Air Quality Matters
Air Quality Matters inside our buildings and out.
This Podcast is about Indoor Air Quality, Outdoor Air Quality, Ventilation, and Health in our homes, workplaces, and education settings.
And we already have many of the tools we need to make a difference.
The conversations we have and how we share this knowledge is the key to our success.
We speak with the leaders at the heart of this sector about them and their work, innovation and where this is all going.
Air quality is the single most significant environmental risk we face to our health and wellbeing, and its impacts on us, our friends, our families, and society are profound.
From housing to the workplace, education to healthcare, the quality of the air we breathe matters.
Air Quality Matters
Air Quality Matters
#29 - Baroness Natalie Bennett, Dr. Douglas Booker, Matt Towner, Professor Sarah West & Simon Jones: Uniting for Better Indoor Air Quality - Policy, Accountability, and Action Steps
What would you say to an incoming UK Government about air quality?
Can poor indoor air quality make us sick? Absolutely, and it’s costing the UK billions.
In this episode of Air Quality Matters, join me alongside a distinguished panel—Baroness Natalie Bennett, Dr. Douglas Booker, Matt Towner, and Professor Sarah West, as we untangle the web of public health issues tied to the air we breathe indoors. With political winds shifting, our conversation is timely and essential, revealing how better ventilation and stricter regulations could revolutionize how we live and work.
The episode underscores the essential role of government intervention and the power of cross-party collaboration in tackling this crisis. Professor Sarah West emphasizes the urgency of holding landlords accountable for ensuring adequate ventilation, especially for vulnerable populations. Matt Towner makes a compelling case for systemic solutions, shifting the burden away from individuals and towards a holistic approach. Our dialogue concludes with an urgent call for clear governmental leadership and a strategic roadmap to enhance indoor air quality nationwide.
From international examples like Japan's innovative use of CO2 monitors to Germany and Belgium's robust public awareness campaigns, we explore actionable strategies that the UK could adopt. The episode also delves into the benefits of systematic air quality monitoring, the role of environmental sensors, and the critical need for providing actionable guidance along with tools.
Highlighting initiatives such as the Welsh government's Air Quality Act, we discuss how statutory targets can drive accountability and progress.
Baroness Natalie Bennet - Linkedin
Douglas Booker - Linkedin
Sarah West - Linkedin
Matt Towner - Linkedin
Gaelan Komen - Linkedin
Policy Connect
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Welcome to Air Quality Matters. I believe through conversation we learn, gain insight and move forward together. We already know so much of what we need to succeed. How well we communicate and share this knowledge is the key to success. This is episode 29 and we changed things up a bit this week.
Simon:With a political change on the horizon this summer in the UK, what would you say to the next government about air quality? Well, I was delighted to be invited by Policy Connect to a thinking with some brilliant panellists to discuss just this. Policy Connect is a cross-party think tank that's led prominent all-party parliamentary groups in the UK Parliament Through the APPGs on carbon monoxide and health. Policy Connect has convened members of the UK's Parliament, chamber of MPs and peers to promote effective policy thinking around indoor air quality. They bring policy together with a range of leaders in housing and clean air to prioritise action on indoor air pollution and marked Clean Air Day with this timely indoor air quality thinking to set priorities for the incoming UK government after the July UK general election. I'll leave it to Galen Common from Policy Connect to introduce this fantastic panel. Thanks for listening, as always, and please do check out the sponsors of the show in the notes. This is Air Quality Matters and a conversation led by Galen Common.
Gaelan :So, baroness Natalie Bennett, I'm delighted to have here today former leader of the Green Party and a peer in the House of Lords, dr Douglas Booker, a lecturer in indoor air in the School of Civil Engineering at the University of Leeds. Matt Towner, programme Director of the Health Effects of Air Pollution at Impact on Urban Health. And Professor Sarah West, director and Senior Research Associate at the Stockholm Environment Institute at the University of York. Last but not least, simon Jones, founder of the air quality matters consultancy and podcast very much a whistle-stop introduction of all our panel today. So it'd be great to have panelists introduce themselves and a bit of the work that they do around indoor air quality and potentially flesh out a key priority action that needs to happen to improve indoor air quality in the UK. I'll hand the floor to Baroness Natalie Bennett first.
Natalie:Well, thank you very much and first of all just to apologise to all participants. I'm joining you from the cafe in Crewe train station, so any interruptions are not entirely under my own control, but this is such an important issue I was determined to make this timing work and I think, picking up first of all the point that Gayle had made about carbon monoxide that, of course, is the acute, deadly side of the issue of indoor air quality and I suspect others will really pick up and run with that in detail. So I'm going to say it's there, it's an important issue, but actually what I'm going to look at, as the Green Party I think often does, is look forward further into broader issues that really during the COVID pandemic, at the height of that, leapt up to the agenda but unfortunately have just been allowed to slide. And these are huge issues of public health, about how we have a healthy society, and I believe that poor indoor air quality is a significant factor in terms of the terrible levels of public health we have in the UK. Now lots of people are focused on our productivity gap, the number of people who are not in paid employment because of ill health, and I don't think indoor air quality has got nearly enough attention in that, which is related to perhaps broader issues of the quality of housing, in which indoor air quality is a part.
