Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee

Oral evidence: Air quality, HC 479
Wednesday 20 January 2016

Ordered by the House of Commons to be published on 20 January 2016.

Written evidence from witnesses:

–       Matthew Pencharz, Deputy Mayor for Environment and Energy to the Mayor of London

–       Councillor Nick McDonald, Nottingham City Council

–       Dr Diane Mitchell, Chief Environment Advisor, NFU

Watch the meeting

Members present: Neil Parish (Chair); Chris Davies; Jim Fitzpatrick; Dr Paul Monaghan; Margaret Ritchie; David Simpson; Angela Smith; Rishi Sunak

Questions 199-285

Witnesses: Matthew Pencharz, Deputy Mayor for Environment and Energy to the Mayor of London, Councillor Tony Newman, Local Government Association Board Member and London Borough of Croydon, and Councillor Nick McDonald, Nottingham City Council, gave evidence.

Q199   Chair: Good afternoon, gentlemen.  Thank you very much for coming to this Select Committee to talk about air quality.  We are expecting a vote around 3.30, so hopefully, with our first panel of you learned gentlemen, we will try to get through our first panel by 3.30 if we can.  We will stick to Christian-name terms, if you are happy with that.  If you are not, speak now.  Matthew, would you like to introduce yourself, then go across the panel and we will start? 

Matthew Pencharz: I am Matthew Pencharz.  I am the Deputy Mayor for Environment at City Hall here in London.  One of my responsibilities is air pollution.

Cllr Newman: Councillor Tony Newman.  I am on the LGA Environment, Economy, Housing and Transport Board, and also the Leader of the Council in the London Borough of Croydon.  

Cllr McDonald: I am City Councillor in Nottingham and I am the portfolio holder for jobs, growth and transport, so transport and some other related issues fall under my responsibility.  

Q200   Chair: Welcome, gentlemen.  We are particularly interested in the cities today.  Later on, we will be talking to a group regarding farms and agricultural pollution as well.  My question is: what are the key air quality problems in your local areas and what impact are these having on your local communities and environments?  Who wants to start? 

Matthew Pencharz: I will start.  London—Croydon being part of London—and Nottingham, as with most of the British, English and European cities, have an air pollution problem.  Today, at the moment, we are having an—

Q201   Chair: Yes, it highlights it today—ideal for our inquiry, on a day when pollution is high. 

Matthew Pencharz: The pollution today is particulate matter and it is quite visible.  You can see the haze here in London and those are small dust particles.  We have the weather system that helps to really create that problem.  It gets worse and worse over time until the weather pushes away.  There is cold air, and then the continued emissions get stuck in the city and cannot really escape.  However, that is not really the pollutant that we have a real problem with.  With particulate matter, in fact, we are within the EU’s legal limits, London for the first time over the last six years or so. 

It is nitrogen dioxide that is the real problem and on which the Supreme Court last year said to the Government that it had to have a faster plan.  If the Committee does not mind, I might focus on nitrogen dioxide, since that is the main air pollution problem.  The reason we are in the situation we are in is because of the misguided policy of dieselisation of our smaller vehicles—light goods vehicles and private cars.  If you think back 16 years ago or so, they made up about 5% of our small vehicle fleet; it is now around 50%.  That has coincided with a spectacular failure of the Euro engine standards to reduce the emission coming out of the back of those vehicles.  The VW scandal—

Chair: Yes, we did have Volkswagen here last week.  We did not get an awful lot of blood out of them, or answers, but, yes, please carry on. 

Matthew Pencharz: It crystallised what we knew was already a problem.  Sometimes, by order of magnitude, you will see greater emissions coming out of the back of these vehicles than they would on their test cycles.  VW, it appears, was doing fraudulent testing.  I am not suggesting any other vehicle manufacturers are doing that, but it is certainly the case that across the industry you have seen a failure of these standards.  You have seen the switch to diesel and then the failure of the Euro standards.  It is worth saying that if the Euro standards had worked in the way that we had hoped they were going to and we were promised they were going to, we would have been within the legal limits of NO2 last year.  As it is, the Government reckons it will be 2025.  We think, in London, we could bring that forward.  

Q202   Chair: Your belief is that not the whole problem but most of the problem is down to vehicles and nitric oxide, is it? 

Matthew Pencharz: That is where the problem is a lot greater than it should otherwise have been.  You have to remember that in London about half is from transport and about half is from non-transport.  Clearly, essentially, where we are now, it is more transport because it is more congested.  You see more vehicles—buses, taxis—driving around at greater concentrations.  It is also domestic gas boilers.  We have focused also on retrofitting buildings. 

Q203   Chair: What are you doing in the City of London?  Naturally, you will understand complaining about the nitrogen oxide from cars, but are you increasing the number of buses that are hybrid?  What is happening to the taxis?  What is the timescale? 

Matthew Pencharz: Since the Mayor came in almost eight years ago, he has been addressing the sources of emissions from all the areas.  Clearly, transport is the biggest one because that is also the one on which he has the greatest powers.  We have seen a huge turnover of our bus fleet, so we now have thousands of diesel-electric hybrids on the streets, increasingly only Euro 6 ones.  It is worth saying that Euro 6 for heavy vehicles is working in the way we had hoped it was going to work, so we are seeing really quite remarkable reductions in emission from the large, heavy goods vehicles, such as buses, etc, on Euro 6. 

We have also seen a tightening of the low emission zone to reduce emissions back in 2012.  We have also seen us working on construction equipment.  Back in September, we had the first regulation in the world for both particulate matter and for nitrogen dioxide for non-road mobile machinery—or construction equipment, probably to you or me—cherry-pickers, pile-drivers and that kind of thing.  It means that we are going to have, by 2020, a huge reduction in emissions from that sector. 

I touched upon domestic gas boilers.  We have a big energy retrofit programme here in London to make homes more energy-efficient, to tick the carbon box, to tick the poverty box, but also, in fact, it ticks the air pollution box.  Overall we have seen, in London, emissions of NOx come down by 20% since 2008.  We have seen a 12% reduction in actual measured concentrations, and some pretty remarkable reductions in some areas. 

Q204   Chair: Why have we a map like this then, with all this air pollution across London today? 

Matthew Pencharz: I am saying it is getting better; I did not say it was solved. 

Q205   Chair: On the air pollution, as far as the cars are concerned, Volkswagen were slightly out in their forecasts, but that has not created all of this problem, has it?  We want to see action.  I am not convinced we are seeing enough. 

Matthew Pencharz: If you compare the action that we are taking in London compared to any other European city and, arguably, most cities around the world, you see more action by this administration—in partnership with London boroughs, with Croydon, Wandsworth, Lambeth and everybody else—to take the action you are asking for.  I am not saying the problem is solved.  It clearly is not.  There is a serious health impact and we have published a report last September suggesting that the equivalent deaths due to air pollution, both PM and NO2, is around 9,500 people.  However, we have seen a reduction in that quantum.  We have seen a reduction apportioned to particulate matter.

Yes, we are on a journey.  We are making great advances.  We are showing that our policies are working with the fact that we are seeing these reductions. 

Q206   Chair: You are on a journey, but not necessarily in a diesel car.  Is that right?

Matthew Pencharz: If I were buying a new car, I would not recommend you buy a diesel car if you lived in inner London, certainly. 

Q207   Chair: Can I bring in Tony Newman about Croydon and then, Jim, you would like a word? 

Cllr Newman: Yes, very much Croydon: it is a huge borough and London’s largest borough in our own part of London.  I will not repeat everything that was said there, but that pollution sits—almost looks like the heart of it and is visible—over Croydon this afternoon.  The traffic, pressure and congestion in outer London is as great as ever and increasing. 

If you look at a very positive piece of infrastructure investment in Croydon, the Croydon trams, they are a fantastic project.  They are now at 90% use, even in what used to be down periods of the day.  They are hugely popular.  The public are voting with their feet, but there are massive delays in expanding the tram infrastructure.  People have told me, whether it is City Hall or TfL, that there are lots of positive meetings and discussions.  People say, “Don’t worry; 30 or 40 years from now the tram will go down to Lambeth like it used to.” The old 64 tram that used to run down the A23 will be back with us.  We just want to celebrate the 100 years since when it was taken off the tram tracks. 

Hopefully the work you are doing here and hopefully the work we are doing across London and Croydon is important.  However, at the end of the day, we have to get people out of those cars more often, whether they are diesel or any other form, and provide alternative routes.  The evidence is, whether it is the tube or the tram network in Croydon, that the public, given a decent, viable and affordable alternative, will use it.  That is the message.  It is an investment; that is how we need to see it.  If we are talking about Croydon and trams, for example, we need to see an expansion of a tram that works in Croydon into other boroughs as an investment in the future, both in terms of public health and literally getting people from A to B. 

Q208   Chair: How practical would it be to bring trams through the whole of London? 

Cllr Newman: I would not say that the whole of London would present challenges.  I know that when a previous Mayor looked to expand down the Ealing Road there were huge challenges to that.  The interesting thing is that the spirit from Croydon was that there was a lot of initial opposition, but many people who opposed them—yes, it is inconvenient for a few years—now are hugely supportive of them.  The irony is that those who opposed them the greatest have seen their house value go up the quickest, because the nearer you live to a tram the more money the estate agents put on your house. 

Chair: That does encourage people, doesn’t it?

Cllr Newman: Once they are in, they are always resoundingly welcomed, but there is a challenge with putting the infrastructure in. 

Q209   Jim Fitzpatrick: I just want to digress a little, if I may, for a couple of minutes.  We do not have trams in East London, but we have the Docklands Light Railway, which is our version, to a certain extent, and it is hugely successful. 

