In praise of red tape

(The government needs to tackle light pollution)

London Mayor, Sadiq Khan, has an admirable record on tackling air pollution. His championing of the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) now expanded London-wide was a landmark moment for controlling air pollution. In London, toxic air had led to children growing up with stunted lungs, an increased risk of asthma, cancer, and dementia and around 4,000 premature deaths every year.

In expanding ULEZ, Sadiq Kahan not only went against Rishi Sunak’s cynical championing the right of motorists to continue killing children (asthmatic kids do not vote, motorists do), but also against considerable opposition from within his own party. The mayor said that expanding ULEZ was a difficult but necessary decision to save lives, protect the health of children and tackle the climate crisis. Data released so far shows that ULEZ expansion is working better than predicted with pollutant emissions falling dramatically.

The arguments used to sustain ULEZ can equally be applied to light pollution. The most common effect of light pollution is insomnia, and chronic light exposure at night associated with night shift work can lead to poor=quality sleep and low sleep duration. These contribute to various health problems, including obesity diabetes and certain cancers. Some epidemiological studies find strong correlations between light pollution and the incidence of breast and prostate cancers, suggesting that outdoor light exposure is an influence.

So why isn’t there regulation to reduce light pollution? According to the House of Lords Science and technology committee inquiry into the effect of artificial light and noise on human health, the Conservative Government’s response to their report was “disappointing”. The Committee stated that it was concerned that the Government had rejected its recommendations on light pollution and the creation of a light policy statement, which would set out the expected roles of different departments in tackling light and noise pollution. This was not surprising. The report itself stated “there is no national Government strategy for tackling light pollution. Witnesses said little attention was paid to the topic.”

The former Conservative Government was always against any regulation. Indeed, one of the reasons Boris Johnson supported Brexit was to free the UK from EU ‘Red tape’, i.e. environmental protection.
His predecessors and successors also had an aversion to environmental protection:

the Cameron Government insisted on a one-in, one-out rule, meaning Ministers had to identify an existing piece of regulation to be scrapped for every new one proposed. The Grenfell disaster was one of the consequences of the ‘war on red tape’. ¹

Liz Truss, who held the environment post from 2014 to 2016, boasted to the House of Commons “We have seen a reduction of 34,000 farm inspections a year and an 80% reduction in red tape from Defra [Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs].”
What she did not say was that this had resulted in a cut in surveillance of water companies and a massive increase in the dumping of raw sewage. Greenpeace UK’s chief scientist, Dr Doug Parr, said: “A decade of budget cuts and government deregulation has left the Environment Agency, almost literally, up shit creek without a paddle.

The free market will not protect the environment or the health of communities or desist from polluting practices if something does not prevent them. The process used by governments to prevent pollution is called regulation. Another word for it is ‘the law’. Trying to trivialise ‘the law’ by calling it ‘red tape’, or ‘deregulation’ when it means getting rid of laws that protect people’s health, and our environment is a cynical con trick. We all have good reason to support environmental regulation.

We need the recently elected Labour government to be the new broom that clears up this mess. It needs a clear focus on environmental protection, including light pollution. Instead of ignoring recommendations from the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee (and before it the all-party group on Dark Skies), it needs to begin drafting policies and legislation to control light pollution as a matter of urgency. If it does not, light pollution will increasingly damage people’s health.

Sadly, the signs to date are not good, Prime Minister Keir Starmer is set to announce a renewed push for Britain’s watchdogs to ‘rip up red tape and boost the economy’. Let us hope the current government demonstrates a more nuanced approach to environmental regulation than their predecessors. Otherwise, the environment will pay a heavy price and people’s health will damaged.

Wouldn’t it be great to see a headline ‘reduced light pollution cutting cancer rates’ in 2029. The phrase “red tape” originated in the 16th and 17th centuries when Spanish King Charles V’s administration bound important state documents with red ribbon instead of string. This became a standard practice over Europe.

One of the ministers in his government Eric Pickles (who famously told the Grenfell inquiry he was ‘extremely busy’ and to stop ‘wasting his time’) was asked about whether slashing rules and regulations, allowed the installation of combustible cladding helped the fire in the west London tower block spread. The inquiry also heard that members of the government and senior civil servants were warned repeatedly that fire safety regulations were not adequate. ↩︎

By Albert Maxwell
Blogs are written by LightAware supporters in a personal capacity

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