What should be the functions of government?

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“Political power, then, I take to be a right of making laws, with penalties of death, and consequently all less penalties for the regulating and preserving of property, and of employing the force of the community in the execution of such laws, and in the defence of the commonwealth from foreign injury, and all this only for the public good.”

–       John Locke, Second Treatise of Government, §3

Today, I will ask the question: What functions ought government to perform? And I will aim to answer this in a Lockean manner.

I shall begin with the paragraph at the head of this essay, the first substantive statement in John Locke’s Second Treatise. I shall fill out the picture with more of his ideas. And at the end, I shall list the core functions of government, as they ought to be in a system based on Locke’s political ideas.

Laws

According to Locke, a government has a right to make laws. But not just any old laws. They must not be “the fancies and intricate contrivances of men.” They must not represent “contrary and hidden interests put into words.”

Instead, “the end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom.” “Laws ought to be designed for no other end ultimately than the good of the people.” And laws are “only so far right as they are founded on the law of Nature.”

That means, in my terms, that laws must defend the freedoms of the governed, never destroy or damage those freedoms. They must always aim at the good of the people; that is, the good of every human being worth the name among them. And these laws may only interpret or explicate the natural law of humanity. Which, in Locke’s paraphrase, is: “being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.” Laws must not contradict this natural law, violate it, or push beyond its bounds.

Such laws, if properly conceived, justly designed, fully debated and consented to by the people, can provide one of the things, which Locke identifies as missing if there is no government. That is, “an established, settled, known law, received and allowed by common consent to be the standard of right and wrong, and the common measure to decide all controversies between them.”

Penalties and reparations

In Locke’s view, government laws can carry penalties if broken, up to and including death. This may seem over the top for laws “for the regulating and preserving of property.” But Locke saw the individual human being as “proprietor of his own person.” Thus, attacks against the person, including lethal violence, he saw as also attacks on that person’s property. Indeed, he used the word “property” as a general word for “their lives, liberties and estates.”

Locke also countenanced civil-law compensation, in addition to criminal-law penalties. “Besides the crime which consists in violating the laws, and varying from the right rule of reason … there is commonly injury done; in which case, he who hath received any damage has … a particular right to seek reparation from him that hath done it.”

Enforcement and defence

Government has a right of “employing the force of the community in the execution of such laws.” That is, requiring those who subscribe to the political society either to be part of, or to pay for, a force to restrain and, where appropriate, to punish those that break such laws. This would correspond, in modern terms, to a police force, together with the right to make a citizen’s arrest.

Government may also use that force “in the defence of the commonwealth from foreign injury.” As above, I see this as levying an obligation either to be part of, or to pay for, a force to be used for military defence against aggressions by political states.

Judges and punishments

Locke gives his view of the functions of government in a short chapter beginning at §123. While not explicitly named in the quote at the head of this essay, one of the functions listed there is “a known and indifferent [impartial] judge, with authority to determine all differences according to the established law.” In today’s terms, this means courts of justice, which can arbitrate disputes, and try those accused of crimes. This is another of the things Locke saw as missing if there is no government.

Another function listed is “power to back and support the sentence when right, and to give it due execution.” This corresponds, in today’s terms, to the services, such as prisons, which support the courts of justice.

Justice

Locke says remarkably little in his Two Treatises about justice, or what it actually is. He does say: “Justice gives every man a title to the product of his honest industry, and the fair acquisitions of his ancestors descended to him.”

But for the most part, he delegates the job to Richard Hooker, a cleric of a century before. Who says: “If I do harm, I must look to suffer, there being no reason that others should show greater measure of love to me than they have by me showed unto them; my desire, therefore, to be loved of my equals in Nature, as much as possible may be, imposes on me a natural duty of bearing toward them fully the like affection.” So, Hooker’s, and thus Locke’s, conception of justice is not so far away from my “condition in which each individual is to be treated, over the long run, in the round and as far as practicable, as he or she treats others.”

Paying for government

“It is true,” says Locke, “governments cannot be supported without great charge, and it is fit everyone who enjoys his share of the protection should pay out of his estate his proportion for the maintenance of it.”

I read this as meaning that each individual should pay, for any period in which government defends his assets, in proportion to the benefit he receives from that protection. And I read “out of his estate his proportion” as saying that how much he is expected to pay should be in direct proportion to his total wealth. This seems fair to me, as I would expect the cost of defending anyone’s life and wealth to be in close proportion to the amount of that wealth.

Further, government “must not raise taxes on the property of the people without the consent of the people given by themselves or their deputies.” But the deputies or “representatives” themselves are bound to act in the interests of the people. “For all power given with trust for attaining an end being limited by that end, whenever that end is manifestly neglected or opposed, the trust must necessarily be forfeited, and the power devolve into the hands of those who gave it.” That means that if our supposed “representatives” agree to taxes that go against, or are used for purposes that go against, the good of the people, they have forfeited our trust, and may no longer act, or claim to act, on our behalf.

The public good

“All this,” says Locke, must be “only for the public good.” He defines this in the First Treatise as “the good of every particular member of that society, as far as by common rules it can be provided for.”

Later, he puts his case more strongly. “The power of the society or legislative constituted by them can never be supposed to extend farther than the common good, but is obliged to secure every one’s property by providing against those three defects above mentioned that made the state of Nature so unsafe and uneasy. And so, whoever has the legislative or supreme power of any commonwealth, is bound to govern by established standing laws, promulgated and known to the people, and not by extemporary decrees; by indifferent [impartial] judges, who are to decide controversies by those laws; and to employ the force of the community at home, or abroad to prevent or redress foreign injuries and secure the community from inroads and invasion. And all this to be directed to no other end but the peace, safety and public good of the people.”

I interpret all this as meaning that if someone keeps to the natural law of humanity – “no-one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions” – then government must never harm him in any of those ways. Nor may it do anything outside its remit of securing everyone’s life, health, liberty and possessions. Nor may it judge any case in any way that is not totally unbiased, objective and honest. Nor may it use force outside its bounds, except in defence or retaliation.

