Colin Ball, Arfon Davies and Ian Ritchie.

Q87 The Chair: I welcome our witnesses to the committee’s eighth evidence session of its inquiry into the effects of artificial light and noise on human health. For this session, we are focusing on the impacts of light. We are pleased to welcome three witnesses: Colin Ball, lighting director at the Building Design Partnership; Arfon Davies, leader of lighting for the UKIMEA region at Arup; and Ian Ritchie, architect and founder at Ritchie Studio.

The session is being broadcast on parliamentlive.tv and a transcript will be made available to you shortly after the session to make any minor corrections. If there is anything you think of during the session or after it that you wish you had said, or further evidence that you would like to submit to us, we would be delighted to receive that as formal evidence in writing.

I am conscious that we seem to have temporarily lost one of our witnesses, but we will kick off with the other two. I ask you to briefly outline for the committee your area of expertise and any ways in which you have been involved in advising on, designing or implementing lighting installations and, more generally, light.

Arfon Davies: Good morning. My area of expertise is as a lighting designer and practitioner designing with light, delivering a wide range of projects in art and culture—for example, the Tate Modern—infrastructure, sports and commercial buildings. An example of commercial that you may know is the Shard in London. I deal with projects in the UK and internationally.

I have 27 years of experience, all of which have been at Arup, which perhaps you are aware is the largest employee-owned organisation in the UK. I am also one of the three founding members of the lights design practice at Arup, which has grown to about 40 designers in the UK, which I currently have the privilege of leading, and we are over 150 lighting designers internationally. That makes us one of the largest independent light design practices in the world.

I approach projects by designing with daylight and electric lighting, and I call it a holistic 24-hour approach. It considers light as a significant contributor to how we positively experience the world that surrounds us. My entire career has been dedicated to lighting discipline and lighting design as a profession. I believe it is very broad and complex, and we are always consistently looking to find the right balance between lighting for people, lighting for place and lighting for planet. This is a subject that I am currently exploring in my role as lighting skills network leader for Arup in the UK, India, the Middle East and Africa. In that role I am responsible for taking forward the discipline of lights in Arup through research knowledge and skills development.

Colin Ball: I have also worked in the lighting industry for 27 years. I have worked internationally, mostly in the Middle East and across Europe, and many projects in London have my fingerprints on them. The most recent project that people will be aware of is the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. With a presence in the historic studies of lighting, I am also currently working in the Palace of Westminster. The parallel stream of work that I have been looking at along with historic lighting is in scientific institutes, mostly with the universities of London, UCL, Kings College and the University of Cambridge.

In parallel to my professional works, I have contributed to research papers in the US and in the UK with specific studies related to psychology, the history of light and specific colours and wavelengths, which I intend to be inherent and aim to use in our work at BDP. We as a team of lighting designers—there are 20 of us—have been consistent award winners since 2015.

Ian Ritchie: Good morning. I am an architect and sometime engineer, inventor, writer and poet. Light is the first material of architecture. I also like working with the mind in mind, and in that sense I work with Russell Foster occasionally. I have designed road light fittings at Shepherd’s Bush Green. I have designed individual light fittings based on the moon’s and the sun’s wavelengths as a task light. I have designed uplighters, because I detest light fittings in suspended ceilings. When you walk around the city, all you see at night are the light fittings through windows, while during the day, because there is more light outside, windows are dark, so we actually create a very dark and glaring environment. I have published papers on glare and how it disturbs our minds.

I have been very inventive with the use of glass and developed a few systems, for which we had world patents, that have been exploited by many people around the world without understanding why they are using them. It is about transparency that has gone slightly mad, but anyway. That is my background.

I suppose the one building that might be noted is the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre for Neural Circuits and Behaviour at UCL in Howland Street, which is a white building in the day and a white building at night. It has particular wavelengths of light inside the building to keep the minds of the neuroscientists content.

Lord Sharkey: Cheaper than drugs.

Ian Ritchie: Yes, cheaper than drugs.

The Chair: We may want to pick you up on the evidence for that at a later stage.