Natalie:Just to sort of start the discussion, there's two main areas that I want to focus on. One is the infectious diseases, and I should perhaps mention that my first degree is agricultural science. Unfortunately, there are very few people in politics from a scientific background and we desperately need more people with that kind of background. But I bring that background in and I do a lot of work on antimicrobial resistance in particular, which there's going to be a high-level UN meeting of in September at the General Assembly, and thinking about that and looking at those issues and looking at COVID and looking at H5N5, the H5, got the numbers now anyway highly pathogenic avian influenza which has now been found in dairy cattle in the US and has spread to humans in the US. Flu viruses are you know we have huge pandemic threats flu viruses, among them Victorians who didn't have antibiotics, were very focused on ventilation and clean air. You know we go back to Florence Nightingale. She had a huge focus on that. We've kind of had antibiotics and had the idea that people get diseases and we fix them and we've stopped thinking about how to stop people having diseases in the first place. So I think that we need to go back to thinking about how do we ensure that people have clean, regularly, either ventilated or, if that's not possible, filtered indoor clean air to deal with infectious diseases.
Natalie:The other area that I've got a lot of interest in is chemical regulation, and I wince every time I see an advert for air freshener and I note that the Royal Society for Chemistry just this week I think it was last week was saying just how much they're concerned about the lack of chemical regulation in the UK and we are actually poisoning our indoor airspaces with things that are heavily advertised towards all of us and we need to tackle that advertising. I'm looking at perhaps having a private member's bill on biocides and poisonous chemicals in those household goods in the next parliament. I think it's urgently needed. We need to push for those things.
Natalie:And just one final thought, which is something that I pushed a lot at the height of the COVID pandemic why do we not have in public spaces like cafes and pubs, et cetera, cafes and pubs, et cetera. It would not be a major job of work to have a rating for ventilation or air filtration on the door, just like we have a health rating for the food standards that has been introduced in other places. It's an obvious thing to do that allows people to make choices for themselves about their own health and allows businesses to actually make a selling point of the fact that they've got good ventilation and good air filtration. Um, so those are, that's my sort of introductory comments, introductory thoughts. Thanks very much, gan thanks, natalie.
Gaelan :Thanks so much for that. Um appreciate your leadership on um indoor air quality in particular in parliament, given it's uh often overlooked. Uh over to you, dr Booker, for a word of introduction and some priorities on indoor air quality.
Douglas:Yeah, thank you.
Douglas:So my research and teaching is on the role that buildings play on health and equity indoors, and that largely covers the physical and social dimensions of indoor air quality.
Douglas:So I'm involved in a lot of work which is generating evidence through making measurements in a range of different indoor environments on indoor air quality. But a real interest and focus of mine is on questions about what a fair indoor air quality situation is. I think we have a much clearer idea based on outdoor air, but much less in the built environment, so particularly interested in uncovering the social mechanisms that underpin patterns of exposure, whether that is housing or any other type of thing, but then thinking about why some people might be exposed to worse indoor air quality than others. Just as a quick note, the other hat that I'm wearing today is I am a regional clean air champion through the UK Research and Innovation Clean Air Programme, which is a £42.5 million research investment, which is really about making sure that a lot of the world-leading physical and social science research that's being done on air quality is linked up with policy and other stakeholders.
Gaelan :Thanks, dr Booker, for the introduction. Matt over to you.
Matt:Thanks. So, hi everyone, I'm the Programme Director for Impact on Urban Health's programme addressing the health effects of air pollution programme. For those of you that don't know, impact on urban health is a part of guys and st thomas's foundation, and we're one of the largest uk um health focused foundations. Um, and I guess why we exist is because, in across the uk and in south london, where we're based, people living just streets apart can experience huge differences in their health, often ultimately due to poverty and or racism. And so we exist to close that gap, and so we fund and collaborate with partners who are delivering projects, research and services that address health inequality, and we try to build evidence as to how we can construct a healthier society and ultimately look to scale that example through policy advocacy. So, um, we have a program on on air pollution.
Matt:Um, and indoor air quality is a really, really central part of that. It can be devastating for people's health and, um, often it's impacting people living on low incomes the hardest, both because of exposure um, cheaper housing is often worse quality and because of wider inequalities that make those people more susceptible to its its health effects. And it's also an issue that comes up time and again for for communities. So we've included in our strategy partly for for that that reason, um, and in terms of, in terms of um, I think overall we want to see the next government introducing a really ambitious new Clean Air Act that makes breathing safe and healthy a human right and which places the WHO air quality guidelines in law and indoor air quality should be a big part of that in sort of four ways. So one we'd really like to see um the people most affected by indoor air pollution involved in policy making. Often, uh, people on low incomes, people from black and other minority ethnic backgrounds living in urban areas, aren't sufficiently, uh, consulted. Secondly, we'd like to see retrofitting done with a a clear health lens.
Matt:So it's clearly one of the the key issues, issues or actions that government can take to tackle the climate crisis, to tackle the cost of living, but also to protect health, and, with that in mind, home energy measures must benefit indoor air quality, including through adequate ventilation. Otherwise, insulation and other measures can concentrate pollutants indoors, and so government can take that into account when revising building standards and making sure the industry's really well equipped to deal with these challenges. Thirdly, we'd like to see bold action to tackle damp and mold across all housing tenures. So we know that both private rented housing and socially rented housing is in a state of disrepair, and so and damp and mould is prevalent in nine and five percent of homes respectively. So our law, which some of you may be familiar with, represents a large step forward, but we'd like to see that applied to the private rental sector and more investment in socially rented homes. And then the last thing I'll quickly mention is we'd like to see a phase out of wood burning stoves, which is a huge issue indoor for the people burning wood, but also for people's neighbours, and so our research has shown that awareness is really low at this issue, and that's currently an impediment to the ambitious policy action we need to see.
