London's row over clean air risks derailing green policies elsewhere.
The case for the scheme is strong, but needs making more loudly.
The political backlash to the Mayor of London's flagship clean air policy, due to kick in this August, not only threatens life-saving progress in the capital. It could ultimately shape environmental policies across the rest of the country, and even in other global cities too. Politicians elsewhere are watching to see if the Mayor has overreached or whether he and the environmental movement, who spent the last years pushing for action on toxic air, can now rally sufficient support to deliver.
The next few months will be key, but winning requires a full-throated defence of the plan despite understandable worries about the impact new charges on certain drivers could have, coming on top of the cost of living crisis. The accompanying investment in a million km of extra bus routes, as well as exemptions for vulnerable drivers, seem to be being overlooked. So too that more than 4 out of 5 of the vehicles covered by the ULEZ expansion are already compliant with the scheme and so won't be impacted anyway. Whilst most of the lowest income residents in these boroughs don't own cars anyway, there will also be grants for drivers on Universal Credit as well as sole traders. Funding is also being made available for a dedicated scrappage scheme. This doesn't seem to be widely known either.
Ultimately, the case for the scheme remains strong but needs making more loudly. The impact of the plan on pollution will be immense. For example, the projected volume of NOx emissions to be saved are even more than the existing central London ULEZ, and so are the projected carbon savings. The Mayor of London's record of using ULEZ to date shows the tool works and has already made a big difference. 94.4% of vehicles driving in the area covered by the existing ULEZ now meet clean air standards. As a consequence, research by Imperial College, released last month, found concentrations of the toxic pollutants killing vulnerable Londoners have plummeted by around a quarter.
Perhaps what's most remarkable is that, until now, Sadiq Khan has made this progress with very little controversy, despite using a policy that impacts just under half of London's population. Setting out his logic for expanding ULEZ, the Mayor told The Times, "Four million Londoners are benefiting from cleaner air. Why should we delay the other five million?”
Certainly, the need for more action is clear. Recent research from Imperial College found that toxic air still kills around 4000 Londoners a year with most of these in outer London boroughs, where research by Asthma UK found half of residents with asthma live and where three-quarters of the city's older population lives. Imperial's analysis, like the studies by Asthma UK and the British Lung Foundation, showed expanding the ULEZ could get this number down and even increase the life expectancy of babies born in the city. The CBI says cutting air pollution will also boost business by reducing worker sickness absence or absence due to sick children.
The furore in the capital is seeing more than one leading Conservative commentator calling on Ministers to turn London's Mayoral elections into a referendum on the scheme. There was always going to be a degree of opposition from those seeking to gain a political advantage. Ministers are clearly deliberately withholding investment in clean transport options that would dampen opposition. London has been excluded from the national scrappage schemes for old diesel vehicles, for example. Sustainable transport funds initiated by Johnson are also being cut back by Sunak. But opposition to ULEZ goes beyond political opportunism.
For now, despite high-profile backing for the policy from leading health professionals, critics of the scheme seem to be far more active, visible and vocal than supporters of the clean air plan. It's clear they're picking up momentum when even green-minded politicians like the Lib Dem leader Ed Davey are now calling for a delay to the scheme's introduction even though this would cause thousands more Londoners' health to be put at risk.
Five Conservative local councils are suing the Mayor, presumably hoping to get the introduction of the scheme pushed back so that it falls closer to the time of the London elections. Rather than putting forward their own rival clean air plans, they've reached for the climate denial playbook and begun to cast doubt on the science of air pollution, describing it as a "false health scare."
One Bromley Conservative councillor called the plans, “stasi-fication… a new Berlin wall… socialism in its darkest form.” MP Bob Blackman declared in Parliament that the Mayor was a “dictator.” Activism against the Mayor's decision is fusing with a pretty sinister set of conspiracy theories from the likes of Piers Corbyn and Right Said Fred and even seeing critics content to join forces with racist extremists.
Backlash to clean air policy isn't limited to London, of course. Challenges driven by similarly dubious claims and conspiracy theories are facing local leaders in Sheffield, Oxford, Bristol and Manchester but what happens in the capital will cause the biggest ripples. With months to go until the scheme kicks in, the battle for public opinion over ULEZ could yet go either way. But if it does fail, we can likely forget radical action on toxic air for another generation and who knows what chilling effect it could have over green policies more widely.
Worth noting that, in a report issued today by geolocation firm TomTom, , for an average 10-mile trip across the UK capital, petrol-run vehicles consumes an average of 1.47 litres during these journeys.
Whereas in contrast the figures showed that diesel-run vehicles consumes an average of just 1.27 litres for every 10-mile journey through the city.
This suggests to me that climate change issues are of less importance to the London Mayor than local air quality issues.
Thanks a great summary