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Lodon’s smoggy skyline. King’s College researchers found that more than more than 9,000 people die in London each year from dust and nitrogen dioxide in the air.
Lodon’s smoggy skyline. King’s College researchers found that more than more than 9,000 people die in London each year from dust and nitrogen dioxide in the air. Photograph: Carl de Souza/AFP/Getty Images
Lodon’s smoggy skyline. King’s College researchers found that more than more than 9,000 people die in London each year from dust and nitrogen dioxide in the air. Photograph: Carl de Souza/AFP/Getty Images

London's mayor seems to struggle with science. Time for a chief scientific adviser

This article is more than 8 years old

Boris Johnson appears to favour the views of friends and associates on issues such as pollution and climate change. The next mayor needs specialist advice

One of the priorities for the next mayor of London should be to appoint a chief scientific adviser. The current mayor has a range of advisers, but has clearly lacked expert guidance on the scientific aspects of key issues such as local air pollution and climate change. The time has come to seek specialist advice to help deal with the wide variety of risks and opportunities facing those living and working in the capital.

Boris Johnson has, for instance, struggled to come to terms with the findings of researchers at King’s College London, who have estimated that more than 9,000 people die in London each year from dust and nitrogen dioxide in the air.

In 2014, Mr Johnson used Twitter to denounce as “B*ll*cks: ludicrous urban myth” a conference presentation by a scientist at King’s College who suggested that average annual levels of nitrogen dioxide measured in Oxford Street may be the highest in the world.

The mayor was later forced to defend his comments in a letter to a Parliamentary committee, admitting that he was “not disputing King’s College data”, but did not accept the scientists’ warnings. It is true that Johnson does have an environment adviser, Matthew Pencharz, but he is a former journalist, not a technical expert.

Throughout his terms as mayor, Mr Johnson has also demonstrated that he is in thrall to friends and associates who reject the evidence that emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases from human activities are driving climate change.

As part of the celebrations for the Olympics in 2012, Mr Johnson invited Matt Ridley, the former chairman of Northern Rock bank, rather than an expert, to deliver a lecture on the environment. Ridley dismissed the risks to lives and livelihoods from climate change that have been highlighted by scientists.

And in one of his columns for the Daily Telegraph last month, Johnson claimed that the mild weather in December had nothing to do with global warming, based, it seems, on a phone conversation with a friend, Piers Corbyn, a climate change sceptic who runs a tiny weather forecasting company. Johnson has written about global warming in his Telegraph column four times over the past few years, and on each occasion has referred solely to Piers Corbyn’s views as his source of authority.

In fact, Met Office data show unarguably that London, along with the rest of the UK and world, is warming. Seven of the ten warmest years in south-east England since records began in 1910 have occurred since 2000, and only one winter, in 1985, from the last 30 years ranks among the ten coldest on record. And the capital is facing higher risks of extreme weather events, including heatwaves and heavy downpours.

Although the mayor does not have complete control over all of the laws and policies for managing the risks to Londoners posed by local air pollution and climate change, it is troubling that he apparently ignores inputs about these issues from scientists, including world-class researchers based in the capital.

And while Mr Johnson energetically promotes the abundance of talent in London and its importance as an economic and cultural centre, he rarely mentions the city’s outstanding array of scientific minds and its unique place in the history of science.

The mayor is not alone in neglecting our capital city’s hugely important scientific heritage. It is difficult, for instance, to find statues or other commemorations of the achievements of Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin or any of the other scientific giants who have connections with the city.

Nevertheless, London now hosts some of the world’s most scientifically accomplished universities, including Imperial College and University College, as well as internationally renowned research centres, such as the new Francis Crick Institute.

It seems logical to propose that whoever is elected in May should appoint a chief scientific adviser to devise a strategy for London to retain its leadership as a global centre for science, at a time when many other cities around the world are already aiming to overtake it.

Most importantly, the holder of such a role should help ensure that decisions across a range of key economic, social and cultural issues affecting London are informed by the best knowledge and understanding, including from the city’s own wealth of bright minds.

Of course, an adviser could not guarantee that the new mayor would always take full account of the evidence, but it would undoubtedly be more difficult to ignore.

It’s why the national government and each of its departments have chief scientific advisers. It is surely an anomaly that the mayor of London, who is responsible for a wide range of issues affecting lives and livelihoods in the capital and who oversees an annual budget exceeding that of every national department apart from health, education and defence, does not directly receive expert, independent advice on scientific issues.

Whoever emerges victorious in May must show that the role of London’s mayor is important enough to require expert scientific advice.

Bob Ward is policy and communications director at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and sits on the London Climate Change Partnership.

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