Gove in war on scented candles and wood stoves

As he backs tough new targets on clean air...

WOODBURNING stoves, bonfires and household cleaning products are being targeted in a major crackdown on pollution.

The Clean Air Strategy, which will be launched today, aims to reduce the estimated 36,000 annual deaths blamed on breathing toxic air.

The UK Government said it would become the first major economy to adopt tough World Health Organisation standards.

The proposals include a ban on the most polluting fuels – such as domestic coal – and ensuring that only the cleanest stoves are sold.

Scotland has produced its own Air Quality Strategy but has been consulted on a national air pollution control programme, and is working in partnership with UK ministers on this.

It is understood the Scottish Government will study England’s approach as part of a strategy review, which aims to assess the progress made over the past three years and provide recommendations on future policy.

Woodburning stoves and open fires are now the biggest source of outdoor particulate emissions – 38 per cent, compared with 16 per cent from industrial processes, and 12 per cent from road transport.

Much of the strategy will involve advice to families such as to have fewer bonfires and buy in bulk to reduce the number of deliveries by van.

Manufacturers will be told to reduce emissions from scented candles, carpets, laminate flooring and glues. These add to particulate pollution and can break down to create toxic gases. Councils will be

‘Extremely relaxed approach’

given more powers in high pollution areas, while ports will have to reduce pollution from shipping. Laws preventing cars from idling may be tightened.

UK Environment Secretary Michael Gove said the Government wanted to reduce particulate emissions by 30 per cent by 2020, and by 46 per cent by 2030.

He said tackling air pollution would save £5.3billion a year from 2030, adding: ‘While air quality has improved significantly in recent years, air pollution continues to shorten lives, harm our children and reduce quality of life.

‘While air pollution may conjure images of traffic jams and exhaust fumes, transport is only one part of the story and the strategy sets out the important role all of us – across all sectors of work and society – can play in reducing emissions and cleaning up our air to protect our health.’

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock said: ‘Breathing dirty air is associated with a host of health problems, from asthma to cardiovascular disease and lung cancer, and all too often it is the most vulnerable – children, older people and those from poorer backgrounds – who are hit hardest.’

The strategy calls for a voluntary labelling scheme to warn consumers against the most polluting products. It says all diesel trains will be banned by 2040 and the sale of diesel and petrol vehicles will be phased out by the same point.

But Jenny Bates of Friends of the Earth said: ‘If the Government is serious about protecting our health, and the health of the planet, it must scrap new roadbuilding plans which would add to the problem, and phase out petrol and diesel vehicles faster.’

Morten Thaysen of Greenpeace UK said: ‘The Government is saying all the right things about the huge cost in human lives, and money, which our appalling air quality imposes and gives an important signal about tighter long-term targets. But there seems a disconnect between this recognition of the urgency of the problem and the extremely relaxed approach to solving it.

‘The Government is proposing nothing new to tackle pollution from road transport.’ Professor Alastair Lewis of the University of York said: ‘The actions being proposed, and sectors and pollutants being targeted, is a reflection that further improving air quality in the UK is getting harder.’