The Scottish Government is proud of its commitment to reducing emissions. It boasts, with justification, of having devised “the most stringent reduction targets in the United Kingdom”. Given claims that exposure to fine particles in our air is causing around 2,000 Scots to die prematurely each year, the issue is more than theoretical.
Among the least desirable fumes created by our attachment to cars are so-called Nox emissions, specifically nitric oxide and nitrogen dioxide. These help to explain why 80 per cent of urban pollution comes from road traffic and why Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Dundee and Inverness endure stubbornly high levels of toxic air; which is to say, according to campaigners, air that persistently breaches regulatory standards Scotland was supposed to meet as far back as 2005.
Stand at a busy city junction on the wrong day and you can only wonder about the efforts of government. At such spots you will be given a taste, literally, of what is meant by toxic air. If you have a mind, you can also admire vehicles bearing the marques of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft.
Or perhaps not. The VW group is, aptly, in bad odour around the world for cheating both nitrogen dioxide emissions tests and its customers. Its “defeat device” will undoubtedly prove self-defeating for the car giant once regulators, politicians and lawyers set properly to work. But the confession that 1,189,906 vehicles with hoodwinking software have been sold in Britain is deeply disturbing.
For one thing, if an 8.3 per cent population share is any guide, this means that 98,762 dodgy VWs, Audis, Seats, Skodas and assorted commercial vehicles are on Scotland’s roads and polluting Scotland’s cities. It suggests, albeit unscientifically, that the noble efforts of the Scottish Government to clean up our air have been subverted, at least in part, by a giant of European industry. The blackest irony of all is that cheated VW customers in Scotland are also victims of our tainted air.
Why has this happened? An answer will cost the company billions, as it should and must. That does not explain the failure of European testing regimes to uncover the scandal before the US Environmental Protection Agency, not for the first time, took a hand. Nor does it explain why the British Government seems content to let VW and European officials handle the aftermath. Instead of a full investigation we have Patrick McLoughlin, the Transport Secretary, urging the company to contact customers and explain what steps it will take to “correct the problem”.
That is nowhere near good enough. The US government ordered a product recall on the basis of “just” 482,000 cars. The UK has a 1.2 million vehicle “problem”. Scotland’s share of that, as a small country, is hideously large. Officially, VW must wait for regulators to approve any kind of European recall scheme. But the public will therefore have a simple question: how can the US authorities act instantly while almost 100,000 polluting cars still spew their nitrogen oxide in Scotland?
A wider issue has yet to be broached. What good is it for governments to devise elaborate schemes to cleanse our environment if multi-national companies can treat public trust and standards with contempt? This is not an argument over a vague, catch-all notion of “pollution”. This is specific; the scandal’s cause has a name, a household name. Trust has been forfeited by the guardians of the VW brand. So what consequences will follow?
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here