Gentlemen, thank you for being here.  I would like to pick up on Mr Pencharz’s comment about misguided dieselisation.  One of the big issues in my constituency, Matthew, is the new cruise terminal at Enderby Wharf, which the Mayor gave planning approval to in recent months.  For many, that is seen as a step change in the use of the river.  Most of us want to say that the town has been used much more for commuting, construction, traffic and we need to get vehicles, especially HGVs, off the road.  However, in the modelling of the cruise ships that are going to be used at Enderby, there were question marks over the accuracy of the emissions that will come from these vessels.  Most importantly, the big issue is why the Mayor did not require the developers to provide shore-to-ship power supply.  Because when these vessels come into London, they are going to have to run their diesel engines in the middle of the Thames, between Greenwich, one of the highest polluted areas of London, and Tower Hamlets, my constituency, which is equally heavily polluted.  They will have to run the diesel engines 24/7 to power the ships, whereas in most sensible European ports, like Gothenburg and elsewhere, it is a local requirement.  So on misguided dieselisation, the GLA seems to basically be endorsing the mistakes that are taking place over recent decades. 

Matthew Pencharz: There are a few points I would make about that.  The first one is to say—and this is a rather tiresome legalistic point—that the Mayor was not giving planning authority consent to the wharf and the ferry terminal.  That had already had consent for quite a long time.  He was giving consent to the wider regeneration of the area behind the port, and that includes quite a lot of homes and businesses.  It was not, as such, the Mayor saying yes to the ferry terminal, because it had already been said yes to. 

Q210   Chair: Did those cruise ships already have the rights to come in then?

Matthew Pencharz: There was already planning permission for a cruise ship terminal at that spot, when the mayor then gave final planning approval to the rest of the development around it.  

Q211   Chair: Surely, it is not unreasonable to ask for electric to be supplied to these boats?

Matthew Pencharz: It is not within the planning guidance for the Mayor to do that, which is what I am trying to say to Mr Fitzpatrick.  Having said that, we did liaise, in fact, with the Royal Borough of Greenwich and did some proper modelling on what the pollution emission air quality impact would be.  There is £400,000 in the planning consent to mitigate what will be the impact on the occasions when those ships are moored up.  It is worth remembering they are not going to have a ship there every day.  The number of ship movements are relatively limited, so we are not talking about having a filthy ship parked there 24/7, 365 days a year.  I do not recall the numbers of ships.  I would have to get back to you on that, but I believe it is public and in the planning consent.  We are now working with the royal borough to work out how they should spend that £400,000 and seek to mitigate the impacts as much as possible. 

The last point I would say is that you have heard figures banded around of the equivalent of X hundred HVGs parked idling away.  It is not quite the same as having X hundred HVGs parked outside your house idling away.  The boat is in the river and it is at the flue at the top of the ship and it is very hot, but it means they disperse pretty quickly.  I am not going to say there is not an impact, because clearly there will be, but I would not necessarily take it exactly as read when you hear the term, “X hundred HVGs parked outside your house.”

Q212   Chair: When we are looking to reduce pollution and when we already have very high pollution in those areas, it seems a very strange thing for you to say that it will not create an awful lot of pollution.  Surely, you just have to reduce the pollution from every angle.  What you are doing with this decision is increasing it. 

Matthew Pencharz: As I said earlier, we are reducing the pollution from all sources that we can.  On this particular example, the Mayor at that point did not have the power to turn down the application for the ferry terminal, because that had already been passed.  I have lost my train of thought; I am sorry. 

Q213   Jim Fitzpatrick: Can I come back with a supplementary?  I am sure Matthew has seen correspondence from my constituent, Ralph Hardwick, who has been campaigning diligently on this.  I can quite confidently say that Ralph would not accept that the numbers of HGVs, which in one report that I have seen says 688 HGVs parked outside your home, is not quite a lot of HGVs sitting outside. Even if the emissions are going up, on a day like today, it is not going very far.  It is only tabling and then coming back down.  I do not want to quibble.  I do accept that the Mayor did not have the legal power or the legal jurisdiction to make a full determination, but one would have thought that, given the predicament that London is in, in terms of our policy, the Mayor might have said something.  He might have suggested something to Greenwich, who only approved this by a vote of five to four, so it was not wholly supportive.  The matter seems to be moved between the Greater London Authority, the Royal Borough of Greenwich, the Port of London Authority and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency.  Nobody seems to take full responsibility or has the full responsibility.  Who actually does the monitoring and measuring of the contribution the vessels of the Thames make towards London’s air quality? 

Matthew Pencharz: You raise a fair point on lots of different agencies.  We do not pass the buck.  We all take responsibility, but you raise a fair point.  Just to go on a slight tangent for a second, there are two industrial areas that we, the GLA, have been quite involved in, Neasden Lane and Horn Lane, both in West London, where you have seen a sort of tangle between the local borough and the Environment Agency and, to a degree—although not so much—between Transport for London and the DLA.  You can see the frustrations sometimes among residents or local MPs in those circumstances, in that he felt that they were representing their residents and constituents.  Who is in charge of this?  Just because of the way it is in statute, it is different people.  You need to have partnership working.  I would say in those two examples I gave we actually have that and have been addressing the problem.

When it comes to Enderby Wharf, I cannot answer the question directly on these sources of emissions on ships.  I can get back to you.  However, I will say that London has one of the best monitoring systems in the world when it comes to monitoring air pollution, which is why we know so much about the scale of the problem.  

Q214   Chair: It is great to have all this knowledge but you have to do something with it.  Therefore, you have all this knowledge; you know that ships are going to emit pollution; and you are not going to do anything about it.  What is the GLA going to do about it?  Are you being proactive with those who are giving permission?  We accept the Mayor does not have the powers not to grant it permission because of those reasons, but surely you can be much more proactive in getting electricity out to these ships, even at this stage?  Are you being proactive?  You are just saying, “I cannot do anything about it.”

Matthew Pencharz: That is not what I said.  It was us who went to the borough and said, “We need an independent assessment of this air pollution impact,” which is where that figure originally came from.  I think it was from the AMEC report.  It was us who negotiated with the borough, talked to them and got the £400,000 to help mitigate the problem.  However, at this point, I do not want to pass the buck but the Royal Borough of Greenwich made a decision in all understanding of what the relatively small, despite what your constituent’s view might be, impact.  There are a lot of jobs and value added in this development, and it is worth remembering that it is going to be something like £7 million or £8 million worth of tourist spend alone in the Royal Borough of Greenwich. 

Q215   Chair: If there is that value there, then there should be no problem to get electricity out to these ships.  This is where your arguments do not fit in.  We all want to see this happen.  Jim wants to see this happen.  It is not that we do not want to see it happen.  We just want the supply of electricity, so these diesel engines do not have to run in the middle of the Thames.  It is fairly basic stuff.  I am sorry; you can talk about the bureaucracy; you can talk about how many times you can monitor it and how good we are at monitoring it; but if you do not actually stop the diesel engines running, you will get more pollution.  You might pick it up in your figures, but that does not help in air quality—does it?—for people today not being able to go out and do sport and other things in the centre of London. 

Matthew Pencharz: You raise a fundamentally fair point. 

Q216   Chair: What are you going to do about it?

Matthew Pencharz: I am sorry to be legalistic and bureaucratic, but the reality is that this wharf was given planning permission a while back.  It is not an easy thing to do to go back to somebody who you have already given planning permission to—and the royal borough is very supportive.  You say it was five to four, but the officers and the leadership of the Borough of Greenwich are clearly very supportive of this scheme, and the jobs and growth that go with it.  We are seeking to mitigate, as much as we reasonably can, the impacts of the terminal, but if we all had our time again and we could rewind the clock back to when the original wharf was given permission we may have had a different—

Q217   Chair: We have done this quite to death, but what we would like is something in writing from you as to how you are being proactive to bring about electric supply to these ships.  We would be really keen on that. 

Matthew Pencharz: Okay, we will write to the Committee.

Q218   Chair: I am conscious of time, but it is an important issue, but if you could give that to us that would be fine.  Nick, I am conscious that you have not spoken yet about Nottingham, and then we will get on to the other questions.  Having said we would try to conclude in an hour, we have taken rather a long time over the first question, but it was important to sort it out.  Over to you. 

Cllr McDonald: In Nottingham, we have air quality issues as most large cities have.  The issues are essentially about congestion.  We have quite tight arterial routes in Nottingham, as many regional cities have, and so on our arterial routes and on our ring road, we have a lot of standing traffic.  For us, it is the ring road that has been highlighted as potentially the problem in terms of meeting future targets and it is in relation to nitrogen dioxide. 

Our strategy in Nottingham is similar to many other cities, and it is essentially about trying to get people out of their cars and on to forms of public transport and bikes.  We were talking about trams before; we have just opened lines 2 and 3 of our tram.  Where we have been operating the tram in Nottingham for a number of years, we have seen congestion held along those corridors.  We have seen public transport usage go up overall in Nottingham and cycling has gone up overall in Nottingham.  Absolutely, that has to be part of the agenda. 

In addition, we are also very keen to see vehicles in the city be reduced in terms of their emissions.  We have Europe’s largest fleet of municipal electric vehicles, for example— something that we want to extend.  We are waiting with fingers crossed and bated breath for the outcome of some of the OLEV bids that are in at the moment.  If we are successful as a city in Nottingham, we have big plans to introduce charging stations right around the city to help our taxi fleet reduce its emissions and, like many other cities, we have a real issue to deal with in terms of our taxi industry and the age of those vehicles and the degree to which they are able and willing to modernise. 

In relation to buses, and buses are an interesting thing, we own our bus company—Nottingham City Council in Nottingham.  Therefore, we do have leverage to get more buses at the moment. 

Q219   Chair: What are your buses at the moment?

Cllr McDonald: We have a large fleet and it is a varied fleet, but most of it is moving towards Euro 6 compliance.  Again, I talk about the OLEV bid; we have a bid in for 86 gas powered buses, which, if we are successful in that bid, will make an enormous difference to the quality of the fleet. 