Q88 Lord Borwick: If you are setting guidelines for how light installations should be conducted to minimise possible negative health effects, what factors would you consider—in particular, guidelines for the use of lighting to improve health effects, such as improved sleep? The third aspect here, which is the one I regard as the most important, is that lighting in hospitals seems to be designed to make it easier to treat the patient, rather than what is good for the patient. Do you have any comments on those? They are connected points; if the patient cannot sleep, that is probably an aspect that ought to be regarded.

Colin Ball: From the perspective of looking at guidelines, it is important to recognise that daylight is really the light-giver for the morning setting in particular, and what we can do with artificial lighting is a fraction of what daylight needs to do. It needs to have a very strong immediate impact in the morning for a limited period of 30 minutes to under an hour.

The parallel of that in hospitals is, exactly as you say, the level of sleep disturbance that we have, not just in hospital rooms but in all sleeping environments, both internally and externally. Future guidelines should really be looking at setting maximum and minimum wavelengths in both night-time conditions and daytime. The tendency for guidelines at the moment is just to state minimums and, even if there are recommendations that those minimums be met, they are over-exemplified and risk assessed. So on the whole we as an industry are overshooting these well-intentioned regulations, but for daytime periods only.

Lord Borwick: Thank you, that is helpful. Do the other witnesses have points to make?

Arfon Davies: I noted three parts to the question. Reflecting on the first one about factors that I would consider, and perhaps how it would be different from today, I point out that health is a very broad subject and theme. Guidelines can really challenge people working with lighting in a built environment to consider both the physiological and the psychological impact of lighting. The World Health Organization, for example, states that human health encompasses not only the physical state of us as individuals but the state of complete physical, psychological and social well-being. We know that poor lighting and poor visual environments have been shown to have negative psychological and physiological health impacts, so not enough consideration is given to the psychological impacts of light.

That is why a factor that we should consider that would differ from what we do today—to illustrate what is being done incorrectly today—is that there is an excessive focus on energy when we talk about requirements and regulations with regard to lighting. As an example, there is significant debate and concern among lighting professionals at the moment regarding the energy-related products policy framework that is currently in consultation by BEIS, which I think concluded on the fourth of this month, which aims to set minimal energy performance standards for products from later this year, and further again from 2025.

It is my view, and that of many others in the lighting profession, including Colin, that we are setting unrealistic energy targets here that draw the focus away from where it should be—that is, creating lighting environments that promote health and well-being for the people who occupy the lit environments.

Ian Ritchie: The first point is that we do not know enough about the impact of different wavelengths on our psyche or our minds.

Secondly, you mentioned hospitals. There is a very strong move in the world today to make them patient-centred rather than doctor-centred or medic-centred. The sharing of knowledge from patients in their environments is a vital part of understanding that sequel.

We do not understand the value of darkness and twilight enough. We talk about light, but actually without darkness we do not have any light. The darkness aspect appears when you hear stories of nursing homes with low levels of light to keep the patients asleep all day long—draw the curtains, put the television on and the staff are happy. That is one example that we all know about, but there are many other aspects that we know nothing about at the moment.

Arfon Davies: Ian covered the question of hospitals well there, and Colin also talked about daylight. I will add that we should consider all the occupants of the hospital environment, not just the patients. We need to think about that, as well as visitors.

I want to identify the very good work that the Department for Education recently produced, updating in 2022 the lighting guidance for schools. That has had a substantial positive impact on the provision of daylight and lighting in schools. This committee and the Government could be advised to do something similar for setting good practice for lighting in hospitals.

The Chair: We have heard about Arup having developed circadian lighting approaches. Is that not very closely related to improving health effects, such as improved sleep? What do these circadian lighting approaches at Arup consist of?

Arfon Davies: You have touched on a subject that I am very passionate about. I authored a document on Arup.com called Circadian Lighting: Definition and Strategy.

There are a few things that I want to point out. The first is that there is a lot of use of the words “circadian” and “human-centric”. It is important to note that the science and the research are nowhere near complete. We do not know enough about the visual and non-visual impacts of light on people. But our work tries to set out what we think circadian lighting means and how we might approach that as a group of practitioners and designers. We set out a design approach where, as Colin mentioned earlier, we design for daylight first, because essentially that is the human light. Then, when we need to supplement that, we do it in tune with daylight. We control it according to occupant comfort and variability, and we aim to produce lit environments that are visually interesting and stimulating. These things then promote visual interest and, potentially, well-being for the people who occupy the spaces that we are designing. It is not an off-the-shelf system but a design approach, a way of doing things. It is an evolving subject.

