Air pollution is the leading environmental threat to human health. Although we have made significant strides in cleaning the air in recent years, we believe that we need to go further to protect and improve quality of life and public health.
Done in the right way, tackling air pollution does not need to be inconvenient or require us to sacrifice how far and frequently we travel. We need to make clean and efficient transport as cheap and readily accessible as possible, remove the complex barriers that make installing cleaner heating sources so complex, and gently densify our towns and cities to provide much-needed new homes close to amenities.
Our clean air programme covers public transport, electric vehicles, active travel, clean heating, and planning. CEN brings together Conservatives in Parliament and local government to champion community focused and market-based solutions to air pollution. Explore this page to find out more about the work of our clean air programme.
We coordinate environmental action within the conservative movement and mobilise conservatives to achieve positive environmental policy change. We do this by developing and championing policy campaigns in Parliament and across the UK. Some of our recent clean air campaigns can be found below.
Technological improvements and tax cuts have made driving an EV cheaper and more convenient. EVs already have lower lifetime costs and, with the quantity and variety of models increasing, the upfront costs are projected to continue to fall.
To give more drivers the confidence to switch, we need more chargers, CEN has been campaigning to equalise VAT on public and private chargers. We are also urging councils to scrap the red tape stopping households from using utility gullies for charging cables instead of blocking the pavement with them.
When carefully consulted, active travel infrastructure can expand people’s transport choices and make walking and cycling an attractive option.
CEN has been campaigning for a capital active travel budget for local authorities to build cycle paths near schools and install school streets, where roads are closed to cars at pick-up and drop-off times. We believe that mayors and councillors are best placed to make decisions affecting their residents.
Britain’s roads are some of the most congested worldwide, with drivers losing 61 hours a year on average sitting in traffic. Encouraging more journeys to be taken by rail or bus can cut congestion and shorten journey times.
CEN has been pushing for more open-access rail operators, flexible bus franchising agreements between local authorities and operators, and demand-responsive services to improve services while relieving pressure on the public purse.
There is substantial evidence that gently densified communities where residents of all ages can walk and cycle around are more desirable and prosperous. Yet, post-war developments in the UK have been built to much lower densities than their European alternatives.
CEN has been campaigning to see more gentle densification in our towns and cities. We believe by introducing design codes, new stories can be sensitively and easily added to existing buildings. And by relaxing our high parking minimums we could increase the supply of homes in existing developments.
We raise awareness of environmental issues and their electoral importance among conservatives, as well as promoting conservative voices within the environmental policy debate. We do this by regularly producing blogs, as well as landing stories and opinion pieces in the media. Read our latest clean air-related media hits below.
We organise public and private events that enable conservatives to debate environmental issues in a trusted setting and find common ground. Photos and recordings from previous events delivered by our clean air programme can be viewed below.
