Global Climate Change — House of Lords, 2015-10-29
Topic: Environment
Anthony Gueterbock (Labour, Centre-left): Indeed. As my noble friend Lord Judd said, it needs political leadership. If the lack of support from the Back Benches in this House is rather evident, I hope that does not put off the Minister and his colleagues from having the courage to do what I think all speakers have urged them to do in the coming months I certainly believe that we have a serious problem with climate change but, as other noble Lords have said, it must not be at the expense of other pollutants, which, according to a press release from the European Parliament yesterday, cause more than 400,000 people to die prematurely each year across Europe due to poor air quality. That is a different figure from that given by some other noble Lords, but it is a very big figure. I am pleased that the Parliament and the Commission have now agreed to fix national emissions ceilings on several important pollutants—not just one—to fight air pollution. I hope that gets taken forward because, as other noble Lords have said, it is not just CO2 The Volkswagen scandal is probably just the tip of an iceberg because people believed that the silver bullet of reducing CO2 would sort out all the other problems. But, as other noble Lords have said, PM2.5 and nitrogen dioxides are really serious. The worrying thing is that the European engine emissions standards are not technologically neutral because the EU has set much looser emissions standards for particles and oxides of nitrogen—NOx—for diesel vehicles than for petrol ones, which is the opposite to what is happening in the United States Yes, people have realised that diesel is a problem these days, but it is very much worse than petrol. Transport for London says that diesel cars emit somewhere between 90% and 95% of the most harmful exhaust emissions from cars in London. That is a very big percentage Another myth that I would try to put to one side is that Euro 6 standard engines will solve the problem, because they will not. There is already plenty of evidence that real driving emissions for Euro 6 standard diesel cars are about four times worse on average than for the current Euro test standards. As one or two other noble Lords have said, let us not listen to the manufacturers who are lobbying very hard for what I think they call a conformity factor to reduce the limits or change the way that the tests are done. This is really serious I agree with the Clean Air in London campaign, which has said that: "Diesel is … the biggest public health catastrophe", in UK policy history. It will be interesting to see whether the Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants—I cannot pronounce its acronym, COMEAP—produces a most authoritative first national estimate of the mortality attributable to nitrogen dioxide. It may also update its estimate attributing 29,000 deaths in the UK to PM2.5 in 2010. That figure might go up and, as other noble Lords have said, it is an awfully large number One of the solutions is for the Government and a lot of other people to look at this as a one-atmosphere problem instead of trying just to reduce one gas, CO2, important though that is. Perhaps they could have a policy hierarchy that would start with lifestyle changes such as driving less and using bicycles. My noble friend Lord Haskel uses an electric bike but he also uses ordinary bikes for shorter distances. Provided that electricity is generated, it is probably all right. There are many things like that, such as travelling less and using more public transport, but the key is to have a much more stringent ban on diesel cars in the centre. Let us also not forget that although particulates in big cities such as London are important, an awful lot of pollution comes in from outside through shipping, farming and other things that need to be addressed. I hope the Minister will look at this one-atmosphere idea and try to turn it into a win-win package of emission reductions and health benefits. That would both benefit climate change and protect the UK’s environment in the short term. I can only hope that Ministers will pursue this, with or without the support of some of their Back-Benchers.