The European Parliament voted Thursday to amend an EU law to give the public greater ability to challenge any EU member action that negatively affected the environment.

These changes bring the EU closer in line with the measures agreed to in the Aarhus Convention, a 1998 UN agreement protecting the public’s access to justice in environmental law. The proposal follows a 2017 UN report stating the EU was failing to properly enforce the agreement. The revision of EU regulation 1367/2006, the governing legislation on access to environmental justice, was adopted by a large majority (553 for, 62 against) and is primarily seen as having a positive effect on Europe’s access to justice for environmental issues.

The proposal would expand the criteria for launching an administrative review. Under current EU conventions, NGOs can make a request only for acts of “individual scope,” administrative acts that directly affect an individual, and limits the scope of the review to an examination to the extent that the impugned policy contributes to its environmental objectives. These reviews currently do not include any investigation of whether the policies contravene EU environmental law.

The proposal widens the legislation to allow NGOs to request reviews under “general scope;” this means any act that contravenes EU environmental law could fall under review regardless of its policy objective. The proposal mimics the requirements set out in Article 9(3) of the Aarhus Agreement by ensuring the public can challenge legislative acts related to protecting the environment through administrative or judicial procedure.

The changes still need the approval of the individual EU member states, however, and there is a reluctance to adopt the measures due to concerns over a rise in legal challenges regarding the effects of climate change. When asked about concerns over an increase in litigation, EU Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevicius said, “[there] is a genuine risk that the system will be unable to cope and that effective case-handling becomes impossible.”

The EU Parliament recognized there would be challenges in addressing the needs of its citizenry and included in the report a need to increase the efficiency of court proceedings and reduce the cost of entrance. The proposal’s first line reads: “The EU institutions need to engage with members of the public if the European Green Deal is to succeed and deliver lasting change.”