Just one in every 1,000 drivers reported for unnecessary idling of their engines were fined in central London, data has revealed.
Toxic air pollution kills about 4,000 people every year in the capital and councils have targeted parked drivers who do not turn off their vehicles.
In Westminster, more than 70,000 idling drivers have been reported since 2017 via the council’s “report it” website. But only 63 fines of £80 were issued and just half of these were paid.
Westminster council says it has the worst air pollution in the country and attracted attention in 2017 when it quadrupled the fine for idling from £20.
“Toxic air needs tough action,” said the councillor Andrew Smith at the time. Nickie Aiken, then the council leader and now MP for Westminster asked the government in 2021 to increase the £80 fine, saying it was not an effective deterrent.
The data, released under freedom of information (FoI) rules, lists 99.9% of the idling reports as ending in “soft action”. It does not record whether a driver was asked to switch off their engine and did so, drove off or was not challenged by a council officer.
“Westminster Conservatives talk a good talk on air quality but this data shows they did not use the powers at their disposal,” said Max Sullivan, the Labour candidate for the Bayswater council ward who made the FoI request. “The lack of tough action on engine idling is appalling and will be disappointing news to those worried about air pollution.”
In Bayswater, just two fines were issued over five years and neither were paid, he said. Lambeth council issued three times more idling fines than Westminster from 2019-21.
“It is reasonable to have some soft enforcement,” Sullivan said. “The problem is there is virtually no hard action at all. I don’t know what you’d have to do to get fined.” The data was likely to represent just a fraction of the true scale of the problem, he said.
Air pollution may be damaging every organ in the human body, according to a comprehensive 2019 review, and is particularly damaging to children. A recent study found that switching off an engine for even 30 seconds cuts pollution by half compared with idling.
“Tackling air quality is a major priority for my constituents – and therefore me,” Aiken said. “From my experience, when I introduced the ‘don’t be idle’ campaign as council leader, the vast majority of drivers who are asked to turn off their engines do so. Perhaps that is why we have very few fines given out. For those who refuse, £80 doesn’t seem to cease their behaviour. Perhaps a larger fine will focus their minds.”
James Spencer, a Westminster council cabinet member for city management, said: “The council has run a successful anti-engine idling campaign for several years. The campaign’s main purpose is to educate and change behaviour, however, we do issue fines to the worst and repeat offenders.
“The impact of poor air quality on health should not be underestimated, especially for children. That’s why we also work closely with schools to distribute anti-idling posters and leaflets.”
Gary Fuller, an air pollution expert at Imperial College London, said: “Many councils boast to me about their anti-idling work. This effort seems out of proportion to the knowledge base. Most evidence is more than a decade old, with little evidence on the emissions from modern vehicles with the latest exhaust technologies.
“I’m not saying that idling is OK – far from it. But I worry that it becomes a politically acceptable diversion that reduces the pressure to take action on the far greater air pollution from the vehicles that are moving.”
The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, proposed on Friday that the capital’s ultra-low emission zone (Ulez) be extended to the whole of Greater London by the end of 2023. Currently, drivers of all but the newest diesel vehicles, and some older petrol vehicles, who enter the Ulez have to pay £12.50 each day for cars, and more for larger vehicles. The extension is projected to cut the number of the most polluting cars on London’s roads by 20,000-40,000 a day.
