Air Pollution (Hansard, 7 November 1995)

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) what is the total budget for the enhanced urban network air pollution monitoring programme for 1995–96; [41152]
(2) if he will publish a list of the sites to be included in the enhanced air pollution monitoring programme by 1997, including the time frame for each site. [41153]

§ Mr. Clappison
In January 1995 the Department of the Environment merged the enhanced urban network and the statutory urban networks to form a harmonised national automatic urban monitoring network. The current contract value for the automatic urban network is £2,084,874, exclusive of VAT, for the financial year 1995–96. This sum includes both the central management, quality assurance and quality control of the network.
The Department intends to expand the automatic urban network by 13 centrally funded sites by the end of 1996. Sites have been announced for Manchester, Glasgow, Sheffield, Nottingham, Bradford, Wolverhampton, Plymouth, Norwich, Stoke on Trent, and a further two locations in London. An additional two sites will be announced next year.
735W
In addition, the Department aims to integrate a total of 35 locally operated sites into the national network by 1996. The location of the first 17 of these sites was announced in October this year. The Department plans to integrate sites at Oxford and the London borough of Brent by November 1995. Within Greater London sites at Sutton, two sites: Greenwich; Haringey, two sites; Kensington and Chelsea; Hounslow; Hackney; Tower Hamlets; Bromley; Camden; Wandsworth; Southwark, two sites and Lewisham will be integrated by April 1996, subject to the approval of the Department's quality assurance and quality control unit.

§ Mr. Taylor
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many times serious air pollution has occurred without being forecast by his Department in each of the last three years for which figures are available. [41162]

§ Mr. Clappison
An air quality forecast of the following day's air quality for ozone, nitrogen dioxide and sulphur dioxide is updated twice a day and is made available to the public as part of the Department's air quality information service via Freephone, Ceefax, Teletext, the Internet and a wide range of other media outlets. An air quality descriptive banding is predicted for each of nine regions of the United Kingdom. Since 1 April 1991, across the United Kingdom, there have been three occasions of "very poor" air quality when "poor" air quality was forecast and two occasions of "very poor" air quality when "good" air quality was forecast.

§ Mr. Allen
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many times in the last 12 months motorists have been asked to leave their cars at home due to high levels of air pollution; what estimate he has made of the number who complied; and if he will make a statement. [41754]

§ Mr. Clappison
In the last 12 months, in periods of elevated air pollution, the Department of the Environment has advised motorists to leave their cars at home four times.
A survey undertaken following a period of poor air quality at the beginning of August this year found that 18 per cent. of drivers surveyed said that they had decided not to use their cars on at least one occasion during the high levels of air pollution. This compares with 10 per cent. reporting taking action when a similar survey was carried out the previous year.