Thousands of lives are being put at risk by the Government’s attempts to water down EU air quality rules instead of prioritising action to cut air pollution on UK roads, the Commons Environmental Audit Committee concludes today.
According to a new report from the Parliament green watchdog, UK Ministers appear to be trying to actively dilute safety standards to avoid EU fines.
And it is in the capital where air pollution is causing the biggest problem. According to EU rules, legal levels are allowed to be exceeded for a maximum of 35 days per year. In London, that quota was reached by April.
30,000 deaths in the UK were linked to air pollution in 2008 – with 4,000 in London alone-that is as many people as were estimated to have died from the great London smog of 1952.
But elsewhere in the UK, the picture is not much better. With the UK divided up into 43 zones for air quality monitoring, 40 out of 43 of the zones breached the annual NO2 safety limit value in 2010.
The UK is currently requesting that the EU delay its need to reach standards on nitrogen dioxide (NO2) until 2015, to avoid heavy fines. But it is not just NO2 that is causing problems; particulates, CO2 emissions and sulphur dioxide also cause health problems.
Chair of the Committee, Joan Walley MP, said: “"It is a national scandal that thousands of people are still dying from air pollution in the UK in 2011 – and the government is taking no responsibility for this.
“It is often the poorest people in our cities who live near the busiest roads and breath in diesel fumes, dangerous chemicals and bits of tyre every day.
“If you have heart disease, asthma or other respiratory illnesses then living near a congested road like this can literally take years off your life.”
In London, the Mayor Boris Johnson is coming under increasing pressure over failings to tackle air pollution in the city. In the video above, the Mayor loses his cool with Green Party mayoral candidate, Jenny Jones as she questions the wisdom of his plans to ‘glue’ air pollution to the road.