Matt:Thank you, Thanks, matt.
Gaelan :Saw lots of nodding heads in regards to your point, so I'm sure we'll have lots of fruitful discussion on those. Those thanks for that, um, that detail, and professor sarah west, over to you thanks, yes, um, I'm sarah west.
Sarah:I'm director of the stockholm environment institute at the university of york and sei does lots of work on air quality both in the uk and overseas. And I must say, my expertise is not as an air quality researcher but as an engagement specialist, and I'm working on a couple of projects at the moment, including one funded by that big programme that Douglas mentioned. So that's Ingenious, which is looking at air quality in homes in Bradford, and then there's SAMI, which is working with schools right across the UK, and both of these projects are looking to monitor air quality in homes and schools respectively, but also raise awareness of the issue. And I had a whole list of things that I was going to rattle off and as Matt and Natalie and Douglas were talking, I was like oh, they've already said that, they've already said that, they've already said that. The things that I can add is thinking beyond the UK. In developing countries, indoor air quality is a public health crisis and it's a real opportunity for the a new government whichever new government it is to really show leadership in this space by supporting countries to integrate climate change and air quality policies together, because there's so many co-benefits by actually considering these two things together, but we also need to look at our own approach to governance of indoor air quality.
Sarah:In the UK We've struggled, with the projects that I've mentioned, to actually find out who we need to talk to in government departments, and that's because it's not currently any one government department's responsibility. Indoor air quality is not the responsibility of DEFRA. It perhaps should be the health and social care people, but it's not really their responsibility and it's really challenging. So I think we need to join up the government departments. Maybe we have some cross-departmental working groups, um, and we also need cross-party working groups so that actually we've got all of these different parties coming together um to address indoor air quality and we also need to consider outdoor air quality at the same time, because, you know, it's not like our indoor spaces are divorced from our outdoor spaces. We need to improve the outdoor air quality and we need to tackle indoor air quality together.
Gaelan :Thank you, sarah. Definitely agree with the point on cross-party working and achieve that lasting benefit through that in particular. And lastly, simon, over to you.
Simon:Yeah, thank you. Well, I kind of sit, as I often do, in this middle ground between academia and an industry and policy and, um, that's partly what the consultancy does. Air quality matters is work with organizations on on navigating this complex sector. Um, and I'm very fortunate, through the podcast, to speak to domain experts across the world when it comes to all three of those pillars, both academic and industry and policy, and I think it's been very well articulated so far some of the challenges we face. But what I would say is that I think we already have a lot of the tools that we need to get better outcomes in this sector.
Simon:There is a phenomenal amount of knowledge out there, both within academic circles, within industry and within policy internationally on how to get this stuff right. Where we fall over in the built environment time and time again is in the application of that knowledge and the policing of that knowledge. In many spaces that we have, there are only a limited number of levers that we can pull to affect a better outcome in those spaces and sometimes we just need to value those levers well enough to affect the change that we need. So it has been well pointed out so far that indoor air quality is the single biggest environmental risk we face. In the UK Estimates up with 20 billion a year. It costs us per year to sort this crisis out. It should be important enough to start taking this seriously.
Simon:And the final thing that I would add is because it's such a broad sector and because there's so much going on, we really need coordination of this, whether that's political or through something like an observatory, political or through something like an observatory. This needs to be coordinated because there's too much duplication and too much siloing, whether that's between departments or whether that's within academic circles or the difference between academia and industry. So that coordination, I think, if we're going to make traction forward, is going to be absolutely critical. Thank you, thanks, simon.
Gaelan :Um, yeah, I think the point on effective governance is really important and then hopefully we can come on to that later. Maybe want to pick up your your earlier point on um, utilizing or making best use of what we already have. It leads nicely into our next section on government support for action. We've done lots of work with local authorities, among others, in the industry and third sector on the work that's already underway around indoor air quality. Often the issue comes up that they just need the proper government support for what they're doing. And perhaps, sarah, given your your expertise in community engagement, I wonder if you've got any insights on the work that you've been doing and difficulties in in practical action to improve indoor air quality, if there's anything that needs to come maybe from government or councils or otherwise, to to better help your work yeah, I think.
Sarah:Thank you. I think one of the big challenges is that people, first of all, aren't necessarily aware of what is in the air. But there's lots of projects now which are kind of trying to raise awareness through monitoring etc in homes, um, but I think the other thing is about powerlessness of people to actually do anything about it. So, for example, we know that, uh, ventilating whilst cooking is really important, and whilst cleaning as well. So, so, cooking and cleaning, get your extractor fans on. What do you do if you don't have an extractor fan or you don't have a working extractor fan and then?
Sarah:So there, I really do think we need government pressure on landlords so private and social landlords to actually make sure that we have ventilation systems that are actually working, and I think that would really help, because there's no point in us raising awareness of an issue and people being not having anything that they can do about it, most likely to live in poor quality housing, who are not able to do anything about improving their own ventilation or perhaps can't open windows because they are opening them out onto a busy street those are also the people that are most likely to be affected by poor air quality.