No transfer of power

Locke writes: “The legislative cannot transfer the power of making laws to any other hands, for it being but a delegated power from the people, they who have it cannot pass it over to others.” Thus, this power always rests ultimately with the people, and cannot be transferred, either explicitly or implicitly, to any external organization such as the EU or UN.

To sum up Locke’s view

1)     Government can make laws. But these laws must always aim at the good of the people. And when put into effect, they must defend the lives, liberties and possessions of the governed, never destroy or damage them.

2)     Government laws may only interpret or explicate the natural law of humanity, which forbids everyone to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions. They must never contradict it, violate it, or go into areas beyond its bounds.

3)     Government laws can carry penalties if broken.

4)     Government can order reparations for harms done.

5)     Government can use force to restrain and, where appropriate, to punish those that break laws, or fail to pay reparations that it has ordered. Individuals can assist if they are so minded.

6)     Government and individuals can use force to defend or retaliate against military attack.

7)     Payment for government should be in proportion to the wealth of an individual’s estate. No other taxes may be levied without the consent of the governed.

8)     Everything government does must be for the public good. That is, the good of every individual among the governed, as far as it can be achieved by making and enforcing laws common to all.

9)     Government power rests ultimately with the people, and cannot be transferred to external parties.

The core functions of government

Here are the functions of government, as foreseen in John Locke’s political philosophy, but brought up to date in terms of institutions of government today.

1)     A legislative, whose powers are circumscribed by the limitations I set out above.

2)     A police force or equivalent.

3)     A defensive and retaliatory military.

4)     Impartial, objective and honest courts of justice, covering compensatory and penal law.

5)     The support services associated with the courts of justice.

To which, for practical reasons, there should be added:

6)     A quality control system, to ensure that government always acts for the public good.

7)     A fair and just system of financing the other government functions, in which the core payment is in proportion to total wealth, and there are no further taxes without consent.

And that’s it!

A Brief History of Air Pollution in the UK

(Image credit: Alan Frijns, Pixabay)

This will be a sharply cut down précis of some of my earlier work, which has documented the history of the science and politics of air pollution and anti-car policies in the UK.

Air Pollution Episodes

I shall first discuss some specific air pollution episodes, whose health effects have been proven to be serious and adverse. I shall concentrate mainly on two kinds of pollutant. First, sulphur oxides. And second, PM_2.5 (that is, particulate matter small enough to find its way through the body’s defences into the lungs.) Though I shall also, towards the end, touch on the subject of nitrogen oxides.

The Great London Smog of 1952

During a cold, windless winter week-end in 1952, unusual amounts of air pollutants collected in the atmosphere in and around London. This produced a fog, in which visibility and air quality were both very poor for several days in a row. I wrote about this here: [[1]].

According to the government report the following year, this “smog” was accompanied by an immediate and sudden rise in both illness and mortality. Hospital figures show that respiratory disease nearly quadrupled, and heart disease levels were three times normal.

The blame was laid on a combination of sulphur oxides and “smoke” (what would now be called “particulate matter” or PM). The report said: “Both medical opinion and chemical investigation indicate that the deleterious effects of the oxides of sulphur are greatly enhanced by the presence of smoke particles.” This unhealthy combination was produced by the burning of low-quality coal, with a high sulphur content. As many as 12,000 people may have died from, or had their lives shortened by, the effects of the Great Smog.

The result was political action, and the Clean Air Act 1956, which led to a number of follow-ups. Over a decade and more, levels of air pollution, and particularly of sulphur dioxide, were significantly reduced.

Other smogs in London, the USA and Japan

Data from the time suggests that mortality from bronchitis in London rose by a factor of more than 10 between 1840 and the 1890s. This reflected a sustained increase in coal-burning, and in the “pea-souper” fogs, for which London became famous. Since then, a combination of regulation and technical improvements has reduced levels of both sulphur oxides and PM, which today are only 2 or 3 per cent of 1890s levels.

In the 20^th century, there were similar smogs in other parts of the world. St. Louis in 1939 and New York City in 1966 were two major ones, and they resulted in political action. There have also been smog events, attributed to sulphur oxide pollution, in Japan. But I know of no such destructive smogs in the Western world since the early 1970s.

Before 1950, there had also been examples of serious health damage in Europe and the USA, due to fluorine compounds emitted into the air. However, there have been none since.

Hazes

Hazes are a more recent phenomenon, with similar effects to smogs. They have occurred since 1997 in south-east Asia and in China. There have also been smogs in China and India during that time.

All these seem to be associated with two sources of pollution. One, pollution from coal and other industry, like the Western smogs. And two, agricultural practices that burn vegetation on a large scale. Such practices often result in large seasonal emissions of PM and sulphur oxides together. Just like the known causes of the major Western and Japanese smogs.

Which pollutants are the toxic ones?

Looking at the field as an informed outsider, I see no evidence to contradict the conclusion of the UK government’s 1953 report on the Great Smog of London. Namely, that you need both PM and sulphur oxides together to produce a dangerous smog.

As to the toxins that directly cause the adverse health effects of this mixture, epidemiologist James Enstrom did a calculation a few years ago, which estimated the total PM ingested in a lifetime of breathing average US city air as about 5 grams. This means that, if these toxins are carried in the PM, they must be very toxic indeed when absorbed into the bloodstream. There are certainly three highly toxic divalent metals (cadmium, lead, and mercury) in PM, which might react inside the lungs to produce a sulphate that ends up in the bloodstream, and could cause the toxic metal to accumulate over the longer term.

Though there has been some science done in this area, notably in China, I am surprised that a problem which has been known about for 70 years seems to have been so little investigated.

The history up to 2008

I’ll look at the history chronologically, as I did earlier at [[2]].

The 1970s and 1980s

In the 1970s, the main focus in the scientific area of air pollution and health was monitoring.

Links between air pollution and health became in the 1980s more and more a political matter. And in Germany, the idea of ambitious “clean air” policies, requiring reductions of emissions from cars as well as from other emissions sources, was first mooted.

The Rio Summit and after

Then, in 1992, there was Rio. The agreements made there did not have a direct, immediate effect in the area of air pollution and health. But they surely inspired the UK government to start taking steps towards making air pollution into a hot-button political issue.