Ian Ritchie: At the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre there are two levels of basement where people work. One of the key aspects of understanding is what sort of lighting you can put into an unlit space that gives the people working there some degree of sense of either daylight or the rhythm of the movement of light through the day. That is quite tricky, but an experiment is going on. There are animals down there as well, along with the human beings.

Going back to the hospital point, I would mention night workers, who generally have a different rhythm and suffer sleep disabilities. We tend to forget about those people who work in hospitals or on underground trains—night-time workers.

Lord Borwick: If I am understanding you right, you seem to be saying that we know so little at present about these various factors that it is too early to come out with definitive guidelines that would be useful. Is that fair?

Arfon Davies: I would agree. I would go further and say that the SLL, the CIE and various other organisations have recently issued statements saying exactly that. More research is needed. I will also say that more engagement with the lighting design industry and practitioners on projects, people who deeply understand the subject, is necessary.

Ian Ritchie: I would also add that a deeper understanding of the relationships that the scientists—such as Russell Foster, who of course you know—and architects like me are coming through with. For example, the 480-nanometre wavelength is the particular light blue wavelength that wakes you up in the morning through the ganglion receptors behind the eye. That sort of knowledge is emerging, and the research into urban and architectural lighting has to be linked with the science research.

Arfon Davies: Absolutely.

Q89 Lord Sharkey: If we look in the round at the UK’s policy response to the problems of artificial light, how well do you think we are currently tackling the problem of light pollution? In order to keep the conversations as short and focused as possible, perhaps you could allocate a score between zero and 10 for that consideration. Do you think in any case that the whole problem is being given the appropriate priority by decision-makers?

Ian Ritchie: I would like to start with Hamburg. Twenty years ago Hamburg switched down its street lighting by half. People were concerned that there would be more accidents, but it revealed that there were actually fewer accidents, because people drove, cycled and crossed the road more carefully. That was an interesting experiment that worked, but then LEDs came along and they pushed the lighting back up again to where it was.

There is a view that one can take, and it relates to British Standard 5489, which is to do with street lighting. Currently it is a blanket approach rather than an intelligent, well-designed, well thought-out approach, and it still avoids dealing directly with pavements where people walk. When I laid out the lighting at Shepherd’s Bush Green 20-odd years ago, I asked the lighting engineer at the local authority what its policy was on pavement lighting. It did not have one.

Lord Sharkey: If you had to assign a number to how well we are doing, what would it be?

Ian Ritchie: Three.

Lord Sharkey: Thank you.

Arfon Davies: I would agree.

The Chair: Three out of 10?

Ian Ritchie: Yes.

Lord Sharkey: I see Colin nodding vigorously.

Colin Ball: We can see a requirement for codes, because they have stressed energy rather than quality of light. There is a realm of unintended consequences. We can see currently that we get many more spaces with dark ceilings and bright glaring fittings, but they are delivering a required lux and required efficiency.

You can go back 20 to 25 years. In particular, I would say that a gold standard was achieved with the stations on the Jubilee Line extension, where we had fluorescent and metal halide technologies and embodied studies about how those lights operated. You would see light levels, energy requirements and encoding that were a lot less than we have now.

Again, a lot of recommendations are written as recommendations for practice, but what tends to happen is that a second or third generation of recommendations are then required for energy that require sign-up and the full application of the previous recommendations. So BREEAM requires you to follow CIBSE regulations, LG5, without question, otherwise you do not get your BREEAM point. So we are in a realm where we have put layers of recommendations together but the quality of light has been dropping consistently for the last 15 years.

Lord Sharkey: Thank you, and I think you agreed with the three rating that Ian proposed.

Arfon Davies: I would also give it three out of 10, to be consistent, because at the moment UK policy recommendations are somewhat lacking. For example, the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act dates from 2005. It defines night nuisance and light emitted from premises as prejudicial to health and well-being, but it contains a long list of exceptions, such as railways and airports and transport infrastructure, which are all exempt from that guidance.