Sarah:So they will be. They'll be exposed to more poor air and they're also going to have worse health effects from it. Perhaps they've got smaller lungs, for example, or they've got chronic health conditions which mean that they're actually going to be more health effects from it. Perhaps they've got smaller lungs, for example, or they've got chronic health conditions which mean that they're actually going to be more exposed. So I do think we need real leadership in this space from government around legislating about that ventilation, which is a relatively simple solution that individuals can do, but they aren't currently being supported to do so individuals can do, but they aren't currently being supported to do so.
Gaelan :Matt, I appreciate you probably have lots of expertise as well to bring on that point around community engagement. Do you have any further reflections on that point?
Matt:I mean. So, on what Sarah said, I would endorse that wholeheartedly. I mean, we can't see this as being primarily an issue of personal responsibility, as she articulated really well. Lots of these factors are outside of their control, they're in the hands of landlords. That's not to say that people don't care.
Matt:And when our community, when community research that we've done has, um, you know, informed people of the health effects, then they, they, they want to know about solutions and I think there are sort of you know, the odd low-cost thing that people can, can do themselves, but but overwhelmingly we need to be focusing on that systemic response, um, partly because also these are the same people that are affected by inequalities around access to healthy food, financial hardship, etc. It's incredibly stressful being poor in Britain and let's not put the burden on those people over. Overall, in terms of the action that we we'd like to see, we agree with the recommendations of the CMO chief medical officer, professor Chris Whitty, in calling for government to work with local authorities, set out a clear roadmap for improving indoor air pollution and improving ventilation wherever possible, and that's also part of what the Healthy Air Coalition are calling for, who we're a part of. Thanks.
Gaelan :Matt, you hit upon a key point that it's often particularly with their work around ambient air. It falls on local authorities to tackle air pollution, but it's very much a collective struggle and there's lots of industry and third sector partners that can provide support. Simon, you've got something of an industry perspective on this, what you see the role of non-governmental actors being on that local level in the kind of on the ground action around indoor air pollution Also, obviously, questions to the floor. Anyone else come on to that?
Simon:Yeah, well, I think one interesting aspect of indoor air quality is not just on the government, but it's also on others that are responsible for the indoor environment that people are exposed to, and one area that's going through huge change at the moment is indoor air quality in the workplace. There's a huge opportunity to bring in stakeholders in the co-benefits of improving indoor air quality by improving air quality within the workplace. So, whether we're talking about the commercial sector or public buildings, or education or hospitals and increasingly now even people's homes through home working and hybrid working, these are all workplaces and there's enormous opportunity to bring other stakeholders and industries, power and insight and influence to bear in improving a large part of people's exposure to poor air quality.
Gaelan :to poor air quality.
Natalie:That's me, if I could just come in briefly to really reinforce the point that we can't make this individual responsibility. It has to be a system change approach, and I think that's one of the reasons why I think most of the focus on indoor air quality has been on issues of mould, issues of carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, even showing how poor it is. We haven't really linked up, and there's some people campaigning very hard on issues of COVID is not over the infectious disease. I think one of the things we can do more is link up these two issues. They've tended to be two different groups of people saying much the same thing but not really talking to each other or joining up with each other, and I think one of the things to say about the infectious disease aspect of this is that you know, no one is safe until everyone is safe.
Natalie:That was a phrase we learnt during COVID in terms of a global, internationalist kind of perspective. But you know, you might be wealthy, you might live in, you know know, an airy, spacious home, uh, but the risk of disease spreading through environments that aren't properly ventilated is a risk that rests on you as well. Um, and so you know we've got to join this a lot together and say healthiness is both chemicals it's molds and quality of homes and ventilation and all those things. But it's also infectious disease and, putting this all together, it's in everyone's interest to tackle this and it has to be tackled on a systemic level. We can't just rely on individuals who you know, very often are private or council tenants with very little power and trying to do something and getting nowhere.
Sarah:Can I just throw one extra thing into that list, because I think that was a fantastic list and that's exactly what needs doing. But the other thing I'd like to throw in there is asbestos, and I shamefully know very little about asbestos, but I was in an event on Friday about education and we were talking about indoor air quality, climate change and asbestos relating to schools, and I think that you know asbestos fine particles that can be breathed into your lungs can cause major problems and lung cancer and mesothelioma, and so I think actually bringing all those things together, as you say, natalie, and deal with it in a systemic way is really important.
Douglas:Yeah, I mean I don't want to agree with everybody, but of course I do. I think this relates back to Simon's original point about a lot of the evidence is already there for action, which I think is something that we can be optimistic about. I mean, four years ago, the National Institution for Clinical Excellence released a really informative report on the roles and responsibilities of different sectors in improving indoor air quality at home, and this is everybody from environmental health practitioners to housing associations, to architects, to healthcare professionals, to building control staff. So if we can find the right sort of venue to house all of this information under a single body, whether that's a government department or something an an NGO which is putting pressure on those making policy, I think that would be really helpful. But, echoing Baroness Bennett's point, this is a system change. This is a system change problem that's required.
Simon:I think we've seen the needle quite rightly move, particularly in social housing, from this lifestyle, blaming culture of poor air quality outcomes to taking some responsibility.
