Local authorities will get just £500,000 - down from £1m last year and £3m in 2011-12 - despite manifesto pledge to increase efforts to tackle dirty air

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

The government has halved the amount of money it gives English local authorities to fight air pollution, despite a manifesto pledge to do more to tackle the UK’s dirty air.

Just £500,000 will be distributed to councils including Leeds, Manchester, and Southampton for 2015-2016 under the air quality grant programme, the environment department has confirmed. That is down from £1m the year before and £3m in 2011-2012.

The cut comes despite the government being forced to publish a national cleanup plan because many British cities breach European safety limits, and recent figures showing the percentage of people dying prematurely from pollution in England has increased.



The Conservative party promised in its manifesto this spring that “we will continue to do even more to tackle air pollution”.

Alan Andrews, a lawyer at ClientEarth which won the supreme court case which forced publication of the government’s cleanup plan, said the government’s approach to the health crisis was laughable.

“Why, when ordered by a court to take immediate action, have they halved the money for local authorities? It was already a desultory amount of money [even before the cuts] given the cost of the health impacts.”

“It [the grants cut] really neatly encapsulates everything that is wrong with the government approach to air pollution.”

In total, the government spends nearly £10m each year on directly tackling air pollution, which the health watchdog says is responsible for nearly 29,000 premature deaths a year. The local authorities grants programme has issued £52m since it began in 1997, £11m of that since 2010.

The £500,000 this year, which was first reported by the trade magazine ENDS Report, will be partly spent on supporting electric car charging points, and promoting walking and cycling. But a large chunk will be spent on feasibility studies for the five cities earmarked for ‘clean air zones’ by 2020, which the government announced last month.

Leeds gets the largest chunk of the funding, at £107,850 in total for emissions modelling, a feasibility study on its clean air zone and monitoring of the toxic gas NO2. Ealing and Islington in London, where some parts of the capital breached annual pollution limits in days earlier this month, also receive funding.

A Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs spokeswoman said: “Tackling air pollution is a priority for this government and the air quality grant scheme is just one of the many ways we are supporting action on air quality.”



She cited a £40m Department for Transport pot awarded this week for cities and towns to encourage electric cars, which have no tailpipe emissions.