The royal commission report, which dates back to 2009, is still relevant, but our knowledge and understanding of lighting as a discipline have moved on significantly since then. I feel that the royal commission report talks too much about road lighting and focuses too much on rural and existing dark-sky environments. I am not suggesting that these are not important, but we should be considering the whole night-time environment, which includes our towns and cities.

Maybe I can give a positive spin to the end of my answer. We are quite optimistic about the future. We are currently reviewing the Government’s proposed environmental outcome reporting legislation, which is in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. That is very positive and, I think, will make a positive difference. The Bill is currently in Committee in the Lords. It will compel developers not just to assess the impact at the outset but to identify how those impacts will be monitored and, more importantly, validated post completion. That is a very positive step forward. If we meet again in three or four years’ time, perhaps my answer will be eight out of 10.

Lord Sharkey: That is encouraging. Are there any projects that you have been involved in that you think set a gold standard for the consideration of the health and environmental impacts of lighting? Before that, though, I cannot resist asking Ian about glare. Is there evidence to suggest that glare is actually harmful, or is it just irritating?

Ian Ritchie: There are indications that it is harmful. It is not just irritating; it is dangerous. Take the train drivers coming in to London Bridge. They are blinded by reflections off the Shard between 8 am and 10 am, depending on the time of year. That is one simple example.

Lord Sharkey: Thank you. Are there any projects you have been involved in that you think set a gold standard?

Ian Ritchie: Yes, the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre. I think you will have to visit and meet some neuroscientists.

Lord Sharkey: In a basement.

Ian Ritchie: No, they are in the labs too. Because the building has a cast-glass facade, it has windows—there was an argument among the scientists about whether they wanted to poison people by dropping things out of the windows—and it allows diffused light into the space, which gives them about 300 lux at the back, 4 metres into the space, so it is a very nice environment. They also register the changing light of the day, because you cannot really read that through an open window or clear glass, you just do not notice that change as much.

Inside, there is a 480-nanometre ceiling, which is painted blue, but largely covered by ducts, services and artificial lighting. That is also about having a quality of light that you feel when you walk into the building in the morning. We decided not to create a photonic shower of 480 nanometres, although I am still keen on it, so you could go in for 10 minutes, as long as it was before 11.30 am, and get a quick dose to be really alert.

Arfon Davies: Ian has talked about reflected glare from glazed buildings. We do a lot of work on that to make sure that there is no impact on visibility of signalling for train drivers. It is well acknowledged that glare for drivers is also dangerous.

In the interior environment, glare from light fixtures, whether LED or anything else, can cause eye strain and headaches. That is also well acknowledged. So it is not just about the external environment; it is about glare in the internal environment.

As for projects that maybe set a gold standard or successful lighting projects, it is not accidental that my Zoom background shows a project. It is one that I wanted to highlight, because it strikes the balance that I was talking about earlier between lighting for people, place and planet. That is where successful lighting comes. You may be familiar with the project: it is the renewed sea wall at Dawlish. If you have been around for long enough, you will remember the scenes in 2014 when, as a result of heavy storms, the sea wall vanished and there was significant disruption, and as a result Network Rail decided to reconstruct the wall. Arup was appointed as the engineers for the project, including my team in lighting, and we were engaged from start to finish. That was a good thing; as I mentioned earlier, too often lighting designers input at the beginning of projects but are not there to see them to the end. That is one characteristic of a gold-standard project for me.

The design creates a night-time environment—that is, it limits glare for train drivers, as we have just been discussing. It creates a lit environment that is welcoming and safe for people. Previously, the occupants of Dawlish did not really use the promenade because it was not lit safely. The new lit environment promotes people walking at night, and that is a direct benefit to health and well-being.

The lighting design itself is well co-ordinated and carefully designed, so there is no light reaching the sky and all the light is contained in the new sea wall. It generally creates a safe and welcoming environment because we used warm colour temperature lighting as opposed to what we typically see with road lighting, which is cool light. I think that meets the very interesting balance between lighting for place, lighting for people and lighting for planet when it comes to limiting the impact on the environment.

Colin Ball: The enterprise centre of the University of East Anglia was a carbon-capture project as it was built. It has been officially declared the greenest building in the UK. All the carbon studies associated with the building were to be seen over a 100-year maintenance period, so embodied carbon was as important as the carbon in use once the building was complete.