COMEAP, the Committee on Medical Effects of Air Pollution, was established in 1992. Professor Stephen Holgate, later to prove an activist in these matters, was its first chair.

Also in 1992, the EU (as it was soon to become) issued its first vehicle emissions standards. In the UK, catalytic converters were required in petrol engines. And the London Air Quality Network (LAQN) was formed, to monitor various pollutants.

In 1993, the Clean Air Act regulated the content of motor fuels. And in the USA, the “Six Cities” study was published, which became the baseline for assessing health effects of PM.

The UK Environment Act 1995 brought a requirement for government to prepare a National Air Quality Strategy. In 1996, the EU issued its Ambient Air Quality Directive. And 1997 brought the publication of the first UK National Air Quality Strategy. All the time, the UN’s World Health Organization (WHO) was working behind the scenes, setting “guidelines” for concentrations of many pollutants, and bedding-in the culture of ever-tightening, collective limits, to which we have been increasingly subjected ever since.

In 1998, the EU issued a new directive on fuel standards. And COMEAP addressed for the first time the issue of links between air pollution and health. In 1999, the UK signed up to the Gothenburg Protocol. And from 2000 on, the scope and pace of regulation only increased. The 2001 EU National Emissions Ceiling directive was a significant marker on the trail that led to air pollution being used more and more as an excuse to violate our rights and freedoms.

In 2003, work started towards the London Low Emissions Zone (LEZ). In 2005, the EU’s “Clean Air for Europe” program began. Also in 2005, the WHO updated its air quality guidelines, including a guideline for PM_2.5 an order of magnitude lower than previous limits, even the EU’s.

One intervention in 2006, which did seem to produce positive results, was stricter controls over the sulphur content of marine fuels. And in 2007, the introduction of ultra-low sulphur diesel does seem to have had positive effects in reducing the amount of very small PM, as well as sulphur oxides; not surprising, given what we know from the Great Smog! What is surprising, though, is that – almost uniquely, it seems – this was achieved at reasonable cost.

In 2008, the EU issued yet another omnibus directive, on Ambient Air Quality and Cleaner Air for Europe. And the London LEZ went into operation.

The COMEAP report of 2009

2009 marks a watershed over this issue. For in that year, COMEAP produced a report which, apparently, laid a “scientific” foundation that enabled government and activist campaigners to make out that air pollution was a more serious problem than had previously been thought.

One thing I found strange was that COMEAP focused only on the level of PM_2.5 in order to estimate the risk, irrespective of what that PM contained, or what other pollutants it was accompanied by. The idea that “all PM_2.5 is equal” in toxicity does not seem to me to be anywhere near proven, even though this is the official line maintained by the WHO. Indeed, as above, historical evidence strongly suggests that PM_2.5 and sulphur oxides together are more toxic than either of them alone.

You can read the full essay at [[3]]. Here are some of my conclusions from the end of that essay.

That the focus was on effects of pollution reductions, rather than on gauging the scale of the pollution problem as a whole, worried me from the start. The “expert elicitation” exercise to determine confidence intervals gave me no confidence at all. That the direction of the report, and what it would study, had been set as early as the beginning of 2006, got me concerned about the integrity of the scientific process which led to its results. And that the whole exercise ended up slavishly following the WHO’s recommendations – even in the confidence intervals! – raised a red flag for me.

That the report concentrated on long-term exposure, when historical evidence suggests that the biggest proven negative health effects from air pollution have come from episodic exposures, struck me as obtuse. Moreover, the significant role of sulphur compounds in combination with PM in causing health damage was not properly addressed, even when brought up by two of the peer reviewers. This damaged further my confidence in the integrity of the processes. And the presence on the committee of at least one activist on the issue did not inspire me with confidence in its impartiality.

All of these pieces of evidence combined to lead me to my conclusion. This report was not an honest attempt to inform policy assessments by quantifying the risks arising from PM_2.5 pollution in the UK. It was far more like an exercise in creating “evidence” to suit previously determined policies. It was simply an excuse – a 180+ page excuse – for falling into line behind the WHO’s position on the matter. It was not science, but politics.

The history from 2009 onwards

The three essays which tell the back-story in detail from 2009 are here: [[4]], [[5]], [[6]]. It is a long and tangled tale, and I shall select only a few of the events most important from the air pollution toxicology point of view.

2009 to 2013

In 2009, the LAQN (London Air Quality Network) report for 2006/7 identified that the EU limit value for nitrogen oxides was being exceeded in many places in London. Curiously, the 2008, 2009 and 2010 reports weren’t published until 2012!

The major UK report of 2010 in the air pollution area was the follow-up to the COMEAP report of 2009. It concluded: “An effect on mortality in 2008 of nearly 29,000 deaths in the UK at typical ages and an associated loss of total population life of 340,000 life-years.” Figures like these are still bandied about today by those of an activist bent.

In 2011, a UK team reviewed how much effect the LEZ charging scheme had had on air pollution levels since 2003. The answer to the question was, in brief, not very much.

By 2012, the culture of arbitrary, ever tightening, collective “targets” and “limits,” that had been conceived by the EU, adopted by the UN, and supported by politicians that ought to have known better, was in full swing. And in Europe, the EU had become its policeman. In the same year, some of the saner UK air quality experts issued a report that “challenges the robustness of the evidence for making future policy decisions in respect of PM_2.5 in the UK context.” But they were not listened to.

The main air pollution story of 2013 came from the WHO and the EU. In that year, they started promoting air pollution as a really big problem, with a project called REVIHAAP. (“Review of Evidence on Health Aspects of Air Pollution.”) A sister project, HRAPIE, “Health Risks from Air Pollution in Europe,” summarized the views of “expert stakeholders.”

I cannot avoid thinking that the WHO and EU must have funded these two projects in order to bias air pollution science towards activism.

2014 to 2018

In 2014, the European Commission, the executive of the EU, took the UK to court for exceeding nitrogen oxides limits. And in 2015, DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) issued a report on nitrogen oxide pollution, which made out that these gases had worse effects than previously thought.

