Morally and legally, the UK government has failed us on air pollution | James Thornton

No less than 17 years have passed since new rules were approved in the UK to save thousands of lives by limiting deadly air pollution in our towns and cities.

Pollution is the “invisible killer” because, for the most part, it goes unseen. Its impact on human health and the planet is why those laws were necessary.

Yet disgracefully – and illegally – we are still subjected to excruciatingly dirty air. Conditions are sometimes so poor that you notice it in your nostrils or lungs. Those days, when the air feels thick with fumes, you may be under the impression that it’s just one vehicle with a bad exhaust in front of you which is to blame. It’s generally not.

London’s pollution – the worst in the UK – was visible on a trip I made to Canary Wharf a few weeks ago. From the 11th floor, a brown haze sat across the skyline, its deadly toxins testing the health of millions of city-dwellers and workers, particularly those who suffer from asthma, heart or respiratory conditions.

Pollution is right there with you when you’re puffing as you cycle through the park on a summer’s day, or when you’re chatting with friends on a visit to the shops on a Saturday morning, or when you’re taking your child to school.

Why are you and I are still inhaling unlawful levels of nitrogen dioxide nearly 20 years after it should have been cleaned up?

There is a simple answer: because the UK government is breaking its own and the EU’s laws.

It has failed to protect your health and mine, and more importantly the health of our children. It has failed legally. And it has failed morally.

ClientEarth is taking the government back to court on Tuesday, because of the lack of urgency, the failure to tackle the problem. Cleaning the air isn’t rocket science. Not doing so is simply unacceptable political behaviour.

The fact that it’s taken the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) 18 months to launch a consultation on just five clean air zones – when there are many more badly polluted towns and cities across the UK – is just one illustration of that lackadaisical attitude.

In April last year, in our first legal challenge, the supreme court ordered the environment secretary to draw up a new Air Quality plan to meet legal limits in the shortest time possible. The plan was woefully inadequate and didn’t envisage UK compliance on pollution levels until 2025. That would be 26 years since the rules were first approved.

Not only that, but while motor manufacturers have been exploiting legal loopholes and using dubious techniques to pass emissions tests, the government has failed to hold them to account – while bidding behind the scenes to allow increased emissions.

The Treasury, meanwhile, is still giving incentives through the tax system, for motorists to buy diesel cars. That is also unacceptable.

A reason some give for not taking action to solve this public health crisis is the cost to the economy and the Treasury and the impact on business, hauliers and motorists. But surely the health impacts of pollution are worth more than that?

Pollution is responsible for 40,000 premature deaths in the UK. It triggers heart attacks and strokes. It can make existing heart conditions worse. It causes cancer and stunted lung growth in children. It aggravates respiratory conditions which can be fatal.

But there is also a substantial economic and societal impact. Defra’s own analysis suggests that the cost to the economy from early deaths by air pollution is £27.5bn. Every year.

So what should the government be doing? A national network of Clean Air Zones, preventing the worst polluting vehicles from entering our towns and city centres; a scheme to retrofit buses and heavy goods vehicles to make them compliant with legal emissions limits; and a targeted diesel scrappage scheme part funded by the car industry – used to fund low emission vehicles and alternatives to car use.

Other solutions should run in tandem: a clean public transport system and a car labelling scheme so that motorists know they cars they are buying are compliant with emissions limits in the real world.

That would be a start. There is also a great opportunity: to move the economy toward zero emission vehicles. We could become a leader in sustainable energy, and sustainable cities.

The air law will be UK law under the government’s Brexit plans. It should be made even stronger in future with a new Clean Air Act.

First, we need to win this court case to make sure the government understands that pollution is a health hazard which we – or rather they – can solve.

Morally and legally, the UK government has failed us on air pollution | James Thornton

Prisoners See Themselves as Morally Superior to Non-Prisoners

It looks that even individuals who have been incarcerated fall prey to the notion that they are greater than other folks. New analysis from the University of Southampton has located that those in prison think themselves to be kinder, much more moral, more self-controlled, and much more generous than non-prisoners.

According to the study published in the British Journal of Social Psychology, prisoners also didn’t uncover themselves to be less law abiding as people outside the prison walls. In fact, they regarded as themselves equally law abiding.

According to Professor of Social and Personality Psychology and Director of the Centre for Analysis on Self and Identity at the University of Southampton Constantine Sedikides, this is 1 of the most compelling findings in assistance of self-enhancement to date.

Sedikides found it particularly exciting that the prisoners did not self-enhance by obtaining themselves to be superior in power or toughness, but as an alternative on professional-social traits. In effect, they ignored the reality that they have been in prison in order to increase their vision of themselves.

The research necessary 79 prisoners from south England to fill out a survey rating themselves in comparison to both other prisoners and regular members of the local community. The survey covered nine social traits: morality, kindness, trustworthiness, honesty, dependability, compassion, generousness, self-control, and adherence to the law.

Interestingly, the prisoners rated themselves to be superior to most neighborhood members on all traits, with the exception of adherence to the law. On that query, they rated themselves as becoming equal with the regular neighborhood member.

In accordance to Sedikides, these final results show just how sturdy the motivation toward self-enhancement is. It is psychologically critical for folks to think about themselves to be justified, no matter what the reality of their recent scenario is.

Of course, prisoners aren’t the only people who tend to enhance their self picture. Most of us do just that and put up formidable defenses towards any person who doubts us.

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Prisoners See Themselves as Morally Superior to Non-Prisoners