To consider the following
Motion in the names of Councillors Khan and Kendrick;
“This Motion calls upon the Environment
Secretary Michael Gove to urgently review the Government’s
updated clean air plan and produce a national Clean Air Act which
demonstrates the Government taking responsibility as well as local
authorities.
Clean air is considered to be a basic
requirement of human health and well-being. However, air pollution
continues to pose a serious threat to health of the public. Air
pollution is contributing to approximately 40,000 early deaths a
year in the UK. When dissected down to a Kirklees level that
was the equivalent to 137 deaths per year associated with poor air
quality in 2015.
This Council believes that air pollution in
the UK is a public health crisis, with the World Health
Organisation and Public Health England describing it as the largest
environmental risk to public health.
Currently Kirklees Council are working on the
following improvement projects;
- Kirklees Council led on the creation
of the West Yorkshire ECO-Stars freight recognition scheme. The
scheme encourages operators of commercial vehicles to clean up
their fleets and at the same time saves operating costs. This
scheme is a free initiative to West Yorkshire businesses. The
success of this scheme is currently under review and an extension
to the scheme is being explored for 2017/18 &2018/19
- Over 100 school transport buses have
been retrofitted with exhaust technology to remove harmful exhaust
emissions.
- Kirklees Council have installed
Smart traffic lights at the busier junctions across the district to
improve vehicle flows and reduce congestion where possible, which
in turn reduces emissions
- Further to this Kirklees Council are
working with a 3rd party company to rationalise this traffic
management system to improve air quality further by running a pilot
which uses modelled air pollution emissions to dictate traffic
light changes. The pilot for this scheme is along the A62 Leeds
Road.
- West Yorkshire has been awarded
funding from central government to encourage low emission taxis.
Kirklees along with the other 4 West Yorkshire Authorities are
looking to install a strategic electric vehicle (EV) taxi charging
network across the district, along with funding for the private
hire sector.
- Kirklees Council are considering
releasing further Hackney License plates for E.V Taxis in order to
encourage further EV uptake
- Air Quality Assessments were
conducted on the Local Plan to assess the cumulative impact of
development on air quality across the district.
- Kirklees are working with the West
Yorkshire Authorities and the combined authority to create a public
electric vehicle charging network.
- Kirklees Council has the Green
Parking Season Ticket, which allows Ultra Low Emission Vehicles to
Park within Council car parks for free
- Working with DEFRA to improve the
understanding of West Yorkshire Air Quality issues by installing a
National AQ monitor within Kirklees
- Continuing to integrate the West
Yorkshire Low Emission Strategy into Kirklees Council policy &
operations and also working with partnership agencies to include
relevant elements of the WYLES into their operations
The Council urges the Government to act
immediately to protect the health, wellbeing and economic
sustainability for our generation and those of the future. The
Government is urged to work with local authorities and industry to
make long-term sustainable evidence based changes.”