Duty of Care targets children and future generations
Ninety-two candidates in Victoria’s 28 November 2026 state election have signed a Duty of Care pledge focused on children and future generations.
According to the group behind the pledge, signatories have committed to legislate a Duty of Care that would hold the next Victorian government to account for climate harm to children and future generations. Those listed include Greens MPs Ellen Sandell and Gabrielle de Vietri, Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell, and independent candidates Sophie Torney in Kew and Dr Lachlan McKeeman in Benambra.
The pledge comes months after fires in early January 2026 burnt more than 400,000 hectares across Victoria and destroyed or significantly damaged at least 300 homes. The Insurance Council of Australia declared the fires a catastrophe, with more than 2,600 claims lodged.
What signatories have pledged
The group said candidates who sign the Duty of Care pledge back legislation to hold the next government to account for decisions that will shape the world young people inherit, and to treat the wellbeing of children as a paramount responsibility in decision-making across government.
Anjali Sharma, lead applicant in the 2021 Federal Court case that found the Environment Minister owed Australian children a duty of care, said: “The court that overturned our win in 2022 did not dispute the danger. It said protecting us was a matter for politicians. These candidates have put their names to doing that job.”
On 27 May 2021, the Federal Court found the Environment Minister owed Australian children a duty of care in Sharma v Minister for the Environment [2021] FCA 560. That ruling was overturned by the Full Federal Court on 15 March 2022 in Minister for the Environment v Sharma [2022] FCAFC 35.
McKeeman, a Wodonga GP, Wooragee CFA volunteer and independent candidate for Benambra, said: “I’m a GP and a father of three, and I was on the fireground here in January. Smoke, heat and the stress of a disaster land hardest on kids. They breathe more air for their size, they can’t leave, and they carry it for years. Children are the ones who live longest with the decisions governments make today, and they have no say in them. A Duty of Care means the next government has to ask what a decision does to a child before it makes it.”
Purcell, the Animal Justice Party MP for Northern Victoria, said young people would be the ones who suffer from the consequences of continued political inaction, and that legislating a Duty of Care was one way to hold governments to account.
The pledge is open to any candidate standing on 28 November 2026, with the list of signatories published at climatedutyofcare.org.au/pollies-pledge.