The major event of 2016 in the air pollution field was a report by the RCP (Royal College of Physicians) and the RCPCH (Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health). It was titled “Every breath we take: the lifelong impact of air pollution,” and was alarmist and activist. Its figure of 40,000 deaths each year due to PM_2.5 and nitrogen oxides went viral in the media. The chair of the working group that produced this report was Professor Stephen Holgate.

In 2017, the UK government issued a Draft UK Air Quality Plan for “tackling” nitrogen dioxide. This laid the foundation for Clean Air Zones, charging entry fees for non-compliant cars and vans. Moreover, it explicitly planned the upcoming London Ultra Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ), from the “T-charge” of 2017, via the launch of ULEZ in 2019, to its extension to the North and South Circular Roads that was to happen in 2021.

In 2018, COMEAP issued another report, on “Associations of long-term average concentrations of nitrogen dioxide with mortality.” It shows evidence of a rather confused genesis, for example: “Policy needs have determined the focus on NO₂ in this report.”

On this occasion, the committee could not reach agreement on its conclusions. Three brave dissenters said, rightly in my view: “there is insufficient evidence to infer a causal association between long-term average ambient NO₂ concentrations and risk of death.” But the majority pressed on regardless, saying: “There is a case for an NO₂ contribution of unknown size.” And, despite admitting that they did not know its size, they gave a risk figure for it anyway!

Another, landmark event of 2018 was a real-world study by Professor Chris Griffiths, which investigated the impact of London’s LEZ on air quality and children’s respiratory health. It “found no evidence of a reduction in the proportion of children with small lungs over this period, despite small improvements in air quality in highly polluted urban areas during the implementation of London's LEZ.” But Shirley Rodriguez, deputy mayor of London, did not like this outcome, and pressured Professor Griffiths to change his conclusions. Which he, to his credit, refused to do.

2019 to the present

I do not think that I need to give much detail on all that has happened since 2019; you can use your own memories, or refer to my original essays. A few bullet-points should suffice.

·       The COVID panic, and all that went with it.

·       The “consultation” on “de-carbonizing transport.”

·       The “Great Reset.”

·       A labelling change, instituting a “Clean Air Programme” and a “Clean Air Day.”

·       New, and greatly tightened, air quality guidelines from the WHO.

·       Extension of ULEZ to the North and South Circular Roads.

·       The first “Clean Air Zones.”

·       An Imperial College study that concluded, “The ULEZ caused only small improvements in air quality in the context of a longer-term downward trend in London’s air pollution levels.” Which, again, the Deputy Mayor of London tried to suppress, this time with help from the then chair of COMEAP.

·       Announcement of “Clean Air Champions,” including Professor Stephen Holgate.

·       A most revealing 2022 “Chemical Hazards and Poisons Report” from the UK Health Security Agency.

·       Extension of ULEZ to Outer London, and the judicial shenanigans that went with it.

·       Activist, anti-car local transport plans springing up, even in rural counties.

·       The WHO’s overblown and unachievable “Vision Zero” road safety scheme.

·       And much more…

To sum up

In this missive, dear reader, I have given you many individual snippets of information. They are like dots in a pattern. Can you connect the dots, and work out what has actually been going on in the world of air pollution toxicology since the 1980s or thereabouts?

To give you a little hint: We’ve been had, haven’t we?

---

[[1]] https://libertarianism.uk/2024/04/07/the-back-story-behind-anti-car-policies-in-the-uk-part-one-air-pollution-episodes/

[[2]] https://libertarianism.uk/2024/04/08/the-back-story-behind-anti-car-policies-in-the-uk-part-two-the-story-up-to-2008/

[[3]] https://libertarianism.uk/2024/04/09/the-back-story-behind-anti-car-policies-in-the-uk-part-three-the-comeap-report-of-2009/

[[4]] https://libertarianism.uk/2024/04/10/the-back-story-behind-anti-car-policies-in-the-uk-part-four-the-story-from-2009-to-2022/

[[5]] https://libertarianism.uk/2024/04/11/the-back-story-behind-anti-car-policies-in-the-uk-part-five-the-story-of-the-last-15-months/

[[6]] https://libertarianism.uk/2024/04/21/the-back-story-behind-anti-car-policies-in-the-uk-part-six-summary-and-diagnosis/

The Clean Air (Human Rights) bill

(Image credit: Matt Palmer, Unsplash)

There is upcoming, on Friday November 7^th, 2025, the second reading of a parliamentary private member’s bill. It is titled the “Clean Air (Human Rights) Bill.” I must say that this is the most tyrannical and extremist piece of legislation I have yet read.

This article was not intended to be part of a set. Yet, it follows on directly from my recent essays on “Our Enemy, the UN” [[i]] and the perversion of the precautionary principle [[ii]].

The bill’s history

The bill was introduced by Sian Berry, Green MP for Brighton Pavilion. It had previously been brought up in 2022. It had its first reading on July 1^st, 2025: [[iii]]. Its stated purposes are: “To establish the right to breathe clean air. To require the Secretary of State to achieve and maintain clean air in England. To make provision about environmental targets and minimum standards in relation to clean air. To make provision about the powers, duties and functions of public bodies in England in relation to air pollution. To give the Office for Environmental Protection additional powers and duties related to clean air. To require the Secretary of State to comply with the United Nations Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution. To require the Secretary of State and public authorities to apply specified environmental principles in carrying out their duties under this Act. And for connected purposes.”

Of the 12 presenters of this bill, two are Green MPs, five Labour, two Lib Dem including Roz Savage (proposer of the Climate and Nature bill [[iv]]), one Independent, one SNP and one SDLP. Ten of them are also listed as supporters of Zero Hour [[v]], promoters of the Climate and Nature bill. Of the other two, one made her maiden parliamentary speech on May 1^st, 2019 in the debate that ended with parliament declaring a “climate emergency.” And the other has been a senior advisor to Sadiq Khan, mayor of London.

Ella’s Law

The bill has the popular title of “Ella’s Law,” after Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, who died in 2013 aged 9. Her mother, suspecting that a cause of death might have been pollution from traffic on the nearby South Circular Road, began to campaign for a review of the causes of death. The suspected pollutants were nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) and particulate matter small enough to enter the lungs (PM_2.5).

