Greater Manchester have been told that their Clean Air Plan – which does not include the implementation of a Clean Air Zone – can go ahead after being assessed by Defra and the Department for Transport, although campaigners say it doesn’t go far enough.
Once they had u-turned on the idea of targeting drivers, Greater Manchester claimed that an ‘investment-led’ approach would be sufficient to allow the council to meet air quality targets by the 2026 deadline.
The cornerstone of the investment-led scheme is a £51.1m investment in zero-emission electric buses for the Bee Network, £8m for taxi drivers transitioning to cleaner vehicles and £5m for measures to manage traffic flow on some roads in the centre of Manchester and Salford.
Of all the city regions in the UK legally mandated to improve its air quality, Greater Manchester is the only one that has not introduced a scheme to charge the most polluting vehicles prompting, in 2022, the Environment Minister George Eustice MP to claim that there is ‘little robust evidence’ to show that a non-charging scheme could meet legal obligations to achieve compliance with NO2 limits in the shortest possible time.
Now Defra and the Department for Transport say they are satisfied that Greater Manchester have provided sufficiently robust evidence that they can achieve compliance with legal limits faster without charging.
The local councils have also been told they can cancel contracts relating to the proposed Clean Air Zone, such as signs and cameras.
Andy Burnham, the Mayor of Greater Manchester thanked the Governemnt for their ‘vote of confidence’ adding: ‘Because we have implemented the first phase of the Bee Network on time and on budget, the Government clearly trusts us to deliver and has seen the evidence that our approach is working. The Bee Network is cleaning up our air and keeping the cost of travel as low as possible. Its success is allowing us to remove a big weight of worry off the shoulders of people who need to drive as part of their job.
‘We are grateful to Steve Reed [Defra] and Heidi Alexander [Transport] for backing us with funding to take our approach further and faster. We will now continue to work towards an all-electric bus fleet whilst investing in local traffic measures and supporting our GM-licensed taxi drivers to upgrade to cleaner vehicles.’
Maddy Dawe, Regional Clean Air Lead at Asthma + Lung UK said: ‘The long-awaited approval of Greater Manchester’s clean air plan is a good first step, but as it stands it still does not go far enough. Whilst we welcome the measures outlined in the plan, they are only designed to cut air pollution levels to just below legal limits, far above the internationally recognised guidelines set by the World Health Organization (WHO). Without striving to meet WHO guidelines, Greater Manchester will not achieve the rapid reduction in air pollution necessary to safeguard people’s health, particularly those with lung conditions.
‘Greater Manchester has had the highest rate of air pollution of any region in the UK for two years, while we have waited for any plan to be approved. This is contributing to high asthma rates and up to 1,200 early deaths each year.1,2 More ambition is needed from the mayor to protect the health of our most vulnerable communities.’