin.

How to join

Join us in person in Room 9.04 in the Fawcett House Building, Clement’s Inn on the LSE campus (a map of the campus can be found here; the Google maps location is “LSE Pankhurst House and Fawcett House“) or

You can also join this event online.

Please register in advance here to join this event in person or online.