Clean Air (Human Rights) Bill [HL]

Lord Randall of Uxbridge Excerpts

Committee stage
Friday 18th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I thank everyone who has helped me get the Bill to this point—it has been a lot of people. This is quite a momentous moment, because this is a very important Bill. Air pollution is the UK’s largest environmental health risk. This Bill will set England and Wales on course to comply with the World Health Organization’s new air quality guidelines in the next five to 10 years; it will achieve our carbon budgets and protect our natural environment. Just as we followed the science for Covid-19, we must follow the science with the air pollution pandemic.

There have been several important international developments since the Second Reading of my Bill on 8 July, which I wish to highlight. We are also much closer to two important anniversaries, which I shall remind noble Lords about.

On 28 July, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution recognising the right to

“a clean, healthy and sustainable environment”

as a human right. The resolution calls on states, international organisations and business enterprises

“to scale up efforts to ensure a clean, healthy and sustainable environment for all”,

with 161 countries voting in favour, including the UK, and none against. That means that the Government have signed up to a UN resolution to make clean air a human right. My Bill turns that declaration into something meaningful in England and Wales. Today, here in your Lordships’ House, I hope that we will do the Government’s work for them by making clean air a fundamental and legally enforceable human right for people in this country.

On 26 October, the European Commission published its proposals for the revision of the European Union’s ambient air quality directives, after more than four years of analysis, discussion and consultations. It has proposed new limit values for fine particulate matter, so-called PM2.5, and nitrogen dioxide, so-called NO₂, to be attained by 1 January 2030 and put the EU on track to achieve zero pollution for air by 2050.

Important upcoming anniversaries include the 70th anniversary of the Great Smog of 5-9 December 1952 and the 10th anniversary of the tragic death of Ella Roberta Adoo Kissi-Debrah, aged nine, on 15 February 2013. I am very grateful to her mother, Rosamund Kissi-Debrah, for being here today, listening to this debate and agreeing that the Clean Air (Human Rights) Bill could be called Ella’s law. We will be doing this for Ella and children like her, but also for all of us, so that none of us has to suffer from poisoned air. So my Bill is very timely. In fact, it is being presented in the right place at the right time to address the public health, environmental and climate emergencies that we face.

I am grateful to everyone who spoke at Second Reading or has spoken to me since about the Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, has asked me to highlight her support for my Bill in her necessary absence today. The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, pointed out that the issue of internal air pollution in schools and homes is also extremely dangerous. She is also unable to be here today. The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, raised issues that we have recognised. Other noble Lords have written, showing how the standards in my Bill can be achieved or used to deliver clean air.

As noble Lords will remember, in my opening speech at Second Reading I thanked the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee for scrutinising my Bill and confirmed that I would propose amendments to the Bill to address its three recommendations. I have therefore tabled amendments here in Committee to deliver on my assurances. Those amendments slightly delayed Committee for my Bill until today, so I took the opportunity to table a small number of other amendments to make my Bill as perfect as possible. In total, I have tabled four types of amendments in a single group for debate, which covers all amendments.

These are, first, on time extensions. An amendment to Clause 1 would allow the Secretary of State to

“postpone the deadline for a particular pollutant in relation to a specified area by a maximum of five years subject to strict conditions”

where the initial deadline cannot be achieved. No time extension would be possible beyond 1 January 2033. A consequential amendment is proposed for local authorities.

This amendment would mean, for example, that the Government could delay the deadline to comply with the World Health Organization’s new air quality guideline for annual mean concentrations of fine particulate matter in one or more zones to January 2033. This is long enough, given that the European Commission’s press release announcing its recent proposals included a baseline map showing that this guideline would be achieved across most of the UK by 2030. The conditions I have tabled for this postponement would ensure that the Minister’s feet are still held to the fire—that is quite a graphic image; I am sorry about that.

Secondly, a new clause would set limit values for fine particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide of 10 and 20 micrograms per cubic metre respectively, to be attained by 1 January 2030. These would act as interim thresholds or backstop targets, depending on the progress made, and would match the latest European proposals. An additional limit value for nitrogen dioxide of 40 micrograms per cubic metre, to be attained by 1 January 2024, would strengthen existing obligations. This amendment builds on debates in this House on the Environment Act and international developments.