Q220   Chair: At the moment, the majority are diesel buses?

Cllr McDonald: The majority are diesel, as in most cities. 

Chair: You are moving towards the gas ones.  Angela, did you want to make a quick point? 

Q221   Angela Smith: Just very quickly, it is the case, is it not, that many local authorities outside of London—I think Nottingham is a bit of an exception—do not own their bus fleet?  Therefore, they have less control over their standards.

Cllr McDonald: Absolutely.  Regional cities do not have control over the bus industry in their cities, full stop.  It is one of the major issues that most cities are pushing for in their devolution deals, which Nottingham is part of, along with a number of other cities.  In London, you have the luxury of regulating your transport system.  We do not have that. 

Angela Smith: I am not from London, by the way. 

Cllr McDonald: In Nottingham, you do not have that.  It is like anywhere else outside London.  We work in collaboration.  The fact that we are a majority shareholder in one of our bus companies is a decision that we are glad we took 20 years ago when many councils were selling off their bus companies.  It allows us to work more closely with them.  It is an arm’s length company, but we certainly would welcome additional powers to regulate the transport system.  We could achieve lower emissions in transport in a number of different modes if we had those powers.  

Q222   Ms Ritchie: Does Defra’s strategy for tackling air pollution give the right roles and responsibilities to local authorities and to national Government?  I will start with Matthew. 

Matthew Pencharz: We are obviously pleased that Defra came forward with this action plan just before Christmas.  The Mayor said earlier today, in Mayor’s Question Time, that in some way a large part is to ask us to do what we are already doing.  In fact, the Government picked up a lot of the air quality activities that we have been doing.  We would say that there is always more that the Government can do.  You can always go and ask for more money, which obviously is helpful when it comes to retrofitting our buses and accelerating throughput of cleaner buses. However, there are also some regulatory powers that we feel that planning city authorities should have.  These do not cost the Government anything.  The example that we would give—I mentioned it earlier—is the non-road mobile machinery regulation, low emission zone of construction equipment in London.  Our enforcement powers on that are quite weak, so we have set this down, but we are reliant on—

Q223   Chair: This is the role of pneumatic drills, generators and all those kinds of thing? 

Matthew Pencharz: Yes, and pile-drivers, cherry-pickers, and that kind of stuff—generators as well.  They are responsible for a remarkable amount of the emissions in London, especially the development in London, like the construction equipment going on in Croydon, all around here in central London and in Canary Wharf, where you have a lot of people also wandering around the streets, so with human exposure.  However, our enforcement powers are relatively weak.  What we have said to Government is that we really need that enforced down at city level, so that the boroughs, GLA or Nottingham can enforce that power, if they choose to do it, and put it in their planning system.  It has really quite an effect. 

There are also things like the diesel scrappage scheme, which we have raised previously.  The former Labour Government did a car scrappage scheme in 2009-10, and, in fact, it was so successful that it was almost revenue-neutral because of the greater VAT receipts the Government saw from selling those cars.  We feel, again, successive Governments have made a catastrophic policy decision to accelerate to dieselisation.  We need to get some of these older, more polluting diesels off the road faster, so a diesel scrappage scheme would be very helpful there. 

We also feel, around VED, that the Government could do more there too, over time; the centralisation of diesel has been over time, so to reverse that takes time.  We have to be reasonable to consumers who have bought vehicles in good faith.  We have to unwind that over time and incentivise people to switch away from fossil fuel and ICE vehicles—internal combustion engine vehicles—altogether, but certainly for smaller vehicles, diesel is not the solution, at least in urban areas.  It may be different in rural areas where the journey to travel is longer and it is less congested, but certainly in urban areas, which we three represent, diesel is not the solution for smaller vehicles. 

Q224   Ms Ritchie: Tony and then Nick, do you have anything you would like to add to that?

Cllr Newman: I would just emphasise that, in terms of the move away from diesel, that does need to be at much greater emphasis at national policy level.  There are some things that Government can nationally make change, whether it is through tax incentives, scrappage or whatever, around the diesel thing, and that it needs to recognise and truly devolve the powers locally.  The answer will not always be the same issue in every city or even in every borough in London.  We have heard an example of that already.  I am nervous.  “Devolution” is an easy word at the moment that everyone is using.  There are then potential proposals here to impose clean air zones.  That does not feel like devolution.  We need to have a much more mature and grown-up conversation with cities and areas within cities about what the local solutions will be.  Government should perhaps take more of a lead on the really big stuff.  If you are taking on the car industry, in terms of driving up their standards—you have seen the VW example—then there really is a greater role for national Government to play. 

Q225   Chair: The point we were making last week with the vehicles is that, up until about six months ago, we were still driving towards diesels and cleaner diesels.  Then, all of a sudden, it has all gone in reverse, so it is interesting what cars you are going to scrap and whether you are going to change your mind.  Are Government or scientists going to change their minds again?  That is what makes people sceptical.  I made the point that I drive a car from the countryside and come into the centre of town; should we have a scrappage scheme just for people in the centre of cities?  It is not as simple as it sounds, is it? 

Cllr Newman: No, it is not, which is why at the detail level perhaps you need to devolve the decision-making to those cities.  If a city wants to have an area where perhaps there is car-free zone and the buses and trams run freely, surely that decision is best taken by local people and not imposed by somebody sitting in an office in Whitehall.  

Q226   Ms Ritchie: Nick, what is your perspective coming from Nottingham?

Cllr McDonald: Our perspective is that Defra’s policy is welcome.  It seems inconsistent with some other aspects of Government policy.  We have talked a little about the tax regime and the degree to which it has incentivised diesel vehicles and we share that.  We have also touched on some of the non-transport emissions.  The cancellation of Green Deal and the feed-in tariff was something that we were in despair about because we did a lot with it.  We installed solar panels on whole estates of council housing, which has not only made a big economic impact on the people who live in those estates but also has a big effect on emissions.  It is not just a question of Defra’s policy; it is a question of governmental policy. 

There are also, let us be honest, issues around funding.  The Local Sustainable Transport Fund, which we have done a lot with to encourage public transport usage, to incentivise and to subsidise public transport usage, and to encourage and educate people about cycling—these are all of the things that we need people to be doing if we are going to be getting them out of their cards and ultimately reduce emissions in cities like Nottingham—ends this year and we have no replacement for it.  Yes, we are very, very keen to do more, but we need the ability to do more.  In terms of regulation, we have touched on clean air zones.  I am sure we will talk a bit more about that.  We welcome the idea of clean air zones but judge us on outcomes.  Allow us to create clean air zones that work for our city; allow us to regulate on ourselves, so that we can create something that works for our city.  We share the same aims in terms of reducing emission and making the city of Nottingham—I am sure other cities are the same—greener and cleaner.  

Q227   Ms Ritchie: You would say that your authority’s effectiveness has been constrained by resources, but also has there been a constraining by statutory powers and political will? 

Cllr McDonald: I will not talk again about tax and the issues around funding for positive schemes, but national policy of other Departments seems a bit out of line with Defra’s stated aims.  That is the first thing. 

Secondly, local government—I am not going to sit here and whinge about local government finance, because I am sure you hear that a lot—in the end, cannot do the things that we want to do without the funding to support those things.  When we are seeing funds like the Local Sustainable Transport Fund end, and it is a fund designed to do exactly the kind of things that Defra would like to see us encouraging our residents to do, that is inconsistent.  If we are going to work together to solve a difficult and serious problem, which we recognise is difficult and serious, there needs to be more joined-up government. 

Q228   Ms Ritchie: Have you been given any guidance by Government about how to deal with the situation and how to deal with replacement of those resources, or what you should do in order to achieve your aspiration in terms of reduction of emissions? 

Cllr McDonald: We are talking to various Departments all the time about these sorts of things, but I am not sure it is a question of guidance; it is a question of money, with respect.  We are seeing funding reduce in every area, so there is no magic pot that we can draw money from to replace these sorts of funds.  They are important funds and they have done important things over the last few years.  When they are cancelled—and we all know why that is and why all the different Departments of Government are having to find cuts, whether you agree with it or not—the effect is significant.  It is significant enough and it will be in other cities, too. 

Q229   Ms Ritchie: Tony, do you think your authority’s effectiveness has been constrained by resources, political will and statutory powers? 

Cllr Newman: Yes, without repeating it, the resources piece is absolutely critical.  It can affect local initiatives in terms of the schemes, such as the tram I was talking about, but right through to getting more people walking and cycling.  I would like to think that we have the imagination and creativity to keep doing a lot of that.  However, when you get up to some of the really big funding for infrastructure, that does come down to the resources, both of national and regional government. 

To use the Croydon example, we have the place of Croydon and the challenge there—you have massive pressure on transport infrastructure in terms of the rail going up right through Croydon and into London.  That is already making the news in London most days of the week because of the pressures on it.  It is not working and there are fears for five, 10 or 15 years from now.  Politicians, I hope, all send out broadly the right messages about encouraging people to use public transport more, but when their experience is as bad as it can be on a daily basis, I do not blame people—and we all do it from time to time—for taking the car.  We think, “I need to get there, so I am going to take the car.” 

The resources are significant.  Sometimes, as I said earlier, we need to change the terms of the debate and start thinking about some of this investment and infrastructure as investment and not just see it as an immediate spending pressure on a day-to-day basis. 

Q230   Dr Monaghan: I would like to follow up on Margaret’s question on Defra’s strategy and ask you what you feel other Government Departments place, by way of a priority, on increasing and improving air quality.  We will start with Nick, perhaps? 

Cllr McDonald: In a way, it is the same answer I will give now to the last answer; Government policy is inconsistent.  There are a number of examples.  I gave the example of the Green Deal, which we talked about, and the tax regime and the way it has incentivised diesel vehicles.  In terms of the Department for Transport, I do not think their policy is inconsistent with Defra’s aim of seeing emissions reduce and meeting European targets, but we are going to need to go a lot further a lot more quickly. 