In her campaign, she was aided by Professor Stephen Holgate. Holgate was chair of the UK government’s Committee on Medical Effects of Air Pollution (COMEAP) from its inception in 1992 until 2001. He was still active on that committee as late as 2010. He was chair of the 2016 working party that produced the highly alarmist RCP (Royal College of Physicians) report: “Every breath we take: the lifelong impact of air pollution.” And in 2021, when UKRI, “UK Research and Innovation”, instituted a “Clean Air Programme,” he was first among those appointed as “Clean Air Champions.”

Ella’s mother became a Green Party supporter, and later candidate. She is now an official World Health Organization (WHO) advocate for health and air quality. And the coroner, who did the re-examination, decided to fall in line. He changed the cause of Ella’s death to “asthma contributed to by excessive air pollution.” He also observed that “there was no dispute at the inquest that atmospheric air pollution is the cause of many thousand premature deaths in the UK.” Though, to my knowledge, no other UK death certificate has ever mentioned air pollution.

There is a website devoted to Ella’s Law. Its major supporters are listed here: [[vi]]. Sadiq Khan is, unsurprisingly, the figurehead. The RCP is also there, having written supportively to Baroness Jones, who introduced the bill back in 2022. But who signed that letter on behalf of the RCP? No less than Professor Stephen Holgate.

And a Tory peer and former paralympic swimmer enthused: “continuous improvement… year on year, is built into it.” Ignoring that such “continuous improvement” means not only ever-mounting costs to us the people, but also an ever-tightening noose around our necks.

The environmental context

Before I look at what is in the bill, I’ll say something about the history of air pollution in the UK. DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) publish a yearly report on the levels of many different pollutants, including NO₂ and PM_2.5. This shows, among much else, graphs of the changes in emissions and concentrations, often going back more than 50 years. The latest report, for 2024, is here: [[vii]].

This shows that NO₂ concentrations have gone down by a factor of almost 3 since the mid-1990s. UK emissions are also less than a third of what they were in 1990. And “all background locations were within the limit value.” (The EU limit, set before Brexit).

As to PM_2.5, “everywhere in the UK was well within the annual mean limit value.” Concentrations of PM_2.5 have roughly halved since 2011. Emissions have gone down by a factor of more than 3. And the only spike during 2024 was due to Bonfire Night.

Leaf through the document, and you will see similar patterns for many pollutants (except ozone, whose chemistry is strange). A steep drop in emissions and concentrations in the 1990s, as relatively easy reduction measures were rolled out (such as installing scrubbers on coal-fired power stations). Followed by a continuing, but slower, drop since 2000, or for a few of the pollutants a levelling-off of concentrations. Haven’t we done well?

What is in the bill?

The “right” to breathe “clean air”

The bill opens: “Everyone has the right to breathe clean air.” Then goes on to declare that this “right” is to be treated as if it was named in the European Convention on Human Rights.

This raises two sets of questions. First, just how clean is “clean?” And, given the huge reductions in pollution over decades as documented in the DEFRA report, is the air in the UK not already clean enough? It is several orders of magnitude less polluted than it was in the 1890s. Or in 1952, when the “Great Smog of London” took place. Or even in 1990. Where is the evidence that all these reductions have not been sufficient to make the air truly clean?

And second, how can anything be a human right, if it is not possible to identify an obligation or set of obligations which, if everyone kept to them, would guarantee respect for that right? A lot of air pollutants in the UK, for example sulphur dioxide, come mainly from sources beyond human control, like volcanoes. And the biggest particulate matter episode in 2024 was the result of air that had come all the way from Russia. Good luck to anyone who tries to defend such a “human right” against Viking volcanoes! Or even Voivode Vladimir.

The timeframe

The bill, as written, dates from 2022. It therefore sets targets which are unachievable, and in some cases already past. Will anyone in the parliament notice?

NO₂ and PM_2.5

From the start, this bill shows up its promoters’ and supporters’ obsession with tightening the screws on us the people. They seek to force on us their malign culture of arbitrary, collective, ever tightening targets and limits on what we may do. And, as I showed in earlier essays, that culture is driven along by a mad craving for “safety at any cost,” regardless of how much harm is caused to the people they are supposed to represent and serve.

Clause 2 shows up obviously who are the bill’s main targets for demonization: drivers of diesel cars. For earlier assessments, including one by COMEAP as recently as 2022, had concentrated mainly on levels of PM_2.5, with NO₂ considered only as an “other pollutant,” the health benefits of reducing which “should not be overlooked.” Yet this bill seeks to focus on NO₂, which is emitted significantly by diesel engines but far less by petrol engines, as the primary target for draconian reductions. Even though COMEAP, in their last major report on the issue back in 2018, could not agree among themselves on how toxic PM_2.5 and NO₂ are together compared with PM_2.5 alone.

The CCCA

The promoters of the bill want to set up a new organization they call the CCCA (citizens’ commission for clean air). It will be required to review annually both the pollutants covered by the bill, and the limits set on them. It must make use of advice from the WHO, the UK Health Security Agency (HSA), United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), and “scientists” (unspecified). The EU’s European Environment Agency (EEA) is to be involved. And the CCCA must apply the precautionary principle.

These organizations are hardly politically neutral ones. This is, very clearly, an attempt to force even harder on to us the UN and globalist agenda, which I described in my essay on over-precaution as “ever more, and ever tightening, government overreach, without any need for them ever to have to prove anyone guilty of anything.” The CCCA will have the power to add pollutants to the schedules, or to lower limits, at their pleasure.

For greenhouse gases, the CCC (Committee for Climate Change) will be given powers very much comparable to the CCCA for pollutants. And the UN’s IPCC must be used as advisors.

The CCCA will have extensive powers to institute or intervene in legal proceedings. It will have powers to force compliance with the “duties imposed by this Act.” And as to clause 20, which specifies the “environmental principles” it must apply, I suggest you read it yourself (but take a sick-bowl with you).

As to its constitution and workings, it appears that the secretary of state cannot dismiss the chief executive of the CCCA, even if they are “unable, unfit or unwilling to perform their functions.” Furthermore, the CCCA can appoint anyone it pleases to any of its advisory committees. This looks to me like a commission that will quickly go out of control, into tyrannical extremism; just as the CCC has done.

