Party held out prospect of act while in opposition but plan did not make it into election manifesto
Ministers should bring forward a new clean air act that would ban wood burning, clear diesel vehicles from the roads and force councils to cut pollution, a group of more than 60 charities have urged before the king’s speech on Wednesday.
Labour held out the prospect of a clean air act while in opposition in 2023, but this was dropped from the final election manifesto, and the government has made no move to reinstate it.
Jemima Hartshorn, founder and director of the Mums for Lungs charity, one of the groups behind the letter, said: “Dirty air is the biggest environmental health risk in this country. Air pollution is costing us about £27bn a year and is linked to asthma, wheezing, cancer and dementia. The dirty air is harming us all, and it’s damaging the economy too. Yet, we know how to solve this problem.”
The call, by organisations with more than 230,000 members, came as one of the country’s leading experts on pollution and health urged ministers to ban wood burning in urban areas. Stephen Holgate, who is the special adviser to the Royal College of Physicians on air quality, told the British Medical Journal (BMJ) it was a “disgrace” that so few complaints about wood burning resulted in any enforcement action. In the year from August 2024 to August 2025, at least 15,195 complaints were made against wood burning in England, but only 24 fines were issued.