To use Nottingham as an example, regional cities have the same sorts of challenges.  We have to think quite boldly about what we are going to do over the next 10 or 20 years if cities are not going to become gridlocked, congested nightmares.  That is when we are going to require much bolder policy.  In cities, and cities have to take their own responsibility, this is very much an urban perspective.  They have to be backed with investment from central Government.  We have three different lines of tram, for example.  I would love that to be 12 or even four, but we are not going to do it without Government support.  Quite simply, the local government finance does not allow us to make those sorts of investments without support.  We have to take some quite bold decisions about the way in which we are going to get people out of cars and on to public transport.  We need to start doing it now.  All cities need to be doing it. 

We are the only city in the UK that has a workplace parking levy, so every business that has more than 10 spaces pays a levy for every parking space it has.  That has been a difficult policy to square with the business community, but actually people are now starting to see what benefits it delivers.  It has not only paid for an extensive tram system; it has allowed us to pay for electric buses; it has allowed us to subsidise free cycle usage throughout the city.  These are the sorts of areas where Governments have to support cities in their aims to make their cities greener and cleaner.  We cannot do that on our own. 

Q231   Dr Monaghan: Do you think Government Departments, other than Defra, could be doing more to prioritise the improvement of air quality?

Cllr McDonald:  Absolutely, yes.  Government policy could be more joined-up.  I have already said that and there could be a far bolder approach to investing in infrastructure in cities—more of a European model, I have to say.  If that were to happen across the board more quickly, you would see cities would reduce their emissions more quickly over a period of time. 

Cllr Newman: For all the other issues I have raised, in London we do have—through the GLA and devolved structure there, and the mayoral model—more of a joined-up approach in terms of the way the buses are run, the Tube network and a lot of cross-borough working.  For all the challenges, some of which I have outlined today, the more you can devolve this to cities and perhaps a more joined-up approach from Government—and people will always look to national Government in terms of the lead, and the messages, whether it is on Green Deal or diesel, have not been particularly strong on this area.  It is not a great picture at the moment in terms of the message.  I will repeat: we do need to devolve some very practical measures down to local authorities.  Basic traffic management and regulations could be devolved locally, just in terms of getting the traffic to flow better as we address these other longer-term issues.  To answer your question, no, it is not as joined-up as it should be. 

Q232   Dr Monaghan: So you would like to see traffic regulations devolved to local authorities?  

Cllr Newman: Yes.

Q233   Dr Monaghan: In terms of that joined-up approach that you have mentioned, are there any particular areas of that that you would like to place an emphasis on?

Cllr Newman:  It is no good saying to someone who has just bought their new diesel car, “That was the wrong decision.  Why have you done it?  Do not drive it.” It is showing that there is a policy—from the street people live in through to the message of national Government—that there are reasons to change behaviour patterns or behaviour in terms of what type of car we buy, how we get to work, or whatever we are doing, and send a strong message.  There are mixed messages. 

I can speak of a similar story about the move away or the lack of funding in terms of solar-powered panels and thing like that.  At the same time, we might be saying to communities, “It is all about using the bus or the car.  We want a much greener future,” but if the message elsewhere is that the policy is moving away from that then the public get mixed messages at times.  As the Chair said, there is compelling evidence around diesel, from what I have read, but people also have a perception, “Well, we were told not to do that last year and now people are telling us…”  So a clear, coherent message around perhaps some key national priorities, coupled with some clear devolution messages to some of our cities—a coherent message and a clear one for a few years—would benefit everybody. 

Q234   Dr Monaghan: So you feel that the parties are not co-ordinated and the visions are fragmented?

Cllr Newman: Fragmented would be a good description.

Matthew Pencharz: There is an element of singing to the same hymn sheet, to a degree, here.  Until the Supreme Court judgment, the Government in general was not focused at all or very much—“very much” is fairer—on air pollution.  You saw focus certainly from Defra and the DfT, but frankly not much across Government in general.  The Supreme Court judgment is helpful in that it has focused minds.  Has it focused minds enough?  I am not sure.  There are some examples, and Nick touched on some of eco work with the retrofitting across the UK.  You never saw DECC co-ordinate that on air pollution.  It was only purely carbon, which was also what it was for, but it is also worth thinking about the cross-benefits of air pollution. 

We carried on going to Government asking for regional targets because London has always done very badly compared to our fuel poverty, our air pollution or our building stock, compared to other regions of the UK.  That was the preceding Labour Government policy, the Coalition eco and, I dare say—and I hope not, but I would not be completely surprised, unless they bring in regional targets—for the Conservative Government’s eco change they did post-election.  They argue about the cost of carbon, etc, but I would make the point that there are targets for rural communities, which are as expensive to do as in London.  They will not do a regional target for London, so that is an example where we have not seen co-ordination.  We also have seen some changes to the planning system, so, for example, on the cancellation of zero carbon homes proposals going forward, where the Mayor has said that we are going to carry on with our London Plan targets, despite that.  I do not know whether that will be the same, for example, in Nottingham or other areas across the UK.  New development is where you can really get value added for addressing air pollution, so we have quite stringent air pollution rules—despite Enderby Wharf, which I hope Mr Fitzpatrick will not return on to.   Despite that, we do have pretty stringent air quality neutral standards in the London Plan to ensure that development does not have an air quality impact in general.  Of course we have talked about the fiscal incentives when it comes to vehicle excise duty, which has been hugely successful in driving us to diesel for smaller vehicles, but that has been a mistake.  We do need to see that kind of cross-Government thinking that my colleagues here have talked about. 

Q235   Dr Monaghan: Is it fair to say that you are describing a fairly damning picture of the UK Government and emphasising the fact that leadership at the moment is coming from the local level, rather than the national Government in relation to improving air quality? 

Matthew Pencharz: Certainly, to answer the second part of your question first, if you do not mind, the Mayor and the boroughs—and it sounds like Nottingham as well, although I have less knowledge there, of course, than my own patch—really is showing the leadership.  We say that the Mayor has been putting in the most ambitious and comprehensive measures to address air pollution.  Yes, we get criticism saying we are not doing enough, because it is a big problem and a hard gap to close, but the Mayor’s and boroughs’ action alone will get us to three quarters of the way to compliance with nitrogen dioxide.  That is, given the scale of the challenge, quite an achievement. 

Q236   Chair: Is it that you feel you more or less have to do it that way?  Because, naturally, we want to see pollution across all the country reduce, but naturally we have the hotspots in the city centres in particular.  Therefore, surely, it is how local government works with national Government that we are trying to tease out.  Quite a lot of responsibility is yours, but what you are saying is that you need some cash to go with it.  How does Government target that cash to make sure that you spend it on this and not just shore up your budgets?  I have been in local government as well, so know what happens.  How does Government target it to make sure that you use the money in the right way? 

Matthew Pencharz: Cash is helpful, clearly.  We could bring forward the date of meeting the legal limits by a few years with some targeted cash—for example, on our bus fleet in London and to incentivise the turnover of cleaner taxis.  However, it is not just money; it is powers and regulation; it is ensuring that the Government, the DfT, and the Council of Ministers in the Commission ensure—I am going to get horribly technical here—that the conformity factor of the Euro 6 engine is as close to 1 as it can be.  It is bouncing around Brussels at the moment and the original proposal was not good enough.  We have been pushing Government to ask that it can be tightened up. 

We hope that, in light of the VW scandal and increasing evidence of the failure of Euro 4 and 5, that they will do that.  However, that is an important regulatory level that the Government and the Commission needs to pull.  I have mentioned vehicle excise duty repeatedly—apologies for that—but some of the bigger levers or hammers are not in fact in the hands of local government.  We are sitting in London.  We are quite lucky in that we have that regulatory power.  I think one of the earlier questions was about statutory powers; the Mayor’s statutory powers are quite strong in this area.  We are quite lucky in London, unlike arguably most other cities in the UK, to be able to bring in—and we already have brought in—congestion charging and low emission zones, and also to accelerate the throughput of cleaner buses in London. 

Q237   Chair: On London congestion charging and lower emission zones, you have that on heavy duty vehicles.  If you have a low emission vehicle you get away with no congestion charge, but what about the idea that if you have a higher emitting vehicle you pay a higher congestion charge?  

Matthew Pencharz: The ultra-low emission zone, which comes in in 2020, which is answering that question exactly, so it will come in September 2020, in four and a half years or so. 

Q238   Chair: Is that fast enough?

Matthew Pencharz: Any vehicle entering the congestion charging area will have to be a Euro 6 diesel, otherwise they pay a charge, and quite a high charge if you are a heavy vehicle.  I think it is £100 a day, which obviously adds up very quickly if you are driving in frequently. 

Is that quick enough?  I would say yes, because what we are asking people to do, for all commercial fleets, is that their vehicle has to be five years old or less.  For the vans, Euro 6 is only appearing this year, so it is pretty much four years or less.  That is quite an ask of business, when there is not the technology yet, certainly for the heavy vehicles, to go to electric. 

Chair: I will stop you there because I am conscious that David’s question really goes into the clean air zones.  Paul, have you finished with yours? 

Q239   Dr Monaghan: I will very quickly pick up on that specific issue that you were talking about there.  That is a policy decision of the Mayor; is that correct? 

Matthew Pencharz: The ultra-low emission zone—yes. 

Q240   Dr Monaghan: So, again, that is leadership coming from the local level rather than from the UK Government?

Matthew Pencharz: I would say yes. 

Cllr McDonald: Yes. 

Cllr Newman: Yes. 

Q241   David Simpson: At the very beginning, Matthew, you talked about different cities and parts of London that are in breach of the whole issue around nitrogen dioxide.  Then, Toby, you mentioned very briefly the imposed zones.  Whether they are imposed or whether they are agreed—and anybody can answer this—will they in themselves solve the issue and get the level of London back down to the levels that it should be under the EEC legislation? 