Requirements on organizations and individuals

Clause 5 requires owners of workplaces, of new and refurbished residential developments, and of other buildings used by the public, to report indoor air pollution against WHO guidelines. And it will require UK based organizations of all sizes to report their greenhouse gas pollutants. (Hint: CO₂ isn’t a pollutant! But our enemies think it is.)

It will require daily information about ambient pollutant concentrations to be provided to the public. And if a limit is forecast to be, or is actually, exceeded, “necessary steps must be taken to inform members of the public by means of radio, television, newspapers or the Internet.” Their idea of how to solve a putative pollution problem, so it seems, is to adulterate our airwaves with alarums!

When a threat to current or future public health or to the environment is suspected, clause 6 enables the secretary of state to “restrain any person or persons responsible for causing or contributing to the alleged pollution.” Without any proof, or any due process of law at all!

Clause 6 also says, “regulations must restrict the sale or use of combustion appliances that emit pollutants to the air.” It looks as if these will include domestic gas and solid fuel boilers.

Requirements on other parts of government

Clauses 7 to 15 direct the Environment Agency, the CCC, local authorities, the Office for Environmental Protection, the Civil Aviation Authority, National Highways, Historic England, Natural England and Network Rail to “achieve and maintain clean air,” or similar.

The controlled pollutants and their limits

The schedules 1 to 4 show, it would appear, that someone has spent a lot of time pulling together scare stories about just about every air pollutant in the universe, and trying to work out just how low a limit for each they think they can get away with setting.

I checked NO₂ and PM_2.5, and a couple of others, and in these cases the limits tally with the WHO’s latest (2021) set of guidelines: [[viii]]. But there are a lot more pollutants covered by the bill, than those the WHO issues guidelines, or even good practice statements, for. Some of those are reported on annually by DEFRA: but some don’t even make it there.

For example, what the heck is radon doing in there? Radon is a radioactive noble gas, which as far as I know isn’t produced by any human activities. How, then, can it ever be reasonable to try to regulate it? And there are also “biological pollutants,” dampness and mould, with a limit of zero! How, could any old church, or other building more than 100 or so years old, be completely free from these?

The WHO’s guidelines

By the way, if you skim-read the WHO’s guidelines, you can see how they have been setting out to tighten the screws, again and again. Every so often, they set a new “AQG target” guideline figure, often an order of magnitude below previous targets. And then the previous target shifts and becomes an “interim target,” while earlier interim targets themselves get re-numbered to match.

There is a lot of discussion of “systematic reviews” of earlier scientific literature. But one thing that is signally lacking is analysis of actual mortality data before and after pollution reductions of the past. You would have thought that the WHO would want to show proof positive that their ever-decreasing targets and limits have in the past led to clear reductions in mortality. Yet I see no such thing.

Furthermore, I have severe doubts as to whether the quoted mortality risk factors for some, if not all, of the pollutants actually reflect reality. I do not have space to address that here, but I will look in future to put together a summary of the history of air pollution toxicology for the UK. And the parts played by the WHO, the EU, COMEAP and others in this process.

Costs

I will close with a rather strange statement from clause 22 of the bill. “Nothing in this Act shall impose any charge on the people or on public funds.” This seems to contradict clause 9, “The Secretary of State must provide money to local authorities from central funds sufficient to enable them to carry out their duties under this Act.” This is typical of the attitude of environmentalists to the costs of their wild ideas; they simply don’t care a damn about costs to the people, nor do they bother to do any proper cost-benefit analysis.

To sum up

“Tyrannical and extremist” is how I described the bill in my first paragraph. That is no under-statement. This bill, if implemented, will hand all but absolute power to a commission of petty despot “experts,” to set ever tightening, and ultimately unfeasible, air pollution rules that, like “nett zero,” will hugely reduce our freedoms and our quality of life.

Of course, this is “only” a private member’s bill, so there is a decent chance it will be kicked into the long grass for now, just as the “climate and nature bill” was back in July. But no-one in their right minds should fail to oppose it with everything they have, or to see its proponents and supporters for what they are – enemies of human civilization and of humanity.

[[i]] https://reformpartygodalmingash.uk/our-enemy-the-un-by-neil-lock/

[[ii]] https://reformpartygodalmingash.uk/predatory-precaution-by-neil-lock/

[[iii]] https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2025-07-01/debates/4A1F4AE9-2DF1-437E-87A3-8EBD1017E5FC/CleanAir(HumanRights)

[[iv]] https://reformpartygodalmingash.uk/the-uk-climate-and-nature-bill-by-neil-lock/

[[v]] https://action.zerohour.uk/mp/

[[vi]] https://ellaslaw.uk/support-for-ellas-law/

[[vii]] https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/68da4202c487360cc70c9e4f/air_pollution_uk_2024_issue_1.pdf

[[viii]] https://iris.who.int/server/api/core/bitstreams/551b515e-2a32-4e1a-a58c-cdaecd395b19/content

Predatory Precaution

(Based on an image, credit: Schwoaze, Pixabay)

Today, I’ll uncover one of the worst, and most insidious, of all the bad things that are being done to us human beings today. That is, the perversion of the so-called “precautionary principle” into a tool for tyranny and predation.

I have written on this subject several times, with emphasis on different aspects of the matter. But today, for the first time, I will try to bring my thoughts on it all together in one place.

The origins of the precautionary principle

When I was young, I was taught a precautionary principle that said, “Look before you leap.” In other words, don’t take any rash step until you are pretty damn sure that the overall results are likely to be good rather than bad. Good advice, no?

But this has not always been the way the principle has been formulated. This article from 2021 in the British Medical Journal gives a good view of its early history: [[1]]. It traces the principle from ancient Chinese origins to “First, do no harm,” which many people think of as the Hippocratic oath for doctors. So far, so good.

The start of the perversion

But then, German environmentalists, with their lop-sided view that all air pollution is bad, even if the nett benefits of an activity are greater than the costs of the pollution it causes, got in on the act. The precautionary principle was changed. Gradually and subtly at first, it moved from “first, do no harm” to “take regulatory action, even if the evidence is uncertain.” This change was intensified by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), particularly in the drafting of the 1987 Montreal Protocol, which banned emissions of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).