Simon:There can be some argument. I think it's fair to say that that needle can move too far. The other direction, and the risk there or in thereof, is that we take away agency from people to have an impact on their own outcomes. And I think that that stands in all walks of life, whether that's workplace or housing or the private sector. And one of the things I don't think we do very well is communicate risk, and air quality has suffered very badly over, particularly indoor air quality, in how we communicate this risk, because it is so esoteric and chronic and long-term often that we struggle to find ways to meaningfully project that risk to people. And I wonder if the panel had any thoughts on that and whether there's something that we could learn from other sectors that have walked that path for many years, like smoking campaigns and other health campaigns, that have had to learn how to communicate these long-term, chronic risks where people have to change habits and behaviors and you know structures have to build around it to improve outcomes let me, let me swallow that bullet first.
Douglas:as always, simon asked the really tricky questions, but it's.
Douglas:It is a key one, I think, when, when we refer to system change which is firmly the approach I believe is required because it we need consolidated action across many different sectors of society that is not saying that it's this out there in the sky thing that's going to happen, which is going to just magically inform change.
Douglas:I think part of that system change is both providing actionable information to people so they can make changes. But I find the concept, which comes from the environmental justice literature, of capability really important, which means I still think you can be placing the onus on those with more power to take a greater share in mitigating the problem, but making sure people have the right information so that they can make changes. But those changes will be firmly anchored on what changes people can actually make. So we can talk until the cows come home about changing policy, but unless that policy is anchored in the real-world experience of different vulnerable groups in different housing situations, without the monitoring enforcement in place at a local level, really it will be change on paper rather than change in the real world yeah, um, and just I think that we also need to be really careful about not thinking about like on the back of the fag packet thing.
Sarah:You know, like air quality slowly kills you. You know we need to be really, really careful that we aren't raising awareness of people and not giving them any solutions. And I think that's a really important ethical issue. If you're thinking, if you're talking about, you know saying like, if you're next to this busy road in central London, you know, you know there's that thing about children in Hackney having much smaller lungs than in other areas. You know, what are you going to do about that? Like, are you going to? How are you and your family all going to move somewhere else? I mean, it's just so.
Sarah:I think we need to be really careful, as Douglas says, about, like, what is a systemic thing that somebody else needs to solve?
Sarah:And then what are things that you as an individual could do? So, for example, thinking back to the my stove and the ventilation, you know, as you're cooking thing, you know, is there a some sort of thing that you can get in your head where it's like if x, then y, so if I turn my hob on, then I also turn my ventilation cooker extractor fan on, after having checked that it actually is extracting somewhere, not just back into my kitchen, which is a problem, but you know so. So there are. There will be things that people can do, like can you walk or cycle a different way to work, for example, and that's on slower, like quieter streets, or can you take a different, different route, or can you go slightly later in the day? Are there things you can do? But also, but I think we have a really strong moral responsibility not to raise awareness of issue and then not give people any like solutions, actionable solutions it's a really good point.
Gaelan :Um, building on that as well. Um, I suppose who the message comes from is really important. I know, know, global Action Plan is supporting air quality and health projects, with healthcare champions who would be championing cleaner and providing actionable solutions to their patients in case of any potential issues, for example, using a gas cooker without appropriate ventilation, and there's a lot of responsible authorities like fire workers, gas engineers, for example, who have a role to play and you know, ought to be communicating the risks is it's one thing for it to come from a council, but councils have been communicating about wood burning stoves for a long time now and I I think sales are only increasing, unfortunately. So you know it needs to be really a cross-sector effort.
Natalie:Just, I mean, I talked about bringing all the different air quality issues together.
Natalie:I think there's also something and this is a really big job of work but again, looking at joining with others, taking the public health approach to health, rather than saying, well, you know, we actually have a terrible level of health, we have to fund the NHS to fix it.
Natalie:But rather than just saying wait till you get ill and then the NHS will fix you, get that public health message in the broader sense out more to say that we want to keep people healthy and that we're not doing that. Now there's a temptation I mean, I was on a session this morning talking about gene editing you know magic bullet solutions to food security, um, and you know the idea that, well, you know lung cancer, well, we're going to find you know the magic drug that's going to fix the problem and that will solve all the problems. Um, and so people feel like you know it's up to someone else's job, someone else's responsibility and there's nothing I can do about it, and I guess I have to wait until I get sick. So, really addressing bringing a public health perspective to everything that the government does, everything that organisations, councils, everybody does, bringing that perspective in and helping people to see that you know we need a society that's healthy.
Douglas:Yeah, I just wanted to come in on the public health side of things. I think there's a real opportunity for some ambition, policy and action there. There have been a number of small trials looking at social prescription for indoor air quality and interventions in different housing. So the GP taking a social determinants of health type role to actually, as you say, tackle the causes of poor health rather than fix them at the end of the pipeline.
Sarah:And just to add to that, I think often the things that are good for your health are also going to be good for, for example, reducing carbon emissions and reducing air pollution. So, for example, encouraging people to walk and cycle or other forms of active travel rather than driving is better for them. It makes them more resilient, so it makes them healthier, which means that if they do live in an area of poor air quality, actually they're going to be able to be more resilient to that, but also obviously that's a lower carbon option.
Natalie:I can just add to that I don't know whether we're counting inside cars as indoor, but I think there's been nothing like enough publicity on the fact that you know we worry about air pollution when you're walking on a busy road but actually on average inside cars is quite as bad as it is on the pavement, and that's a very little known fact. A number of people I've said that to and they've sort of gone. What really?