As it was a passive house project, without any energy applied to heating, lighting would become more than half of the energy consumption in use. So the first thing I had to do when I met the client was talk to them about their understanding of darkness, and how the public could see darkness as a beneficial and healthy item of the daily cycle. Part of the design of the building was to make sure that the daylight was balanced and correct as well.

The final effect of what we were able to achieve in that building was that one-third of the ceilings had no lighting but also no other systems—no suspended ceilings for one-third of the floor plate—because at that time we were able to use British Standard 12464, and we could apply a strict regime of lighting to the occupants and the individuals and not waste light on empty space. From that, we were able to develop a system of when and where, such that lighting was in use only when it was needed. We were able to demonstrate that, once you applied those factors of time and relevance, you could achieve enormous energy savings of up to 70%.

We have continued with the project post occupancy. We have studied the sensations of the occupants, and they declare that the project is dark. Now that we have other energy targets, and WELL standards and other standards are being written, sometimes they state that something is beneficial, but it is still right up against the dialogue and the understanding of the word “dark”. So this project really challenges what we think of that as a positive or negative aspect of a project.

Viscount Hanworth: What are the materials of the building? Were you avoiding concrete and so on?

Colin Ball: It is a timber-framed building clad in straw, with everything assessed for the distance travelled. Over the 100-year period the flooring and the ground floor were changed from wood to concrete, because at the 60-year maintenance regime the energy was lower. Below 50 years, timber remains more carbon efficient.

The Chair: Thank you. That is all we have time for on that question.

Q90 Baroness Neville-Jones: This is a complex subject, so I am not surprised that the answers are quite complicated. I think it was Mr Davies who said that the lighting targets were taking things in the wrong direction. I would like to pursue that thought.

Something that seems to have emerged from our discussion is that there are lots of factors being balanced when we think about installing lighting, and health is one of them. Part of my concern is that our inquiry is about the impact on health, which posits the implicit assumption that health is the most important thing and therefore should be your first consideration.

First, is that so? Secondly, even if it is, presumably, when it comes to design, the answer to that question will not be technically the same in all circumstances—or am I wrong about that? Thirdly, if it is the case of potentially considerable variation in how you construct the balance between the various relevant factors, how do public authorities best translate that into intelligent regulation?

Ian Ritchie: What we do not do enough of is pilot studies of lighting, at either city scale or building scale. There are groups of people who have come together. The Hanseatic cities in the north, for example, have got together, and they have a programme called LUCIA looking at six or eight towns, considering the quality of light and its effect on people. That has been running for some time.

There is another project called LUCI. Three municipalities in this country have joined it and are working together to understand how better lighting can improve the quality of life for people, and they are Glasgow, Durham and the City of London. What the other 123 are doing, I do not know. Organising local authorities to organise pilot schemes is a vital way of learning and improving the light quality that we produce.

Baroness Neville-Jones: The question that arises is what criteria they are using.

Arfon Davies: As I said in my introduction, perhaps the reason why I still love my career and I love what I do, and have been doing it for so long, is because it is such a complex subject, as you alluded to in the question. You asked whether health should be the first consideration. I would not advise that we suggest that any of these matters should be prioritised over another.

To your second question, every project is different. Every project requires us to consider the specifics of that particular project. One project may prioritise health, another may prioritise experience, cost or whatever it may be. It is very variable, and it is the role of professional lighting designers and architects to find the balance that is suitable for every project that we work on.

Lastly, you talked about variation and how local authorities seek to address this huge variability. Unfortunately, it is a reflection on our industry in the UK more generally that the majority of lighting that is delivered, designed and installed in the UK is not designed by a qualified professional lighting designer. Local authorities could go some distance towards ensuring that they compel developers—the people who build our built environment—to engage professionals in the work of delivering lights and lighting in the built environment.

Colin Ball: The health of the occupants is always our priority in a project, according to what the occupants are doing and depending on the majority of the time of day or night when they will be doing it. We then have to advise our clients on the nature of the current landscape of codes that they wish to sign up to. Many of the various codes and recommendations will contrast with each other, so it is very much about negotiating those.

I would say that the health of the occupants is important. Even in a retail scheme, a good functioning lighting scheme increases dwell time, comfort and footfall. There are sweet spots in every project where we can say that the benefits for the occupant are better for our client.