Thirdly, my amendments respond to three recommendations from the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee that I accepted in a letter to the committee dated 4 July, and in my opening speech at Second Reading. In essence, these amendments would align parts of my Bill relating to the tightening of future standards after Royal Assent more closely to mechanisms in the Climate Change Act 2008 which require the Secretary of State to “comply” or “explain” to Parliament. The tightening of future standards would require a draft of the instrument to be laid before and approved by resolution of each House of Parliament. These technical changes would be achieved by a new clause which would replace several subsections in Clause 2, and the substitution of several subsections in the existing Clause 3. Together, these amendments would improve my Bill, and I am grateful to the committee for drawing my attention to the need for them.

Fourthly, I have taken the opportunity to table a small number of other amendments to improve my Bill and correct several omissions and typographical errors—for example, adding Network Rail alongside other public authorities; substituting the new citizens’ commission for clean air for the Environment Agency when reviewing and revising standards and advising Ministers; substituting the World Health Organization for the International Organization for Standardization in relation to indoor air pollutants; adding standards aligned to the World Health Organization’s good practice statements for ultrafine particles—PM0.1—in indoor and outdoor air and its air quality guideline for 24-hour mean nitrogen dioxide in indoor air; and, finally, correcting the name of Highways England to National Highways, following its rebranding in 2021.

These amendments will give the UK the best and most up-to-date clean air standards in the world, and they each improve an incredibly strong Bill. Together, they make my Bill oven-ready for the Government to adopt. They can take it and run, and do something fantastic for the UK. For those who want more, or something slightly different, I encourage them to present evidence to Ministers, the citizens’ commission for clean air, and public authorities once my Bill has achieved Royal Assent and given them new powers and duties. If I can, I would be very happy to help in that process if it will deliver clean air sooner.

As I said in July, let us give Rosamund “Ella’s law” on the 70th anniversary of the great smog and before the 10th anniversary of Ella’s death on 15 February 2023. I hope your Lordships will support my amendments today and that the Government will agree to allow my Bill time to progress in the other place early in the new year and to reach Royal Assent.

[Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con)]

My Lords, I rise very briefly; I do not want to detain this Committee for long, because there is other important business. Having been a bit of an expert on Private Members’ Bills down the other end, I know that time is of the essence.

I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, on bringing this forward. I am sure her amendments will improve the Bill—whether that is the view of the Government, we shall see. We will be told that this matter is too big for a Private Member’s Bill—it is one of those things; I may have even had to say it myself once or twice—but I urge my noble friend on the Front Bench to see it as an opportunity. If there are things in the Bill which are not quite to the Government’s liking, there is ample opportunity to change them. I am sure that the noble Baroness, within reason, will allow that, without a complete filleting of her Bill.

We have waited too long for proper clean air legislation. We tried to introduce provisions to what is now the Environment Act. We owe it to the people who live with the consequences of this pollution, which unfortunately people are dying from. I urge the Minister to take this back and say that it is a golden opportunity to do something really wonderful. The Government could take pride in being part of a world-beating Bill, which is the sort of thing I believe they like saying.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I echo the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Randall, in congratulating the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, on bringing forward amendments that strengthen the Bill. I wish that the amendments on the time extension were not necessary, but I understand that pragmatically, it makes sense to include them.

It is absolutely right to call this Ella’s law, and it is good to have Ella’s mother here today. However, this week there has been news of an inquest that will provide a change if this Bill goes through: that following the death of two year-old Awaab Ishak, who died from respiratory arrest following months of exposure to black mould and damp in his housing association home. The coroner said that this inquest was a defining moment, asking:

“how does this happen? How, in the UK in 2020, does a two-year-old child die from exposure to mould in his home?”

The coroner will write a prevention of deaths report, not to the housing association, because she has been so impressed with the steps it has taken, but a more general one to local authorities and other bodies responsible for social housing, which would, I believe, be covered by this Bill. It gives tenants of private landlords the right to take action on their human rights, in respect of which landlords have been very dilatory, and it could well help.

These two cases relate to children, but the health of many adults has been ruined by the lack of clean air, whether inside or out. I hope the Government understand that. The Bill is not quite as broad as the noble Lord, Lord Randall, outlined; it is very particular in providing strict law about the human right and how it affects public bodies. I hope that the Government will recognise that now is the right time to move this forward, especially after their comments about the Awaab Ishak inquest earlier this week.