This paper [[2]] documents some of the steps, by which the precautionary principle began to morph into something very different. It tells how activist scientists, combined with power-hungry regulators, perverted the earlier approach that “emphasizes precaution and scientific knowledge before action” into a system of “rules… that compel lower-level decision makers (households, firms and other organizations) to not engage in activity that risks tipping-points and other irreversible outcomes.” The coin had flipped from reactive regulation based on actual, measurable damage, to proactive regulation, based on speculation and scares.

With hindsight, we can see that all this was a “perfect storm” for tyranny. It allowed to the unscrupulous abundant opportunities for ever more, and ever tightening, government overreach, without any need for them ever to have to prove anyone guilty of anything.

The precautionary principle might sound like an abstract, even a “philosophical” idea. How can such an innocuous sounding idea make people’s lives a misery? But in truth, its perversion has had profound, negative effects on all our lives.

The 1992 Rio Summit

The UK Tory party, for one, had by 1992 already formed a perverted view of the precautionary principle. In their 1992 election manifesto, they described it as: “the need to act, where there is significant risk of damage, before the scientific evidence is conclusive.” That is a far cry from “Look before you leap!” Indeed, it is not at all far away from its opposite.

At Rio, John Major and cohorts signed up to the “Rio Declaration on Environment and Development.” [[3]]. And, in particular, to Principle 15: “In order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach shall be widely applied by States according to their capabilities. Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.”

Now, I find that idea rather bizarre. For, if you don’t have a high degree of scientific certainty about the size and likelihood of a problem, how can you possibly assess whether or not a proposed counter-measure is cost-effective? Yet, with a recklessness typical of dishonest, unaccountable, psychopathic politicians, they signed us up to it anyway.

That was an egregious violation of the true precautionary principle. And it marked the first of the three major steps, in which the UN, the EU, the UK government, and the globalist and corporate ruling classes and their hangers-on, perverted it into a tool for tyranny and predation on us human beings.

The 1998 Wingspread Conference

In early 1998, the Wingspread Conference on the Precautionary Principle was held in the USA. It was hosted by Samuel Curtis Johnson, long-time chairman of S. C. Johnson & Son, Inc., a founder of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), and described by Fortune magazine as “corporate America's leading environmentalist.” It was convened by a shadowy organization, only founded in 1994, called the Science and Environmental Health Network (SEHN).

This was the second of the three major steps, in which the principle was perverted, in effect, from “Look before you leap” or “First, do no harm,” to “If in doubt about a risk, government must act to prevent it.”

The SEHN’s (much later) account of the conference is here: [[4]]. It described the participants as “treaty negotiators, activists, scholars and scientists from the United States, Canada and Europe.” It says: “The key element of the principle is that it incites us to take anticipatory action in the absence of scientific certainty. At the conclusion of the three-day conference, the diverse group issued a statement calling for government, corporations, communities and scientists to implement the ‘precautionary principle’ in making decisions.”

The Statement extended Principle 15 from the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development. It says: “When an activity raises threats of harm to human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause and effect relationships are not fully established scientifically. In this context the proponent of an activity, rather than the public, should bear the burden of proof.”

This is a radical re-write of the precautionary principle, in at least four ways. First, the idea that the action to be taken must be cost-effective, which had been included in the Rio Declaration, was thrown out of the window. As a result, the principle became a recipe for predation on taxpayers. Second, the re-written principle required precautionary action to be taken, even if there is no proof, or even hard evidence, that there is any danger at all. Third, it inverted the burden of proof, and undermined the presumption of innocence until proven guilty. And fourth, when they talked of “the public,” they didn’t mean us ordinary people. What they meant is that government shouldn’t have to bear the burden of proving its accusations. So, all of us, for simply going about our daily lives, are to be treated as guilty, unless and until proven innocent (and that won’t be easy!) That is tyranny.

However, the Statement also said: “The process of applying the Precautionary Principle must be open, informed and democratic and must include potentially affected parties. It must also involve an examination of the full range of alternatives, including no action.”

That one concession apart, with a few strokes of the pen, the Wingspread activists gave the political and corporate élites and their hangers-on carte blanche to violate our human rights as they please in matters affecting the environment. They put something they called “the environment” up on a pedestal, above the human environment; the rights and freedoms, justice and honesty that we human beings need in order to survive, flourish and prosper.

In summary: They inverted the burden of proof. They rejected the presumption of innocence. They required the accused (that’s us) to prove a negative. They mandated “precautionary” action, however much pain it would cause. And they threw out all consideration of objective cost-benefit or risk-benefit analysis.

The 2002 Inter-departmental Liaison Group for Risk Assessment report

2002 was the year in which the perversion of the precautionary principle, which had begun with the Rio Declaration and been extended by the Wingspread Statement, was not only explicitly incorporated into UK government policy, but strengthened too. The Interdepartmental Liaison Group for Risk Assessment, a working party originally set up in 1994, produced a report called: “The Precautionary Principle: Policy and Application”: [[5]]. It followed on from a corresponding EU document, agreed in 2000.

They saw the purpose of the principle as “to create an impetus to take a decision notwithstanding scientific uncertainty about the nature and extent of the risk.” They saw it as to be applied whenever “it is impossible to assess the risk with sufficient confidence to inform decision-making.” They wanted to invoke it “even if the likelihood of harm is remote.” They said, too, that “the precautionary principle carries a general presumption that the burden of proof shifts away from the regulator having to demonstrate potential for harm towards the hazard creator having to demonstrate an acceptable level of safety.” And they misused an aphorism attributed to Carl Sagan, saying: “‘Absence of evidence of risk’ should never be confused with, or taken as, ‘evidence of absence of risk’.”

This goes further even than the Wingspread Statement did. It doesn’t just invert the burden of proof and require us, the accused, to prove a negative. But it enables them to take “precautionary” action against any risk, even one that is minuscule or very unlikely, instead of requiring an objective risk analysis accurate enough to support good decision making. Moreover, they want the decision to be taken before all the evidence has been mulled over. And even if there’s no evidence at all that our activity causes any harm to anyone, they wouldn’t accept that as evidence!