Gaelan :And you know that's also a workplace health and safety issue, because a vehicle is what to people's workplace? Yeah, really important point. I know, for example, paramedic services that have been investigating exposure to carbon monoxide found that the gravest exposure is just sitting in their cars waiting to ambulances, waiting to go off to attend to a scene. Doug, do you want to?
Douglas:I'll just chip in on that point. I've done quite a lot of work looking at vehicle interior air quality and you're quite right that the same sorts of principles for residential indoor air quality apply. Apart from, the air intake is directly behind the tailpipe of the car. In front Maybe the tailpipe's cleaning up, but it's going to be tyre wear and brake wear now, and the problem that I am seeing is that it is as you might imagine. It's the luxury car manufacturers that are taking this up to begin with as a new value proposition they can have of a clean air bubble driving through a dirty urban environment which is just going to widen health inequalities.
Gaelan :I think the point on active travel you know that obviously unlocking co-benefits for air quality is really important to emphasize. Um, a very popular policy across manifestos is a drive to insulate homes, but I haven't yet spotted the necessary qualification that indoor air quality must be preserved and and, natalie, you know the green party has got a great commitment around insulating homes but also, you know, great focus on clean air. Is that something that, um, you've considered kind of policy solutions around?
Natalie:very much so.
Natalie:One of the things I point to is, of course we have an enormous skills issue and you know I can point to this personally myself.
Natalie:I was trying to insulate a terrace in Sheffield, got you know a nice builder who had actually been a Green Party council candidate as well, but it was obvious that she didn't really have the skills and the knowledge to know how to do the insulation. And I know subsequently, because I pushed her to do it, she's gone off and done a course about it. But one of the things you'll see actually in our manifesto and in our papers around it is we've got a huge skills training job and you know we can talk about getting the right ventilation, but we've got to have you know, on the individual level of the individual terrace in Sheffield we need a person doing the building work who has sufficient knowledge and skills to be able to deliver the clean air indoors. And one of the reasons why we've, in some ways, we're doing a lot in the first five years in our plans in the manifesto, but we're also acknowledging that that's actually essentially a training period to really scale up after that, because that skills gap is just a huge problem.
Simon:I'd like to make a point there. Actually and I think this is a really good example of not having a central organisation looking at something like air quality One of the challenges ventilation and air quality has always had within the built environment is it tends to sit within the energy part of the built environment and unfortunately, nothing beats no ventilation for energy efficiency and unfortunately, nothing beats no ventilation for energy efficiency. So we've always had this challenge that providing adequate ventilation is seen as an energy problem rather than a health benefit. And the second point I'd like to make on that is that the UK isn't alone in this, but we have a massive responsibility and accountability problem. Um, the the fact of the matter is is very large swathes of our built environment are simply not ventilating adequately, whether that's in the new build projects that we take on or the existing, the existing buildings being run to failure. Best estimates is somewhere between a half and three quarters of all buildings across sectors are underventilated, even to minimum standards.
Simon:So one of the policy areas that can be brought to bear is to start to look at that collective accountability, that this is a consumer protection problem, this is a public health problem and we're not getting what we're paying for, quite simply so there's enormous gains can be made simply by doing what we're supposed to have done in the first place.
Simon:This doesn't necessarily even require any innovation. This is about simply getting what we're supposed to have got in the first place and people being held accountable for that, and that's something that much more robust policy could really bring to bear. Many countries throughout the European Union, for example, are starting to bring in third party independent inspection of ventilation systems both across residential and non-residential sectors, taking it out of the hands of the people that are installing the products and bringing third parties into the picture to start stamping and approving the performance of the spaces that we occupy, because, whether we like it or not, ventilation is one of the critical pillars in the outcomes of our built environment, and at the moment, we simply do not get that right enough thanks.
Gaelan :I mean international comparisons is a really important point and I wonder if anyone can bring examples of other countries and leading the way on indoor air quality or, say, related issues such as housing health and safety or clean air more generally.
Sarah:I guess an example is from I believe it's Japan which during the pandemic, had lots, exactly as Natalie was describing in the opening statement, as those kind of display screens showing the real time carbon dioxide levels, and carbon dioxide is important here because it's a proxy for ventilation. So if you have high carbon dioxide levels, then that shows that you've got lots of rebreathe there and therefore you've got poor ventilation. And I do think countries like Germany as well, and Belgium during the pandemic, had lots of kind of public awareness campaigns around this, which was really important. So I do think we can learn from those things, because I think if people start seeing these things around, then it becomes a bit more part of kind of the everyday knowledge and oh, okay, yeah, that there is that.
Sarah:Counter to that, though, I would say there also needs to be education alongside that. So an example of perhaps not doing this very well is, during the pandemic, the government sent out co2 monitors to every single school, every single classroom, I think, across the uk, um, and many of them literally sat in a box and never, ever got opened, and that's because they didn't bother to tell schools that they were coming and what they were for and what they were meant to do with them. Some of them made beeping noises, which obviously disrupted learning. So I think we also need to learn from what we've done badly as well.
