16:31 Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)

That this House has considered COP26 and the impact of air pollution on public health and wellbeing.

Sir Gary, it is my pleasure, on this day of all days, to have secured this Westminster Hall debate: a day when the whole world’s attention is focused on COP26 in Glasgow, and there are signs—some mixed, but some good—of what is happening there. There has also been a petition, as you of course know, signed by more than 100,000 people, calling for an introduction of charges on carbon emissions to tackle the climate crisis and air pollution. Forgive me, Sir Gary, but I am currently suffering from a bad cold and a booster jab, so if my voice fails at any time, you will know the cause.

Air pollution kills 64,000 people in the UK every year, yet the Government provide annual fossil fuel subsidies of £10.5 billion, according to the European Commission. To meet UK climate targets, they must end this practice and introduce charges on producers of greenhouse gas emissions. Most Members of the House, and especially the Yorkshire Members, know of the Drax power station, which is currently producing energy from wood pellets, either produced in this country or imported from South America. For that purpose, it received a massive Government subsidy of £900 million last year.

Of course, with COP26, there is a risk of a great missed opportunity, as I believe there was last week in the Budget. If I were marking it as a university teacher, I would grudgingly give it a lower second. Why? Because I thought it was very technically competent, but it missed any true originality. That is the mark of a good essay: true originality. Originality is so important to everything that is produced. I could see the technical competence in last week’s Budget, but there was a lack of the imagination needed to say, “This is the time—with COP26 about to start in Glasgow, with all of us conscious that the planet is warming up and with the future of this fragile planet in danger—to tell the British people that we must act.”

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16:50 Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)

I absolutely agree that it is a fundamental right to breathe clean air. Stafford Borough Council has installed the first eco-post in the country to monitor air quality. Does my right hon. Friend agree, following COP26, with the journey to net zero, that it is important to invest in air monitoring in our constituencies?

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16:57 Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)

My hon. Friend is making a very good speech and I congratulate the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) on bringing this debate. My hon. Friend makes a good point about incinerators. Would she agree that incinerators have often been built to deal with the undesirability of landfill, but that has created a perverse incentive in the system? If we are going to look at issues such air pollution and clean air, we need to do that in a holistic way with other decarbonisation targets and priorities. That is what has created this problem in her constituency, and in others.

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17:09 Dave Doogan (SNP)

COP26, of course, is about our climate. Air pollution is a different, although not entirely unconnected, matter. COP is about cleaning up our act, and we certainly need to clean up our act when it comes to air quality. To that point, the hon. Member for Huddersfield mentioned Drax, and I say to the Minister that Drax is anathema to anybody with a passing concern for air quality. It is an almost dystopian process, which scars the landscape of the United States on an industrial scale, poisons the people who live near the mills with particulates in the air to make the pellets, and ships them half way around the world to England to be burnt. It would be bad enough without a Government subsidy, but with one it is absurd. I would like to know if the Minister agrees with that analysis.

To this end, the Scottish Government aim to reduce car use by 20% by 2030, taking it back to levels last seen in the 1990s. Moreover, sustainable public transport is essential for the ambition to reach net zero. That is why the Scottish Government will have phased out the majority of fossil fuel buses by 2023, and will invest £120 million in zero-emission buses. The UK Government could learn a lot from Scotland in our shared pursuits of net zero and viable green recovery plans. For example, the UK Government must stop cutting electric vehicle access schemes, such as England’s electric vehicle grants system. This has been further downgraded from £5,000 in 2011 to £4,500 in 2016; to £3,500 in 2018; to £3,000 in 2020; and now to £2,500 in 2021. This is the worst sort of swimming against the tide. Figures from electric vehicle charging website Zap-Map show that of the 21,000 public charging points in the UK, only 20% are free to use; that is 4,928 points, and 26% of these are in Scotland where around 60% are free to use. Electric vehicle drivers in Scotland benefit from almost 40 public charge points per 100,000, compared to fewer than 30 per 100,000 in England. Promoting and investing in active travel access is essential to drive down car usage. Scotland currently spends over £18 per head of population, compared with just £7 in England––more than 150% higher.

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17:15 Ruth Jones (Labour)

Last week, I met Rosamund, the mother of Ella Kissi-Debrah, who died in 2013. We spoke about the need for urgent action to clean our air and the fact that COP26 could set an example––a British-made example––to generations to come. In December 2020, the coroner ruled that Ella had died as a direct result of air pollution, as we have heard already today. The coroner said that he believed that air pollution made a material contribution to Ella’s death. Like so many, she was exposed to illegal levels of nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter in excess of WHO guidelines. I would like the Minister to explain why the Government voted against Labour’s attempts to clean our air by writing the guidelines into the Environment Bill.

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17:19 The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Jo Churchill)

We are all concerned about the impact of air pollution on public health and we are hosting the COP26 summit at a turning point for both the planet and health. We have been making progress. However, over the course of the UK presidency of COP26, we need to see further progress on commitments to secure global net zero carbon emissions by the mid-century. It will be a challenge; we need to see countries coming forward with ambition. Success at the summit and beyond will rely on all countries rallying behind the common goal of rapidly reducing carbon emissions and protecting the planet. Although COP26 is arguably focusing on greenhouse gases and not air pollutants, we should seize the opportunity to reduce the emissions of other pollutants from the same sources, because, as everybody has said, there is a lot of crossover here.

In conclusion, taken together, this is a comprehensive package. However, we have to do more by seizing opportunities and addressing risks. We need to take action to tackle climate change and air pollution. We are committed to cleaning up our air and carrying on our work.

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17:29 Mr Sheerman (in the Chair)

It has been a very good debate, as it always is with you in the Chair, Sir Gary. The fact of the matter is that we do not want too little, too late. We want it now. Children are being poisoned; 3 million children in our own country are being poisoned by fumes mainly coming from air pollution from roads. We have some short-term things. Yes, we need international and global leadership at COP26, but we need local empowerment and we need it now.

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