Cllr McDonald: Yes, that is an interesting question.  The issue of whether they are imposed or whether they are agreed, I agree ought to be moot, because we do not resist the idea of clean air zones.  We are anxious to find out how Defra proposes they will work, because we are not clear about that at the moment.  We are not clear about how vehicles will be monitored, charged and what the enforcement regime is going to be.  We are very, very keen that if they are introduced, they are introduced in a way that will allow local areas to enforce them themselves and allow local areas to nuance the parameters to suit their cities.  We are not resistant to the idea at all.  We want clean air in Nottingham. 

Q242   David Simpson: You are not resistant to it, but do you think they will solve it?

Cllr McDonald: They are part of the solution.  We have to be careful how they are implemented.  For example, I absolutely think that our taxi industry needs to be reformed quickly, for economic reasons, for the industry itself and for emissions reasons.  I can see how we can work very closely with various Government Departments to make progress on this.  

Q243   Chair: How in particular do we get to a national framework?

Cllr McDonald: It could be around clean air zones, but it could also be around a licensing regime, and to go back to the point I made before, it is about incentivising and funding to modernise fleet.  There is also an issue about technology platforms as well for taxis specifically. 

In terms of the more general point about clean air zones, we have to be very careful with buses.  Because if we move to a regime where effectively we are charging bus companies that are moving towards better standards but are not there yet, and they are passing those charges on to their customers and driving customers away from public transport and into their cars, we have the wrong outcome.  That is not to say that we should let bus companies off the hook by any means, but we should be careful about this.  We should introduce it in the right way, and that is why I think every city is going to have a slightly different solution.  Government introducing these clean air zones need to be concerned with outcomes and allow cities to have the flexibility to introduce zones that work for them as part of the solution—not the whole of it—so they can deliver the outcomes that both the European Commission and Defra want to see.

Q244   David Simpson: Very briefly, just to finish, Nick, you said earlier that you were reasonably content with the direction that Defra was going in, but what more policies can be put in place to incentivise local action?  What more policies could be put in place, do you believe, that can incentivise local action and help local councils and others?  

Cllr McDonald: In terms of Defra’s specific policy, I do not think there is a major resistance from a city like Nottingham to the things that Defra is saying.  We have already made points about the consistency or inconsistency of Government policy.  There have been some interesting points made about things like car scrappage schemes.  In fact, it was a very successful scheme nationally.  We would love to have a local ability to introduce something like that.  In the end, it does come down to money.  If you are going to get people out of high-emission cars, you have to find innovative ways to make them do it or, certainly in terms of heavy goods vehicles, buses or taxis, to work with industries to allow them to modernise their fleets. 

Q245   Chair: You refer to the situation around cars, buses and other forms of public transport.  What about cars?  Would you stop cars?

Cllr McDonald: Both light goods vehicles and cars—until we understand what clean air zones are going to be, how they are going to work, what charging regime there is going to be, who is going to enforce it, what it is going to be set out and whether we can make it work—

Q246   Chair: So the answer is no at the moment?

Cllr McDonald: The answer is that we would be quite nervous about it and we would want to understand more before we were committed to it. 

Cllr Newman: This is why you have to devolve the power.  You should not impose a one‑size‑fits‑all clean air zone from the centre, but they should be negotiated in genuine partnership as they suit particular areas. 

Chair: That is a very good point.  Jim, can I bring you in on ultra-low emission zones, zones in London in particular, please? 

Q247   Jim Fitzpatrick: It is a direct follow on to Mr Simpson’s question and, gentlemen, you have already covered it to a certain extent, but on the consultation on clean air zones and ultra-low emission zones and the like, Defra says any local authority will make a decision as to what vehicles are allowed in or not.  However, they also go on to say that they will consult on a national framework to make sure that there is consistency, so that individuals and companies can purchase vehicles and will be able to travel wherever in the country.  Mr McDonald, you made the point about how there is a lack of clarity as to where we are.  In terms of the consultation, local and national, is Defra doing enough to give you confidence that you know how to implement that which will work, whether it is a congestion charge zone extension or clean air zones? 

Cllr McDonald: No, and presumably the detail will come.  We will have imposed on us a requirement to create clean air zones and hopefully we will get funding through a number of different bids to create additional clean air zones.  We are happy to do that.  We are not being told there is total flexibility.  They are going to be different classes, and I think class B, for example, will be the minimum requirement in Nottingham.  I have said it already, but we need to understand how it is going to work.  In theory, we would be prepared to go further.  There is no resistance from local government here, as far as I am concerned.  There is certainly no resistance in Nottingham.  We would like our air to be as clean as we can make it in Nottingham; if that means going further, we would very happily do it.  However, we are also conscious of the need to do it in a way that is supportive of business, for example.  If we are looking at clean air zones in city centres, and we are going to introduce charging regimes for light goods vehicles, what is the effect going to be on independent businesses within those areas?  This could decimate retail areas, if we are not careful, so we need to be really careful about it.  We do need more detail.  I would like to think that rather than being recipients of some imposed scheme, we can talk in detail with Defra and other Government Departments about how to make it work best in our city.  I am sure other cities and boroughs will say the same. 

Q248   Jim Fitzpatrick: Is there clarity about the timeframe that Defra is working to for you to understand what they want to do so you can then co-ordinate and make sure it all works together? 

Cllr McDonald: There is a timeframe, as I understand it, so I do not think there is too much difficulty about that.  Whether or not there are detailed milestones within that timeframe, so we know what we need to do when, I doubt—certainly not in anything that I have read.  Until we know what the endgame is, and how ultimately it is going to work, it is very difficult for us to plan. 

Cllr Newman: I do not think there is enough clarity around the detail, and there does not seem to be, in the spirit of it at the moment, enough of a recognition to let go and make it a genuinely local deal and partnership.  If you just take the retail point alone, different areas and different cities have different out-of-town or in-town retail predominance, so how you get those goods to those retail outlets alone will vary from place to place.  One policy will not cover that.  

Matthew Pencharz: From a London perspective, when it comes to ultra-low and low emission zones, we really led the way on that so, in some ways, what Defra is saying does not directly affect us.  Effectively we are way ahead. 

It is worth saying that low emissions zones do work.  All of Greater London is covered by a low emission zone that has a standard for all vehicles except for cars and motorcycles at the moment, and we had 98% compliance for heavy goods vehicles and vans driving into London.  That was one of the main drivers of why we are compliant for particulate matter now, in a way that we were not before.  So those much older diesel vehicles were spitting out lots more particulate matter out the back, and that is one of the reasons we are now in compliance for the first time in the last few years. 

Where it would be helpful in having the national framework, particularly, is a techie point about having proper databases of all the vehicles.  Constructing the databases for clean air zones is not cheap and TfL has been covering that itself.  It could be tens of millions of pounds.  What they are asking London to do by 2025, which is a Euro 6 standard for all of Greater London by 2025, I think except for cars and motorcycles, does have a cost implication that we need to talk to Government about. 

The ultra-low emission zone, when it comes in in 2020—in fact, Chair, you did ask whether it was quick enough.  In some ways, Nick answered the question more eloquently than I did; you need to work with the commercial sector and industry to ensure those vehicles are on the market, there are enough of them, and there is enough penetration by 2020, so you do not have the cost of logistics in London going up so much that it becomes a difficult economic problem.  We are going to have almost halved the NOx emissions in central London by 2020.  It is already starting now because all of the bus routes we are letting have to be Euro 6 hybrid for double-deck or zero emissions for single-deck.  That is already having an effect on the streets.  There is a 64% reduction in particulate matter in central London.  That does have profound effects in Mr Fitzpatrick’s constituency in East London, but also all of London because these vehicles have to drive to central London.  We are going to see a huge reduction in the numbers of people living in areas that currently breach NO2 areas because of this clean air zone.  I would suggest that they do work but they do need to be done in partnership, and they are not cheap either.

Q249   Chris Davies: How will local authorities take into account a disparity between their real-world emissions from vehicles compared to laboratory emission measurements when assessing how much pollution their policies will prevent? 

Matthew Pencharz: I can answer that. 

Chris Davies: Can I settle for a very concise answer because we are against the clock?

Matthew Pencharz: I will be very quick.  Our modelling for the EULES is based not on the test cycle but on what we expect them to emit.  In fact, we hope the silver lining around the VW scandal is that the Commission will have a tighter conformity factor for Euro 6.  This would mean that the EULES would have a better outcome than we originally modelled, which would be, frankly, similarly not having the same emissions reductions as they promised, but something more realistic.  We hope that because of the furore, understandably, around the VW scandal, you will see a better conformity factor, so you will get a better outcome when the EULES comes in.  We do not know obviously until it happens, but we model on real world, not on laboratory tests.  I hope that is concise enough for you. 

Q250   Chair: You are not considering, like the Americans, taking a case against VW because they claim one thing on their vehicles and they are doing another?  I am convinced it is not just Volkswagen anyway.  Why are we letting them all off the hook? 

Matthew Pencharz: It is interesting to notice that our American friends are the people who get their man—in this case VW, but also you might say the former President of FIFA.  Sorry for buck-passing here, but that is the place for the European Commission to go for VW.

Q251   Chair: Because you made the point just now about whether the European Commission are being too soft on the motor vehicle manufacturers.  Is the lobby for motor vehicle manufacturers too strong in Brussels? 

Matthew Pencharz: Yes, in a concise answer; in my view, yes. 

Chris Davies: I will take back the idea of suing VW to my local government offices and see what response I get.

Q252   Angela Smith: We have covered some of this territory, Chair, but I do think it is worth exploring the further support that councils think is needed from central Government to replace fleet buses.  We have talked about devolution and so on, but there is a resources issue as well.  I wonder whether all three—it may be less of an issue for London—of you could comment quickly on that.

