The Commons Environmental Audit Committee has today published its second report into air pollution in the UK.

The committee heard evidence from expert witnesses in June and July, including testimony from King’s College London’s Professor Frank Kelly. This is a follow up to the committee’s first report which was published in March 2010.

In their summary the committee concluded that:

"Over the past year the evidence of the damage caused by air pollution has grown stronger. But the UK is still failing to meet European targets for safe air pollution limits across many parts of the country. The step change called for has not happened."

"The Government has failed to get to grips with this issue. Most of the measures set out in its response to our predecessors' report are yet to be brought in. Forty out of the UK's 43 assessment zones are failing to meet EU targets and poor air quality is now found to be shortening the lives of up to 200,000 people by an average of 2 years. The Government must not continue to put the health of the nation at risk."

"It needs to:

• Prioritise action across central Government by putting improving air quality in the Defra Business Plan, and set up a Cabinet Office lead Ministerial Group to oversee delivery of a new cross government air quality strategy;
• Engage with local authority leaders clearly to set out the risks of failing to act to improve air quality, and join up thinking across local authority departments so they all contribute to solving this problem;
• Establish a national framework of low emissions zones to help local authorities reduce pollution from traffic;
• Ensure that thinking on air quality is central to public health reforms that will transfer public health functions to local authorities;
• Launch a public awareness campaign to drive air quality up the political agenda and inform people about the positive action they could take to reduce emissions and their exposure to these."

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Item date 14/11/2011