Air Quality (Taxis and Private Hire Vehicles Database) (England and Wales) Regulations 2019

Lord Addington Excerpts

Thursday 11th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Adonis (Lab)]

My Lords, I think the principle of the regulations that the Minister has moved will be entirely uncontroversial to the House. Giving local authorities more powers to regulate air quality and the causes of poor air quality is the right thing to do. It is right that local authorities, which represent the views of their voters, should be able to act on this, providing they use sound procedural methods. I do not think any noble Lord will want to query the principle of the regulations. Poor air quality is one of the main causes of premature death in the country at large and it is right to give local authorities the power to deal with it.

I have two issues. First, the Minister’s speech was full of impenetrable jargon. It was clearly written for her by her civil servants. Will she tell us what a “regulatory triage assessment” is? I have not come across that phrase before. What is the “new burdens principle” she referred to? I was not aware of the old burdens principle, but can she tell us what the new burdens principle is?

Secondly, it would be helpful if the Minister could give us some indication of the Government’s assessment. She referred to a regulatory panel being set up in her department to deal with this, an oversight panel that will oversee the process. It would be helpful if the House had some indication of what the impact of these new clean air zones will be on taxi fleets outside London. There clearly will be opposition to it from taxi operators because they fear they will be subject to charges, particularly for older vehicles that are more polluting. It would be helpful if we had some idea of what the Government think the impact will be. I know this has been a particular issue in London. The mayor has been forthright about the need to modernise taxi fleets, and I support him in doing so. My assumption is that the taxi fleet outside London is older and might be more impacted by clean air zones, and it would be useful if we had some understanding of what the impact is likely to be.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, there will always be somebody who will be inconvenienced by changes and, as the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, said, in this case it will be fleet drivers and fleet operators. They will often have cars that a few years ago would not have been thought out of date but will suddenly become so. A study of how we are making sure that that bit of the transport network goes on would be beneficial to the House.

This information will be updated once a week, but local government is not exactly awash with spare cash at the moment. Will the Minister indicate how the Government will support this to make sure it happens? I cannot think of a bit of local government at the moment that is not saying and displaying by its actions that it is short of resources. This database is a good thing, but if the Government do not make sure it is properly financed it will not happen well or quickly. Will the Minister give us a little more information on that?

[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

My Lords, I welcome the Government’s proposal. I draw the Minister’s attention to the concerns raised by UNICEF, particularly about children’s health. For instance, children’s lungs, which are developing, are particularly susceptible to toxicity in the air. I suffered from pneumonia as a child, and the risks of pneumonia and asthma are raised by high air toxicity levels. These clean air zones seem very welcome.

The Minister talked about nitrogen dioxide levels, but did not mention particulate matter, which can be so fine that it can enter a mother’s respiratory tract and pass through to her developing foetus, reducing birth weight and impacting the foetus in other ways. Issues such as asthma and pneumonia can result from that. Could the Minister say whether she is also looking at particulate matter in these clean air zones?

As a vice-president of the Local Government Association, I am also concerned about further burdens on local government and what the Government are doing to help authorities get the funds necessary to be effective in reacting to this problem.