Cllr McDonald: We work with our bus companies, one of which we own, to encourage them to modernise their fleet.  We have a low emission zone in our city centre and we are very much prepared to go further to encourage, incentivise and, if necessary, penalise in relation to modernisation of their fleet.  It could be done more quickly.  If we are talking about creating clean air zones, in the long term there is a case for using the charges that you levy on polluting vehicles to support modernisation of bus fleets, because public transport is part of the solution.  We want more people to use public transport.  We need more people to use public transport in a city like Nottingham.  If that does not happen, we are not going to be successful in reducing emissions.  Without a more innovative way of funding the modernisation of bus fleets, I do not think it will happen as quickly as it needs to.  Good bus companies are moving to the European standards more quickly than they need to, but there is a case for being more innovative about how we use charges levied on polluting vehicles, perhaps in clean zone areas, to fund to provide a mechanism for modernising public transport. 

Tony Newman: I can only agree with that in London.  I want to see it happen rapidly.  

Matthew Pencharz: The only point I would make is that more money always helps.  We have shared with Government the figures of what it would be to have a more rapid acceleration to having all our buses Euro 6 or zero emission.  There are different costs depending on when they want to do that.  We could do it by 2020, by 2023 or by 2025, but all this has a cost, because you are kicking buses off the road that you would otherwise keep going. 

Q253   Chair: Why do you not move to electric buses rather than Euro 6 buses, which are still too high on pollution?

Nick McDonald: We will have the largest fleet in Europe. 

Matthew Pencharz: Electric double‑decks are only just appearing.  We are going to do a trial of the first fully electric double‑deck very soon, but the technology is not yet mature.  That is not to say that it will not be in half a decade or so. 

Q254   Angela Smith: That is interesting, because the point about doing things more quickly is really important.  We have had written evidence about tram trains, and the one place that it does not mention for tram trains is the one place where they are being piloted, which is Sheffield-Rotherham.  We got the go‑ahead for the tram train project in 2007, and they are still not on the road.  They are not going to be on the road until 2017, so there is a 10‑year timeline for this kind of project.  Do you think that there is anything that the Government and the DfT could do to quicken the pace of the kind of innovation that you are talking about for tram trains, electric buses and so on?

Matthew Pencharz: In fairness to the Government, the DfT did secure a £500 million pot for the Office for Low Emission Vehicles, OLEV, to try to stimulate that kind of innovation.  I would say, coming from London, that I obviously realise that we are in competition with other regions around the UK but, when it comes to the best bang for your buck in that kind of innovation, we would have liked to run a route that goes from Stratford to Walthamstow using inductive charging buses.  That kind of innovative project is a combination of European funding and some funding from OLEV as well. 

Q255   Angela Smith: I do not think my question was so much about funding, but the bureaucracy and the unnecessary delays that we sometimes see. 

Nick McDonald: I will give you an answer that relates to both.  Tram trains are really interesting.  We are looking at tram train options in Nottingham, because we want to extent our network further.  We have a HS2 station that is going to be fairly close to Nottingham, but between Nottingham and Derby.  We have an airport, which we do not have a rail link to at the moment.  We are looking at all of these sorts of things.  I do not think that there is, in the UK, a proper model for how you develop that kind of infrastructure.  Yes, it is about funding, but it is also about the mechanism for doing it. 

We effectively developed an ad hoc solution in Nottingham by introducing the workplace parking levy.  The workplace parking levy has been very successful actually and lots of cities are now looking at that, but it seems strange that that is our solution and another city has a different solution.  If you look at the European cities, they have a much more settled way of funding these sorts of things.  I think, if we want cities to develop that sort of infrastructure, it is probably the biggest thing you can do to reduce emissions over a period of time and get more people using very low‑carbon forms of transport.  We ought to be able to solve that problem, rather than fudge our way through it every time a city wants to develop major infrastructure. 

Q256   Chair: What can we do to encourage these technologies to get here quicker?  Angela, you made the point that this was from 2007 to 2017, which is 10 years.

Angela Smith: They were two different Governments as well, so this is not a party political point either. 

Matthew Pencharz: You have touched on a wider problem in the UK about how slow we are.  I do not know anything about the tram train, but I guess it is quite a big piece of infrastructure development.  There is a wider problem that we have in the UK that the current Government are trying to overcome, in how slow it is to develop these things and bring the project forward. 

Also, some of the way the cost-benefit analysis is done in Government is, frankly, just wrong‑headed.  For example, the Treasury would never have cleared the Jubilee Line Extension.  Its cost-benefit analysis 25 or 30 years ago would not have cleared it.  Clearly, Margaret Thatcher, John Major or whoever was the Prime Minister just said, “Just do it.”  They wanted us to just do it, so it was done.  It is an example of wrong‑headedness at times, when it comes to doing the cost-benefit analysis for these sorts of projects, which do have a long lead‑in time, because they are not small beer.  I think that there is a problem in this country, and I hope that Lord Adonis and the National Infrastructure Commission will be seeking to overcome these problems that we have had for a long time in the UK. 

Tony Newman: Transport policy is the only area where people come in with a completely straight face and talk to you about the 30‑year plan we have to possibly bring the Tube extension down or expand a runway.  Could we talk about a slightly shorter timeframe?  They think a 30‑year plan is something they should be proud of. 

Angela Smith: That is just Heathrow.

Tony Newman: People should be banned from talking about 30‑year plans and talk about what they are going to do in a maximum of 10 years.  

Q257   Rishi Sunak: I have a very specific question for Matt.  We have been hearing a lot about emissions, and I keep hearing about HGVs, cars, taxis, buses and all the rest of it, but I have not heard anything about airports, surprisingly.  As someone who is a layperson to this, when we think about the nitrogen dioxide impact of airports, and you have seen the maps, does it largely come from the traffic associated with the airport rather than the flights themselves?  Do you have any data to explain that split?

Matthew Pencharz: If you look at the London heat map of nitrogen dioxide, you obviously have central London; you unfortunately have a bit of Croydon.  You also have Canary Wharf and then you also have Heathrow, which is a very deep colour red.  You can apportion where the emissions come from—how much is vehicular transport to the airport, because of the airport.  Remember all the logistics functions, all the way down the A4/M4 to Slough and as far as Cardiff, frankly.  That is a long way away from Heathrow.  You can apportion where it comes from.  Yes, it is not the aeroplane landing or the tugs dragging the vehicles around, although they do have an impact.  It is a lot of the traffic because of the airport. 

You have given me the opportunity—and thank you very much because I had not yet said this—to talk about the Defra plan and any plan for the Government to get within the air pollution limits.  It will not happen any time soon whatsoever, certainly not by 2025—you are pushing it back decades—if you are to expand Heathrow.  Heathrow is a fundamental problem to do it before 2025, under current operations.  If you wanted to add a third runway, a number of extra flight movements and therefore a number of vehicle movements for people to get to the airport, the freight and the logistics, to suggest that there is any chance of this country being within legal limits anytime soon is frankly impossible. 

Q258   Rishi Sunak: Can I just push back on that?  If the issue is all the vehicles going to an airport to take the extra flights and the freight associated with that, presumably that would exist if we created extra flights anywhere.  This is what I am trying to distinguish.  Maybe I am misunderstanding.  Say we are going to have extra airport capacity.  That would generate extra travel to those flights.  Why does it necessarily matter where they go?  Tony may have a view.  I do not know, but I would be interested to know.  Do you see what I am getting at? 

Matthew Pencharz: You are compounding an already air‑polluted part of the UK, in London.  It is very densely populated.  You have a lot of London suburbs around there, so you are affecting a lot of inhabitants, of people.  Whatever happens, if Heathrow just disappeared, you would still have the M4/A4 driving very close to its site, which is obviously a source of air pollution, even if they were not all going to Heathrow, which obviously a lot of those vehicles are doing.  If you were to have airport expansion, which we feel and the Mayor feels you need, you need to have that extra airport capacity in a part of the country that does not have a huge number of human inhabitants and is not already in a very highly stressed part of the UK, so that part of West London.  His solution to that is obviously a Thames Estuary airport, where you have far fewer people at all. 

Q259   Rishi Sunak: I understand his point of view, but I am asking the more specific question.  It is not the airline necessarily that is causing the pollution.  It is access to the airport and the vehicles travelling to it.

Tony Newman: Very much a Croydon view on that would be a second runway at Gatwick, with improved train links to Gatwick.  That would nail the solution. 

Chair: If we get into a debate on the airports, we will be here all day.  Margaret, did you want to come in?

Q260   Ms Ritchie: This is not about airports.  We know of other cities in Europe that are planning to do certain things, like Brussels and Dublin have plans for a possible ban on diesel cars in the centre of their cities.  Oslo has plans to better deal with congestion.  Do you have plans to deal with that in your overall strategy, in order to address not only congestion, but to address emission levels?  Can we have short answers?

Matthew Pencharz: Yes, London has the ultra-low emission zone, which is now enacted in what is called a scheme order.  That actually means that the market, commerce and industry, and residents now know this is coming down the track.  It is now only four and a half years away.

Q261   Chair: Before you disappear, Matthew, can I say a little bit about Oxford Street?  When are the monitors going to be working?  It is quite a good idea, if you have a very high‑polluting area, to make sure the monitors are working.  Whose responsibility is it to get those working?  Is anybody considering actually having a pedestrian zone in Oxford Street or is that just too difficult to achieve?

Matthew Pencharz: When it comes to the monitor, I believe King’s College operates that.  Have I got that right?  King’s College actually operates the monitor. 

Q262   Chair: Are you encouraging them to get it fixed?

Matthew Pencharz: It would be nice if it were fixed, wouldn’t it?  It seems to have been broken for a while. 

Q263   Chair: Are you encouraging them to fix it?  You have not actually answered the question.