In essence, the UK government decreed, in contradiction to the norm of presumption of innocence, that absence of evidence of guilt is not evidence of absence of guilt. They decided to re-write the precautionary principle to say, in effect: “If in doubt about a risk, government must act to prevent it.” Regardless of how much harm, or costs, their action causes to the people they are supposed to be serving. This, again, is tyranny.

Related cultural perversions

As I have outlined above, the precautionary principle has, over time, been subverted and all but inverted. The UN, the EU, the UK government and the globalist and corporate ruling classes have perverted it into a tool for tyranny and predation on us human beings.

But in the process, this perversion has spawned two more cultural perversions, from which we all suffer today. One is a culture of arbitrary, collective, ever tightening targets and limits on what we may do. The other is a culture of “safety at any cost.” Together, these bad cultures make our lives today all but unliveable.

Creeping targets and limits

The culture of arbitrary, collective, ever tightening targets and limits was conceived by the European political élites in the 1980s. It was initially designed to be applied to all kinds of air pollution, as well as to carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions. Since then, it has been taken on eagerly, both by the UN and its World Health Organization (WHO), and by UK governments of all parties. And in the 2010s, the EU became its policeman across Europe.

The desire to get away from this culture was one of the motivations that led so many of us back in 2016 to vote for Brexit. But despite leaving the EU, this culture has not been weakened. Indeed, the UK government, particularly since 2019, have been pushing it ever harder and harder.

This culture, too, has characteristics that make it very nasty to live under. One, it can never be applied fairly and justly. Collective limits always weigh hardest on the people at the bottom of the political ladder. The arrogant élites, both as individuals and as a group, will simply ignore the limits they themselves promote. They think they only apply to “the little people.” That explains, for example, why so many hypocrites fly in CO₂-spewing helicopters or private jets to conferences about ways to force ordinary people to reduce CO₂ emissions.

Two, a key part of the design is that the goalposts must be kept moving. The job is never done; the problem, whatever it is, is never solved. For example, the CO₂ emissions goalposts have already been moved many times, always in the direction of increasing restrictions. Exactly the same is planned for particulate matter (PM_2.5), and no doubt other kinds of pollution as well. And we have had, for decades, ever tightening speed limits on the roads.

Three, in the end, the targets or limits will always end up becoming unrealistic and unachievable. This has already happened with “nett zero.” It will do so with air pollution too, once the implications of the WHO’s latest guideline for PM_2.5 sink in to people’s minds. And it’s not impossible that government may try to resurrect the 19^th-century law that required every car to be preceded by someone walking, carrying a red flag.

Safety at any cost

We are subjected today to a culture of “safety at any cost.” This culture, applied by political governments, subjects us to ever more and tighter restrictions, while spying on us to catch us out in the smallest violation.

But who is supposed to feel “safe?” And who or what are we supposed to feel safe from? This culture certainly doesn’t make me, for one, feel safe against government overreach.

Moreover, this culture has led to ongoing failures to do objective risk analysis on, or cost-benefit analysis from the point of view of the people affected by, green projects. And in the latter case, to machinations designed to prevent any such cost-benefit analysis being done. In a later article, I will outline how the UK government has again and again plotted to ensure that no objective cost-benefit analysis would ever be done for “nett zero.”

This culture of over-safety, I think, has also been a major force behind the ongoing assaults on our freedom of speech. For such a depraved culture cannot survive the glare of the truth.

The demonization of opponents of the “climate change” meme. The censorship, using Big Tech, of dissident voices who seek to reveal the truth. The efforts to make any chance remark into a potential “hate crime.” All these, I surmise, are different heads of the same hydra.

And this hydra has, if I am not mistaken, many more heads still. The erection, on just about any excuse, of more and more “panopticon” cameras to track and record us as we go about our daily lives. The ever-growing list of situations, in which we are required to confirm who we are; and the prospect of being forced to use a “digital ID,” that will be entirely controlled by government for its own purposes. Projects such as anti-money-laundering laws, the abolition of cash, and central bank digital currencies, whose effects will be to destroy the last shreds of privacy in our financial dealings. And immediate, permanent de-banking of people who cannot provide a bank with ID when asked.

All these, I think, are being driven ultimately by this same perversion, the culture of safety at any cost. Together with the psychopathic nature of many of those in the ruling classes, or in positions of government power today.

Governments and their hangers-on like to make out that they want us to be safe. This very excuse is used to “justify” campaigns like “road safety.” But in my cynical moods, I think that it is the denizens of this depraved culture that want to make themselves safe. Safe from “climate change,” safe from air pollution, safe from the truth coming out, safe from all possible resistance by the human beings they are oppressing. Safe from us.

To sum up

The perversion of the precautionary principle into a tool for tyranny and predation lies at the heart of many of the problems we suffer today. This perversion, in effect, inverts the burden of proof, denies the presumption of innocence, and requires the accused – that’s us – to prove a negative. The perversion was originally sparked by German environmentalists, but it was taken on and broadened by the UN, and acted on by the EU, governments – particularly the UK, and the globalist and corporate ruling classes and their hangers-on.

This perversion has led to two related cultural perversions. One, of arbitrary, collective, ever tightening targets and limits on what we may do. The other, a culture of “safety at any cost,” which throws out all consideration of objective cost-benefit or risk-benefit analysis.

It is my view that all good people, including Reform UK supporters, should recognize these cultural perversions for what they are. And should start to push back not only against the perversions themselves, but also against those that are responsible for them, or have used them to harm innocent people.

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[[1]] https://www.bmj.com/content/375/bmj.n3059

[[2]] https://igsd.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/How-Montreal-Protocol-Applied-Precautionary-Principle.pdf

[[3]] https://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/migration/generalassembly/docs/globalcompact/A_CONF.151_26_Vol.I_Declaration.pdf

[[4]] https://www.sehn.org/sehn/wingspread-conference-on-the-precautionary-principle 

[[5]] https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20190701152341/https://www.hse.gov.uk/aboutus/meetings/committees/ilgra/pppa.htm