Schools urged to do more to protect pupils from poor air quality

Environmental campaigners ClientEarth has called on head teachers to ‘do everything possible’ to protect their pupils from toxic air at schools.

The green group highlighted that City Hall did not publish a report in full in 2013 on primary schools in areas with nitrogen dioxide levels which breach EU legal limits. The study found that 433 schools were living in such areas, with more than 80 per cent of schools in deprived neighbourhoods.

Parents of children who develop air pollution-related illnesses such as asthma are more likely to struggle to sue to the authorities as they would have to prove a link to toxic air.

However, Alan Andrews, a lawyer at ClientEarth, said: “Head teachers worried about legal action should put in place clean air policies that do everything possible to protect their students from air pollution. 

“These should include things like encouraging parents to stop driving their children to school and supporting the new Mayor’s proposals for an expanded and strengthened Ultra Low Emission Zone.”

Russell Hobby, general secretary of school leaders’ union the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT), said that headteachers would be in regular contact with parents on travel to and from school. “However, it would be perverse if schools were held accountable for something that they have no control over. Local authorities are ultimately responsible for parking regulations and clean air policies.”