Matthew Pencharz: I personally have not rung up King’s College saying, “Fix the monitor.”  I do not know if my electricians have; I will have to ask.

Q264   Chair: Is anybody from the local authority doing it?

Matthew Pencharz: I am just being told that it is City of Westminster’s responsibility.  You can ask them.  When it comes to Oxford Street, ask the businesses what their view of pedestrianisation is.  It is interesting that, of the two mayoral candidates likely to win, both have been discussing pretty ambitious schemes for Oxford Street.  It is not an easy thing to do, because people do not like changing buses.  You would be disrupting a hell of a lot of bus routes.  Pedestrianisation sometimes does an odd thing to an area, certainly at night, when you have no vehicular traffic, so it is not as straightforward as you might have thought.  Where do you turn the buses round?  It is not straightforward.  Arguably, with Crossrail coming in, and the huge extra capacity of public transport to that area, there may be an opportunity in due course, when that comes along.  In large part, that is going to be a political argument for the two main candidates, and I suppose it is for them to do.

Chair: Thank you, gentlemen, very much.  We have taken you on quite a long journey this afternoon.  We appreciate your evidence and your answers.  If you have anything further that you feel, when you go back and think about it, that you would like to present us in writing, then feel happy to do so. 

Matthew Pencharz: We will write to you about the wharf.

Chair: Yes, certainly the first points we raised with you.  Thank you very much. 

Examination of Witnesses

Witnesses: Andrew Bauer, Deputy Director of Policy, National Farmers’ Union Scotland, and Dr Diane Mitchell, Chief Environment Adviser, National Farmers’ Union, gave evidence.

Q265   Chair: Thank you very much for coming.  We are now going to talk about agriculture, emissions and what have you.  Diane, would you like to introduce yourself, please, and then Andrew?  We will keep on straight away.  Thank you for coming to give us evidence. 

Dr Mitchell: I am Diane Mitchell.  I am the Chief Environment Adviser at the National Farmers’ Union.

Andrew Bauer: I am Andrew Bauer, the Deputy Director of Policy with the National Farmers’ Union of Scotland.

Q266   Chair: I have a nice simple question for you to start with.  What are the trends in emissions of key local air pollutants from the agricultural sector?  Who wants to start off with that one?

Dr Mitchell: I will kick off.  From an England perspective, or certainly UK‑wide perspective initially, certainly the trends are going in the right direction.  One of the key emissions that would be of interest to the Committee is ammonia, and ammonia emissions have fallen by approximately 23% since 1980.  I am guessing that one of the other emissions that you might be interested in is particulates, because ammonia reacts in air with other compounds and other emissions to form particulates.  My understanding is that, in terms of agriculture’s contribution to those, there is a general declining trend in finer particulates from agriculture. 

Q267   Chair: With tractors, for instance, some of the modern ones have AdBlue in the systems.  Have you any idea of what percentage of tractors, through the industry, are meeting those targets?  How many old tractors are out there?  Do you have any idea at all?

Dr Mitchell: I do not.  I can try to find out for you.  It is certainly something that we can follow up on, but I do not have any information on that to hand. 

Q268   Chair: The rest of the industry is looking at that.  Can I also bring you in, Andrew?  What about minimal cultivations?  Is the industry looking at some of those processes, especially on carbon and others?

Andrew Bauer: It has certainly been an area in the cropping parts of the country, which Scotland has proportionately less of.  There has been uptake of that.  It brings some challenges, but I think it is seen in most cases as not being done for air quality reasons or greenhouse gas emissions reasons.  It is a management tool and a way to reduce pest and disease pressure, but it has certainly become more commonplace.

Q269   Chair: As far as ammonium nitrate is concerned, being applied to land, there would be an argument for more injection into the land, rather than any wastage.  Not only does it have potential to allow the nitrogen to go up into the atmosphere, it is also less effective as far as growing the crop is concerned.  What work is the industry doing on that?

Dr Mitchell: In terms of work that the industry is doing, the NFU is part of an initiative called Tried & Tested.  It is an industry‑led initiative that was set up in 2009.  It was formed to help provide the right tools and information to farmers to help make improvements in nutrient‑management planning, mature‑management planning and to provide advice on feeds as well. 

Q270   Chair: I am talking particularly about artificial nitrogen, ammonium nitrate.  It is very expensive and it seems a nonsense that that goes up into the atmosphere.  I suspect that, by the very price of the fertiliser, less is wasted, but are we being proactive enough on the thought of injecting it into the ground wherever possible, rather than actually spreading it on the land and waiting for it to be washed in?

Dr Mitchell: The industry is certainly promoting good practice and best practice.  We do that through the nutrient‑management initiative, Tried & Tested.  I do know that the industry more generally is doing a lot on helping provide the right advice to farmers to help make improvements in resource efficiency or nutrient‑management planning.  I know that there is a lot of investment that has gone into providing advisers, whether feed nutritionists or agronomists, with some really good information, not just about production, but also about production efficiencies, resource efficiency and nutrient‑management planning.  It is an area of work that we are actively promoting.

Q271   Chair: Before I bring in Andrew, I always think it is good with farmers to encourage them in the pocket.  One way of encouraging farmers to get the best equipment to inject their fertiliser is that that fertiliser is going to go a lot further and perhaps they can use less of it.  Is there a drive for that within the industry, because I think it would be very sensible?

Andrew Bauer: I can speak about Scotland here.  The main drivers have been the price of fertiliser but, in recent years, the work that the industry has done with the Scottish Environment Protection Agency to meet the Water Framework Directive has driven; that has probably been the biggest regulatory driver and that has certainly encouraged farmers to take far greater consideration of what is going on in their fields and make the investments that you are describing there.

Q272   Angela Smith: I think the work that is ongoing helping to encourage best practice is very interesting.  There is a lot of investment in there, but do you think that there is more that Defra could do to support this work, by way of directing European Union funding, agri‑environment schemes or just more generally?  Does Defra do enough?

Dr Mitchell: There is certainly some work that could be done on promoting research and development and innovation.  That is really important.  Defra has a role there and also in helping to facilitate information exchange.  Once we have the research there, we also need farmers to be able to access the research.  We need farmers to be able to use the results of research.  Just on that research element, it is really important that we get farmers involved in that discussion, so farmers are helping initiate ideas to continue research and development.  The important aspect of that is that, actually, perhaps some of the solutions that we are looking for might not actually come from Defra or a piece of regulation.  They might come from the farmers themselves, so they need to be involved in that. 

Q273   Angela Smith: My point is whether Defra does enough to support farmers, the NFU and the scientists in doing all of this work, the innovation, the development and this spread of best practice.  That was more my point. 

Dr Mitchell: I think that there is always more that can be done.  Certainly, we would like farmers to get more involved in helping to drive research, and Defra has a role there.  European Innovation Partnerships is an EU initiative that is very keen to involve farmers in setting that agenda on research.  We would like Defra to follow that lead.  Of course, Defra has some broader responsibilities in relation to providing the right tools for farmers, and information and advice, whether that is through agri‑environment, through grant funding or through initiatives that they support, like catchment‑sensitive farming. 

Q274   Ms Ritchie: How far do Government policies for agriculture take into account their air quality impacts on human health and the environment?  In that respect, is enough research being done into the health impacts that air pollution may have on farmers’ health?

Chair: Has anything been done?

Andrew Bauer: I am certainly not aware of research into air quality impacts on farmers’ health.  We have seen some tragic incidents in Northern Ireland, where there have been fatalities.  They have been in very specific circumstances.  Out in the fields, I am not aware of anything.  I am aware that there has been work on monitoring greenhouse gas emissions, which has used really quite cutting‑edge technology to measure emission from crops and from livestock.  There is the potential there, I suppose, to measure the impact on farmers, but I am not aware of anything having been done. 

Dr Mitchell: What was your first question about?

Ms Ritchie: How far do Government policies for agriculture take into account their air quality impacts on human health and the environment? 

Dr Mitchell: There is an extensive set of regulations and policies that take account of air quality impacts in relation to ammonia.  For example, we have international agreements like the Gothenburg Protocol, which has just recently been renegotiated and sets new targets. At an EU level, we have the National Emissions Ceiling Directive, which is currently in place, which sets ceilings or targets for ammonia, but that is also being renegotiated at the moment.  We have the Industrial Emissions Directive, which affects pig and poultry producers.  A key driver for that has been the reduction in ammonia emissions.  There is quite an intensive set of regulatory drivers, and of course there are also the Habitats Directive and habitats regulations that will protect sensitive habitats. 

I know that there is also some national legislation that protects sensitive habitats, like SSSIs, which are not part of the European framework.  There are broader policies as well that help farmers make improvements in resource efficiency.  We have just talked a little bit about those; there are agri‑environment schemes and also grant funds that help farmers to make improvements in their resource efficiency.  There is also catchment sensitive farming, providing advice to farmers in particular catchment areas. 

Q275   Chair: Do any of these sorts of policies actually take into account air quality?  We have nitrogen‑free zones and poultry units with nitrates that have to be dealt with, but do we have any policies in place that deal with emissions of gas and its effect on farmers?  I am not sure we do.

Andrew Bauer: At the farm level, the obvious one is the Industrial Emissions Directive and then the Pollution Prevention and Control regulations.  From my perspective, the others are there and having an impact, but it is less obvious to the farmer.  The PPC regulations are the ones that are felt.  For the others, where we are seeing changes again they are being driven by things like the Water Framework Directive or the Nitrates Directive, and the multiple benefits they are giving. 

Q276   David Simpson: If, as Margaret touched on, more research was needed in relation to the impact of these things, who should pay for it?  Should it be Government or agriculture?  Second to that, from the National Farmers’ Union point of view, are farmers fully aware of the impact of this?  Smaller farmers will just jump on a tractor, sow the fertiliser and do what they have to do, but do they really grasp the impact of the difficulties and the whole issue around the legislation?

