, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 2
Yes. So, Joyce, this will only be in a smoke control area. At the moment, there are only four of those in Wales. One of my officials will correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe they are Swansea, Newport, Flintshire and Wrexham at the moment. They tend to be…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 2
Diolch, Joyce. So, currently, it's a criminal regime for smoke control, and the prosecution process is burdensome, lengthy and expensive, and, frankly, very rarely used. The resources required by the local authority to bring a prosecution are really often not…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes, there are. Indeed, there are.
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
I'm not not open to it, Huw, I guess. It's just the more things you get us to do before we do the actual thing, the less likely we are to achieve the thing, if you see what I mean. So, if we were going to slip it by three weeks, and I had to go through a…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
So, I would say as soon as possible in the circumstances, but if the committee has evidence—. Part of the point of the scrutiny process, isn't it, is if the committee has evidence that means that a timescale could be put in place that we can all agree then…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Well, if the committee wants to take evidence about what kind of timescale they think is appropriate, I'm certainly prepared to look at it, but I do genuinely worry that if the committee comes up with something that—. It's just in the nature of the way that…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
I suppose that's because we just want to do it as soon as possible, and I would struggle to say what the timescale would be for that. Again, just to give an example, what would you say? Within a year? Within two years? We are very keen to do this as soon as…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Thank you, Joyce. So, the way this would work, as I have been trying to outline, is that this is a set of partnership working with the local authority. They will be under a duty to produce this compliance date. The only way we're going to dispute that is if…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Thank you, Joyce. So, this is a bit of a complicated scenario as well. There are currently 44 air quality management areas in place across Wales. So, obviously, each local authority has a plan, but then they have management areas as well. So, some of them…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
So, we're doing a bit of both of those, Chair. So, we are increasing the resource, but we're increasing the resource over a fixed-term period, and that's because—and you've heard me say this on other provisions that we've put in place—we think there is an…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes, for sure. I don't know if you want me to address it now, but there are some provisions about idling. We're changing the regime for enforcement of that. But that will be an educational piece as well. I can't emphasise enough that, all the way through…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
—is the mechanism by which the local authority decides where to do its hotspot monitoring, just to be clear, so there's a whole process by which they come to that. They don't just randomly decide to put it on a particular junction. There's a process that they…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
The local air quality management plan, Janet—
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes. So, at the moment the legislation requires local authorities to review their air quality plans 'from time to time', is what the legislation actually says, but actually we have statutory guidance in place that requires them to submit annual progress…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes, so, again—thank you, Delyth—this is, as I said, part of a suite of measures that are going on, and almost like a road map, if you like, of what we have to do. We've recently undertaken a review of the national air quality strategy, and we'll be…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
So, the idea is, Delyth, that it's taken into account at a corporate level, so that the policy-making function of the local authority in its entirety takes account of the clean air Act, as we hope it will be by then, and not just the environmental health…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes, thank you, Delyth. So, what we're trying to do here is make sure that the local authority in its wider sense, its wider corporate sense, takes account of the guidance, and not just the environmental health team. So, we're making sure that all policy…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Well, I'm not against it, Chair, as such. I suppose what we've done is pick out the environmental ones that are more likely to have an upfront contribution to make, and then, as I said, there's a wide consultation duty anyway, so frankly anyone who did want…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
—than if you're lucky enough to be not affected by it. So, we have interest groups right across Wales who are very keenly involved in this, and whom we're very, very keen to keep involved and to use their expertise. And I know the cross-party group has a list…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes, yes. So, we are required—the Bill is requiring us to consult the public as a whole, and I know that a large number of you are members of the cross-party group; you'll know that there are very active members of the public, some who are far more…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes, Janet, and also, we have a duty to consult the public as a whole, so effectively, anyone who wants to make a contribution at that point can. Otherwise, who would we be listing out? Would we be listing the National Library of Wales, or, I mean, which…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Well, I just think it's out of sync, basically; that's what we're saying. So, what we want is for each Senedd term to have a set of reports coming to it that are meaningful, and at the moment, it's just out of sync, because of where the Act started, it just…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes. And so, this is not a criticism of what's happened in local authorities, but we know that it's not consistent, and it's not helping us towards this; it is helping us towards making some decisions on local roads, for example, so, please don't take it as a…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
Yes. That's a very good question, Joyce, and I'm afraid that it is slightly driven by economics. So, we can't afford to put an air-quality monitoring station on every junction of every road right across Wales—let's just be clear. So, to some extent, we will…
, Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee
The Environment (Air Quality and Soundscapes) (Wales) Bill - evidence from the Minister for Climate Change: part 1
It's aimed at policy makers, not the general public, and it's aimed towards making sure that local and national legislative regimes can support the proper action to be taken. So, these are things like speed limits, one-way systems, no-traffic zones and…
