THE HIGH Court has ordered the government to explain itself after putting off plans to to tackle illegal levels of air pollution in Scotland and the rest of the UK.
The government was ordered by the court last November to produce an Air Quality Plan to tackle illegal pollution levels across the UK by 4pm on Monday. But on Friday after the court closed, and less than one working day before the judge-imposed deadline, government lawyers applied to defer publication until after the general election.
Government lawyers are expected to attend the hearing which has been listed by the court for Thursday at 10.30am, The court has set aside two and a half hours.
The Government was ordered to publish updated clean air proposals by April 24, after courts ruled existing plans to meet EU-mandated air quality limits, which are being broken across many areas of the country, were not sufficient.
The development comes just two months after it emerged Britain faced multi-million pound fines if it does not heed a final warning by the European Commission over its failure to address harmful levels of toxic air in the UK, with Scotland amongst the worst offenders in the country.
The new plans that meet the legal requirement to cut illegal levels of nitrogen dioxide pollution in the “shortest possible time” was expected to involve clean air zones in many cities and towns across the country.
But the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs applied last week to delay publication.
Some 2000 early deaths are caused every year in Scotland because of polluted air according to the latest medical research, with some 40,000 across the UK.
Glasgow has been described as "the most polluted city in Scotland" by environmental lawyers ClientEarth over what it called "illegal and harmful levels" of nitrogen dioxide (NO2), which comes mostly from diesel vehicles.
Data produced by the EU shows that Glasgow has the highest average annual concentration of NO2 outside of London, with 68 micrograms of NO2 per cubic metre of air - 70 per cent higher than the Euro limit.
James Thornton, chief executive of ClientEarth, said of the development: “Thursday’s hearing is at the court’s direction because the UK government has asked for an extension.
“We are preparing our response to the government’s application. This is a public health issue and not a political issue. "Urgent action is required to protect people’s health from the illegal and poisonous air that we are forced to breathe in the UK.
“This is a matter for the court to decide once the government has made its arguments because it is the government which has not met, and instead seeks to extend the court's deadline for the clean air plan, to clean up our air.” Dirty air causes at least £27.5bn in costs very year in the UK, according to the government’s own estimates, and was called a “public health emergency” by MPs in April.
A raft of recent studies and reports have linked air pollution to heart disease and lung problems, including asthma.
ClientEarth won a Supreme Court ruling against the government in April 2015 in which ministers were ordered to come up with a plan to bring down air pollution to within legal limits as soon as possible.
But ClientEarth was dissatisfied with those proposals, and took the government to the High Court in a judicial review demanding a strike down of air quality plans to be replaced by new ones.
The November ruling in the judicial review called the government's plan "woefully inadequate".
Mr Justice Garnham said the 2015 Air Quality Plan (AQP), devised when Liz Truss MP was environment secretary, failed to comply with the Supreme Court judgment and EU directives.
The ruling said the government had erred in law by fixing compliance dates based on over-optimistic modelling of pollution levels.
Mr Justice Garnham said it was “remarkable” that ministers knew they were using over-optimistic pollution modelling, based on flawed lab tests of diesel vehicles rather than actual emissions on the road, but proceeded anyway.
The existing government plan was for clean air zones – in which polluting diesel vehicles are charged to enter city centres – but in just six UK cities.
A new plan that meets the legal requirement to cut illegal levels of nitrogen dioxide pollution in the “shortest possible time” was expected to involve clean air zones in many cities and towns across the country.
DEFRA said after making the application: “We are firmly committed to improving the UK’s air quality and cutting harmful emissions."
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