Andrew Bauer: On the point about research, a lot of that research is being delivered via levy boards and the farmers are making a contribution there.  If that research is going to be to the benefit of farming, then there is probably a strong case for farming at least contributing to that research.  If this is something that is purely being driven by a regulatory requirement and farmers are not going to see some value from it, then we would be looking to Government in saying, “This is for the greater good.  This is not delivering for farming,” so the Government needs to step in there.

Are farmers aware?  I think they are aware of their obligations to wider society.  They are aware of odour issues.  They are aware of water quality issues.  They are probably less aware of the less obvious emissions to air, but through the climate change agenda and the Water Framework Directive agenda, that awareness is rising rapidly.  It is certainly noticeable. 

Q277   Chair: Even when it comes to things like spraying crops—and I speak now as a farmer—we certainly did not take enough protection historically.  I think farmers are getting better, but they probably need to be made aware of the effects that some of the chemicals they are using could have on their health.  Do you think we are doing enough about that?

Andrew Bauer: It has not been the issue north of the border that it has been south.  For ourselves, the Water Framework Directive is driving action on pesticides as much as it is on nutrients.  The European Commission has identified Scotland as an example of best practice.  We are proud of the work that farmers in Scotland have done, which includes cropping and moving further away from watercourses with the sprays that they are using.

Q278   Chair: What about in England, Wales and Northern Ireland?

Dr Mitchell: There is an increasing awareness amongst farmers about their environmental responsibilities.  One of the points that I would make is that we probably have not been very good at joining up some of our messages to farmers.  We tend to focus on particular issues.  For example, it may be nitrates, and we talk a lot to farmers about nitrates and what they should do to help make improvements there, then we might talk about greenhouse gases and then we might talk about ammonia.  What we perhaps should be talking about is some of the common messages that are underlying some of these emissions.  A lot of the activities that we are asking farmers to undertake are similar or common across addressing a number of these emissions, certainly in greenhouse gas emissions, water quality and ammonia. 

Q279   Angela Smith: Sprayers now have to be qualified, I believe.  It is now a legal requirement that sprayers are qualified to do the job that they do, so does the qualification to engage in spraying activities include environmental awareness as part of it?

Andrew Bauer: It does, yes.  It does for the actual person.  That is a requirement.  The last remaining grandfather rights were phased out at the end of November last year.  For the actual people themselves and the equipment, we are going through a phased introduction of mandatory testing and that will take a number of years to come in.  Every single person who is now doing spraying will be tested on their awareness and that will include awareness of impacts on the environment.

Q280   Angela Smith: Thank you.  The EU proposes ammonia reduction targets of 21% by 2030, which the NFU thinks are at the limits of technical feasibility.  Can I ask what evidence you based this conclusion on?

Dr Mitchell: The proposal from the European Commission is a reduction by 21% of ammonia by 2030.  That proposal was set out by the Commission in its Clean Air Package in 2013, so our analysis is based on the information that was provided by the Commission and the Commission’s consultants, at that time, and its impact assessment.  They ran a number of scenarios and one of them was on technical feasibility.  One of our real concerns, when those proposals were published, was about whether the Commission, the Commission consultants and the impact assessment had taken account of whether growth had been factored into their calculations.  We have an underlying concern about whether industry growth has been accounted for in those calculations that were presented. 

Q281   Angela Smith: Does the NFU have a factor in mind that it deems to be more acceptable or more realistic?  The EU’s target is 21%, but what is the NFU’s target?

Dr Mitchell: Without undertaking the same level of analysis, which the Commission’s consultants undertook, and I understand that it involved very technically detailed and complex modelling, we do not actually have a figure ourselves that we have promoted.  What we have said is that work needs to be done to look at what is technically feasible, achievable and affordable to the industry, in that time to 2030. 

Q282   Angela Smith: Have you looked at the successful approaches adopted in the Netherlands and Denmark on this aspect of what we are talking about?

Dr Mitchell: Yes, and I am familiar with some of the requirements that are made on Danish and Dutch farmers.  I was in the Netherlands at the end of November.  I went on a two‑day study tour, which was organised by the European Commission.  That was very interesting.  What I found interesting about that was that I know that the Netherlands has taken quite a strict approach and it has had quite strict legislation, requiring farmers to make reductions in ammonia. 

What I found interesting about that visit was that it appears that the Dutch are now changing the approach that they take.  Yes, the legislation may still be there, but, as I understood from the two‑day tour, they are taking greater account of the potential for economic development.  I took it that perhaps they had gone a little too far in the past and been a little bit too strict, but they do recognise that economic development has to take place, so they are re‑looking at the approach that they take, so that they are protecting the environment, but also allowing farms and other industry sectors to grow. 

Andrew Bauer: Certainly, from a Scottish perspective, what has earned us plaudits from the European Commission is the results and the way that the results are being delivered.  From a Water Framework Directive, the results are being delivered by working with the farmers, giving the farmers time to change and giving them the advice that they need in order to change, not taking a very hard line, with a very hard date, by which time they must be completely compliant.  I have never heard anyone describe the environment directive and the EU as a soft touch, so for them to say that that has worked in Scotland speaks volumes. 

Q283   Angela Smith: On that point, and this is my final question, Chair, what do you think are the barriers to greater use by farmers of measures to reduce ammonia emissions?  If I may frame it this way, you just mentioned lack of awareness, but there also may be financial and technological barriers. 

Andrew Bauer: There are financial and technical barriers, not least given the current state of agriculture in many sectors.  There is also a market driver here, in what the general public wants agriculture to look like.  Does it want agriculture to happen in big sheds with abatement technology or does it want agriculture to happen out in a field?  There is a real decision and a real debate that has to happen there with society, saying whether we are driving for efficiency, for animal welfare, provenance or quality.  What is it that we are looking for? 

The market is sending messages at the moment and farmers are responding to them.  They are responding to them in the context of very strained finances and a lack of time.  Certainly, in Scotland, we are down to 2.2 full‑time equivalents per farm.  That is not a business that has a lot of time to reflect on its impacts on air quality.  If we want the advice to stick, we need to go over and above, as we have done in Scotland, to present it to the farmer in a way that is going to be able to digest and act on.

Q284   Chair: Further to the points I made earlier, one way of appealing to farmers is, if their nitrogen is going up into the atmosphere, it is not growing their crops, so it is costing them money.  If their manures and slurries are being washed into the river or going into the water supply, then they are not actually growing their crops.  It is how we work together to improve what is going up into the atmosphere and into the water, by actually appealing to the farmers to be able to manage that better.  I know it is not always simple; the weather sometimes turns wrong and it rains a lot when you put fertiliser on, but I think there is scope.  At the moment, it is almost seen as a stick to beat the farmers with.  In some ways, it does not need to be.  Are you doing enough to change these attitudes?

Andrew Bauer: On that point about win‑wins, there is an excellent knowledge transfer programme in Scotland, funded by the Scottish Government and run by the Scottish Agricultural College, called Farming for a Better Climate.  They have focus farms and they have lots of events on farms.  One of the things that was very interesting out of that was that the win‑win message does not always penetrate to the extent that you would expect, for those time‑pressured, financially‑pressured reasons I described earlier on.  You can tell someone that this is going to save them money and they may still persist. 

Where they saw greater potential was in this message about stewardship and handing it on to the next generation on the farm.  That is maybe where we have struggled with air quality, because the impacts are diffuse and they are long range.  It is slightly more complicated than saying, “This is going to save you money.  Therefore, you should do it.”

Q285   Dr Monaghan: I would like to turn to greenhouse gas emissions, if I can.  I have a question for Diane.  Diane, is it time for the UK Government to set a clear policy direction for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture?

Dr Mitchell: In England, there is already a commitment set in the Low Carbon Transition Plan from 2009.  There is a target in there to make reductions to 3 megatonnes of carbon equivalents for the third carbon budget, which is 2018‑22.  In terms of what the industry is doing, as a result of that target being set, the industry developed its Greenhouse Gas Action Plan, which is a commitment by a number of agricultural industry partners, including the NFU, setting out how the industry plans to make its contribution to that reduction.  It has a detailed plan for how it plans to do that.  The industry is committed to that commitment.  There are a number of other things that the industry is doing.  Just at the end of last year, the NFU, alongside a number of other organisations like AHDB, launched its Dairy Roadmap, setting out some of the good practices that the dairy sector is doing, including what it was doing on nutrient‑management planning, but also carbon reduction.  There are lots of things that the industry is doing to help fulfil that commitment.  [Interruption.]

Chair: I think the division bell has gone.  Unless Paul is really committed, I do not think we will ask you back.  We will ask for written evidence on the rest of question 14 and on 15 regarding methane gas, because that is another interesting one.  New Zealand has done quite a lot of work on types of diets for cattle and sheep to see if they can reduce the amount of methane gas.  The quicker an animal finishes, the less methane gas it gives off.  Those are interesting things.  I am not entirely sure I am interested in whether they should eat less meat, but that is me.  I must declare an interest as a farmer.  Seriously, if you can, get those to us.  I do not know, Paul, if you want to add anything last, then we must go and vote. 

Dr Monaghan: I am happy to have evidence in a written format, but can we just follow up that first question with a supplementary to Diane, which is for her to perhaps come forward with suggestions as to what the UK Government can do to more effectively support the NFU, in terms of taking forward the plan that you have highlighted there just now?

Chair: The best thing you can do with that is supply it to us in writing, because otherwise we will be missing our vote and we may not be popular for doing so.  I appreciate your evidence.  I am sorry that we had to rush you a bit at the end, but if you could give us those written answers to Paul’s question, that last one, and to the methane gas one, we would be most obliged.  Thank you very much for coming this afternoon and giving evidence.  Again, we had better go and vote.  Thank you very much. 

              Oral evidence: Air quality, HC 479                            2