Natalie:Some of those were um were opened and then produced terrifying readings. Um, there wasn't any advice on what to do with. Even if you'd gone to the effort of trying, you know, opening monitors, getting the reading, having the beating people, still had no real guidance or no real capacity, no real resources to do anything about it absolutely, and so on this, the sammy project that I mentioned earlier, which is working with schools.
Sarah:One of the first things we did is held like co-design workshops with schools and talk to them about like you had these CO2 monitors before, tell us about how that worked. Didn't work very well, you know. Children were scared by them, et cetera, et cetera. So we embedded that kind of like knowledge within what we've made, which is a web app where they get to see their data in real time from their classrooms but, really importantly, are supported to take action to improve it. So what does this number mean in the context of other numbers that I might be seeing? And then what, as I, as a classroom teacher, or even as a student, what can I actually do here, which I think is really important? I think you're absolutely spot on. That was the piece that was missing. They were like so it's telling me, I've got 2000 ppm. What do I do? Like? What do I do now?
Simon:just just a quick one on that. When it comes to best practice, I think there's many examples across Europe and further afield of people taking practical steps to start providing some independence and assurance and the performance of systems that are installed into the built environment, and we can reel off country after country that have bit the bullet and started to introduce third-party oversight of some description into the quality of the ventilation systems that they're getting and that is going on around us. And if the UK is not careful, it's going to be left behind as an industry that still doesn't properly police and provide building control to ventilation systems, and I think that would be a shame with the potential that the UK has. My second point on the technology and this is something I think governments need to be aware of is, whether we like it or not, probably within the decade we will be judged by the ongoing performances of the spaces that we occupy. The rollout and proliferation of sensors that are capable of telling us how our spaces perform is going on around us, whether we like it or not, not just in academic circles, but in commercial sectors.
Simon:You look at the housing sector, for example.
Simon:Hundreds of thousands of properties now have environmental sensors in them that are providing a value proposition in their own right, on looking at things like fuel poverty and void risk and condensation risk and ventilation performance and energy performance, and the list goes on and on. And if we're not careful, we find ourselves in a position that if we can't stand over performance, we have to start answering questions on the ongoing performance of the spaces that we occupy, and I can tell you they're very uncomfortable questions to be asked, answering on the back foot. Just project for a moment that um teaching unions decide to start looking at the data that their members have to work in and start using that data to support strike action, and I think you could very quickly project how uncomfortable that kind of space we can be in, in full knowledge that we know we're not getting a lot of academic environments right. How would we handle that? And if that's being presented with data data, it becomes a much more difficult thing to navigate and I think that's something we need to be aware of that.
Douglas:The world is moving on around us and we need to keep up I just wanted to mention one specific international learning I think we could draw on, and it was hinted at earlier.
Douglas:France has had an indoor air quality observatory for more than 20 years, running national campaigns to measure indoor air quality in homes, school offices, all the sort of indoor environments that you could imagine, and this is really important because currently a lot of the work that goes on in academia and in industry it's siloed in individual projects measuring different components of indoor air pollution in different ways, which makes getting a really comprehensive picture of what the indoor air quality in the UK is like very difficult. There are individual projects which are building up evidence things like the SAMI project for in schools, but there are ongoing discussions about getting something done to replicate this in the UK, which I think would be really helpful. Building on Matt's initial point, as we undergo the biggest period of retrofit in the residential sector, really it's an opportunity to make sure that net zero is done in a way which can make healthy net zero buildings.
Matt:So I think that's a really good point and I guess a couple of points that the other panellists have mentioned have spoken to the role of the private sector in delivering this transition and, to be honest with you, it's not something I know lots about. This is a bit of an earlier stage of work for us. It's not something I know lots about. This is a bit of an earlier stage of work for us, but we see from our work on construction and outdoor air pollution, kind of there are skills gaps, there are knowledge gaps within the industry. There's more of a focus on climate change than there is air pollution. You know, simon mentioned the need for greater accountability, which I can well believe. Natalie mentioned skills. I'd be interested in understanding what it is, what it is going to take to get the sort of private sector pointed in the right direction.
Gaelan :That's a good point.
Gaelan :I mean I can point to an example the gas distribution networks received an allowance from the government to improve or to address fuel poverty and risk of carbon monoxide and do a lot of good work to upskill the workforce, to make sure that homes and residents are properly protected against carbon monoxide, and I think that could be quite a blueprint potentially for the wider work, wider involvement of the industry in the fight against air quality.
Gaelan :It's been very much focused on carbon monoxide, but I think there are good lessons of how they partner with, for example, like healthcare professionals, fire and rescue services that I think the government can pick up as a kind of blueprint for further work.
Gaelan :I'm just conscious of time, but I think the point around better systematic air quality monitoring is a really important one and I think there's an interesting lesson from the Welsh government, who this year introduced an Air Quality Act. They didn't introduce statutory targets for all of the WHO-recognised air pollutants because of this lack of data, but we're very much committed to gathering more data. So you know, I wonder, matt, you mentioned, you know, introducing statutory targets in line with the World Health Organisation, but what kind of reflections are of the feasibility of that sort of further reaching legislation than what's happened in Wales, given the kind of data picture we have now yeah, um, and I think my understanding, because we spoke to the um, the, the public health team there, and I think they are sort of working out if there is a way of including it feasibly in the future of particulate matter.