Ian Ritchie: I would add one other factor: atmosphere. In the end, we are all trying to design better atmospheres in which to live, work, sleep and play. We have a plethora of legislation largely written by, I would say, un-aesthetic-trained engineers who drive these figures endlessly in the wrong direction. I love working with engineers, do not get me wrong.

Colin Ball: It is well-intentioned but with unfortunate consequences.

Baroness Neville-Jones: Clearly those who are trying to spend public money are taking very difficult decisions. Do you think you could write them a code for best practice and give examples of guidelines that they should try to follow?

Ian Ritchie: Yes, absolutely.

Colin Ball: There are some exciting tests currently going on. Worcester City Council has implemented red road lighting for areas of bat sensitivity. We have done a few projects for Roehampton University on bat populations, but of course you have to balance that with the safety of women in particular, or at least the perception of safety, in the night-time environment. Again, as soon as we implement a time cycle for that, the lighting that we do for 7 pm on a winter’s afternoon is very different from the lighting at 2 am or 3 am. At the moment, controls, timing and absence detection are major factors that need to be in a lot of recommendations.

Baroness Neville-Jones: Technically, of course, modern lighting is dimmable and variable. Are you saying that much more use should be made of that?

Colin Ball: Absolutely. That is where the enormous energy savings are. We can maintain the quality but when people are witnessing it, or when people are in those spaces.

The Chair: That is the perfect point to move on to the next question, which is exactly about these issues.

Q91 Baroness Neuberger: You have already made it clear that you think the problem of light pollution, both inside and outside the built environment, has got substantially worse across the course of your careers. You have also made it clear that you could produce guidance that would improve things considerably, which is nice for us to hear, although there would of course be all sorts of qualifications to that.

I think you think that the introduction of LED lighting and the way it has been used has contributed to this getting worse. Coming back to Baroness Neville-Jones’s question at the beginning, we have heard some evidence about the flexibility of LED lighting, and you have already said that we could use that in different ways. Are there any reasons that you could give us as to why that flexibility is not used properly? Why are we not doing this well, when you could write guidelines for us that would make it much better?

Arfon Davies: If you will permit me, I will also comment on the previous question about guidance. I will strike a note of caution and say that every project is different, so we must not be too prescriptive. We are aiming to provide the right lights in the right place at the right time, so every project is different.

On LEDs and their flexibility, it is true to say that the technology has advanced significantly through the course of my career, but there is much more that we can do. There are negative things that have occurred because of LEDs but also positive things that have happened because of their installation. We can artificially control light in ways that we have not been able to before, so we are able to deliver light where we need it at the right time and in the right amount.

There are perhaps reasons why they are not as utilised as they should be. This goes back to my previous comments about the use of lighting designers and qualified individuals on projects. I make it my business to understand technology and how it can be brought to projects, but unfortunately, as I am familiar with, not all lighting is carried out by qualified lighting designers. Perhaps that is why we do not see this technology being used as extensively as it could be.

Colin Ball: We must bear in mind the nature of the marketplace and our own clients in relation to the enormous savings and the sense of quality of a space. We can only really argue that when it comes to the associated additional installation costs of the systems for any of our clients who are benefiting from the energy saving or increased occupancy. In far too many cases, developers sell on projects where the rewards and benefits of the schemes that we implement are not putting the outlay of cash and investment into the projects that we are working on. That is a major stumbling block at the moment.

Baroness Neuberger: So we could do this, but some people do not want to spend the money. One of the arguments for the universal use of LED lighting is that it is cheaper and energy conserving, so presumably you would then have to balance other aspects that would be valuable if you could monetise them. Ian, do you want to add anything?

Ian Ritchie: I want to bring in AI. AI offers an opportunity to integrate with lighting very easily and simply. The technology is there. It should enable you as an individual walking into a room to cough, splutter or wink and to make sure that you want to get the lighting you want at any time of day.

The bigger area is the public area: streets, public buildings, hospitals and schools. These are the areas that need attention and which come under the Government, councils and municipalities. We can write guidelines—I am sure Arfon would be happy to work with me on this—for public authorities, knowing how they are spending money and how tight money is, to make better use of lighting in their public buildings. There is no question that you can do it.

