Court ruling erodes climate activists’ ability to defend themselves – as the planet heats up

The ‘consent’ defence allowed defendants on trial for criminal damage to argue they believed the owner of a targeted property would have consented if they had known of the circumstances. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

It took a matter of minutes in the court of appeal, where demonstrators were strangely absent, for the dial to shift once more on the rights of protest in England and Wales.

The decision taken on Monday by the court of appeal to, in effect, find in favour of the attorney general, the Conservative government’s premier legal officer, has removed a defence for climate protesters that had been available on the statute books since 1971.