Matt:But, um, yeah, it's, I think. I think we have to. I think we have to sort of work to increase um, you know, available data in order to be able to hold ourselves accountable, because without, without that, we don't know what progress we're making. I think. I think, um, in other areas, it's, it's, it's more We've seen huge investment in air quality monitoring networks in London.
Matt:It's, you know, I don't think this is a sort of challenge that's beyond our capabilities and I think sort of more than that. It's the level of ambition that we're sort of baking into our policies and our and our goals. That's really. That's really important. We've seen it, you know, there are various councils within london that have committed to who guidelines, um, and the incentives that sits that sets within the wider council and the leadership that goes alongside that is really important to driving action further, further down within organizations. So, um, and I think, environment, the new national guidelines that we introduced in 2021, I think weren't as ambitious as we would have liked in the UK. So I do think there's a feasibility of monitoring question, but I also do think that it can really help drive helpful incentives in a broader system.
Sarah:What gives me hope is that often, actually both around kind of net zero stuff and around air quality, is that private sector are moving forwards on this, regardless of what governments are saying they should do.
Sarah:And I think you know we've got a huge number of um companies who are doing air quality monitoring, who are doing um education work um, that's fantastic.
Sarah:But we also have companies who are just looking at air pollution that happens across their supply chains, and sei have been doing some work with ikea, um, for example, and a group called the Alliance for Clean Air. So Alliance for Clean Air is 16 enormous companies and global companies who are trying to improve their air quality and looking at where are the air pollution emissions across the whole of our supply chains and then working to improve it. And so I feel like there's definitely a role for government legislation and we talked about that before, but actually I feel like the private sector are just going to do some of this anyway, like I think that people are realising that this is a major human health problem and even if we're not going to have legislation, we're going to take action to address it. So I would urge people to have a look at the Alliance for Clean Air and the stuff they're doing. I think it's really interesting.
Natalie:I'd agree with that. But I think one of the things to focus on and an issue that I've particularly been working on, which is not exactly always indoor air quality, but silicosis, which is a disease that's led Australia to ban certain sorts of kitchen worktops because basically a significant number of their masons have come down with lung diseases, particularly potentially deadly lung diseases, certainly disabling lung diseases. And so much of our business sector, private sector, is actually small companies, small and medium enterprises, and it's so much harder for them to put the resources in, to have the knowledge of all the thousands and thousands of other things they've got to worry about. So, yes, big companies can take action, but actually how do we support the small and medium enterprise sector, which is so much of our economy, so much of our society, so much of the spaces we spend so much time in RSMEs, and it's difficult to expect them to do a great deal without a lot of support.
Gaelan :An issue we've seen with the manifestos by the Green Party is the presence of air quality in the current debate. It's seen as maybe too contentious, probably around the difficult expansion of the ULAs, to include as a policy priority in the manifestos. To include as a policy priority in the manifestos. I wonder if people can share reflections on how we make sure that government can prioritise this. Who in the next government should be leading on this, whether it's a particular minister named for IAQ or a particular department that has kind of oversight of the broad issue as other departments work together or other points. And many thanks, natalie, for joining.
Sarah:I mean, I think it should be DEFRA, because DEFRA already have really great outdoor monitoring stations we've got. We are very, very intensely monitored in the UK and, matt, you know you said about we need more data and I think, in a way, we need more data because it helps people raise awareness of what the air quality is actually where they are, but also we know what is. We know that we have a poor air quality um in many of our spaces and we know that it's just that we need to take action. So I sort of feel like, um, if a government, if there were a government department who were responsible for it which would be amazing I think it might be sensible to incorporate it into DEFRA's remit, given that they cover outdoor air quality health inequalities more broadly.
Matt:We're hearing reports that you know different parties might organize so the civil service slightly differently, and have you know um cross-departmental working groups on health inequalities? Or you know, if it's labor, that there are various missions, so, um, it may be that there's a sort of opportunity to embed indoor air quality within that sort of broader crossed up, yeah, departmental way of working yeah, I.
Simon:I think, whatever happens, we have to take control of our built environment, and that's going to require some accountability and policing of that sector. It has not performed, uh for too long. Um, and I'll make the point again, we simply are not getting value for money. We're not getting what we pay for when it comes to the built environment, and it's such a critical factor in air quality outcomes. Um, and the second and last point I'll make on that is I don't know how much clearer evidence we need on the value of getting this right and, however, whatever flavor this ends up being, I think the potential return on investment is so enormous that something should be done. The, the value of getting this right, uh, for all of us is so important that, um, whether it's a department, whether it's a uh, an indoor air quality observatory, I think anything like that is going to reap rewards that would pay for itself many, many times over I can care.
Gaelan :Thanks so much to the panel for joining um. We'll be busy, you know, comms wise over this week around clean air day and, yes, very much looking forward to the next government and working with you all and hopefully a very enthusiastic and fresh-faced crop of new MPs and obviously our existing supporters, like Baroness and Natalie Bennett, to actually drive through policy change.
Simon:I think there were some great ideas there and, no doubt, future podcast guests. I hope you enjoyed that Before you go. Coming up next week on the podcast, we have Sotirius papathanasu, one of the original bloggers on air quality and someone I have been following for years. We talk about how the view on air quality has changed, particulate matter and much more. This show was sponsored by 21 Degrees, aeco, ultra, protect and Imbiote. All can be found and much more at airqualitymattersnet. Thanks for listening. I'm Simon Jones and this is Air Quality Matters. Thank you.