Baroness Neuberger: In a financially sensible way?

Ian Ritchie: Correct.

Baroness Neuberger: I chair two hospitals. I would love to read those guidelines.

Ian Ritchie: We will have to write them for you.

Baroness Neuberger: I think you might.

Q92 Baroness Northover: A lot of this question has already been addressed. The question is whether there is a need for the Government to set out updated guidelines and minimum standards for the private sector or whether good guidelines already exist, and you have clearly indicated that you do not think what is there at the moment is satisfactory. You have already addressed much of this question in a very broad way, so I wonder whether there are any other brief comments that you want to add.

Ian Ritchie: The further north you go, the warmer the light. There is a lot to learn from the northern peoples, the Scandinavians, about health, psychology and light. The further south you go—towards the equator—the colder the light. If you go to India, you find fluorescent lights everywhere. This is all simple psychology about wavelength, yet we do not really know how our minds interpret it.

Arfon Davies: If I have not said so before, I think there would be great benefit to the Government establishing a more consistent national approach to how lighting is dealt with at a planning level. We deliver projects across the UK and we see variable responses from local authorities to how lighting should be addressed at the planning stage. That would be my additional comment: there would be a benefit to having a national approach.

Colin Ball: The main tool that really changes developers’ behaviours is in the British standards regime. We have successful ones, such as 12464, and workplace. If those were extended to understand the night-time environment as much as the day and minimum requirements, we would have a very good tool for all to use.

Q93 Lord Rees of Ludlow: The aim of our committee is obviously to try to make recommendations that will lead to genuine government responses. Could you each summarise what you think should be the headline in our recommendations that would lead to a definite response from the Government?

Baroness Neville-Jones: And an improvement.

Lord Rees of Ludlow: What would be your key recommendations?

Ian Ritchie: There should be clear guidance on external public space, and I would define that as urban, suburban and exurban.

Colin Ball: I would point out that the Greenwich observatory was used for observations of the moon landing as late as the 1960s. The issue of external light pollution has really only become an issue over the last few decades, so it is easily correctable. Lighting recommendations should really look at when and where lighting is powered, with an increased regime of efficiency and technology to make sure that we do not have lamps burning in an empty space, internal or external, at 3 am.

Lord Rees of Ludlow: This is not so much about health as about energy and aesthetics, I suppose.

Colin Ball: Exactly. We can increase the quality of illumination. That may not be seen as efficient, but when it is used with efficient timing it does not have to increase the energy requirements of the national system.

Arfon Davies: I have two points. First, I mentioned the EOR regulations that are in the House of Lords at the moment. My recommendation would be that the good work that this inquiry has done and the evidence that you have heard should feed into setting the lighting objectives that will be in the regulations. I understand that the Government are currently consulting on the proposals, and they have said that the proposed objectives—that is, the objectives that they would set for developers, clients and lighting designers to follow—will follow. It is critical that those objectives are informed by the outcome of this committee, as well as experts in lighting like me, Colin and Ian, the Society of Light and Lighting and the ILP. I am positive about the regulations, but it is essential that they are informed by the work of this committee.

Secondly, I recommend that the Government consider how they could be more proactive and engaged in funding research in partnership with industry. A great deal more needs to be understood about lighting and its impact on health and well-being, and the Government have a role to play in collaboration with industry.

The Chair: On a point of clarification, are you absolutely confident that the environmental outcome reporting includes light? We heard from our previous panel that noise was potentially not included.

Arfon Davies: I will return to you with my comments on that, but we have been discussing that internally at Arup and at the moment we think light and noise are included.

Baroness Neville-Jones: That does not reassure me.

The Chair: Given that we understood that the outcome reporting would be based on the environmental improvement plan targets and the impact on those, that might not necessarily include light and noise.

Arfon Davies: I think we can agree that it must.

The Chair: Are there any quick follow-up points of clarification that any members of the committee want to ask about? No. Then I thank our three witnesses in this second evidence session. We have heard some very interesting material. I remind you that we would be delighted to receive further evidence from you in lighting—I mean in writing, sorry, but you can do it in lighting as well if you want, and I would be interested to see how. Arfon, you have kindly said you will follow up with some further comments on my last question, and that would be helpful.