A coalition for healthy air

Key info:

• Partners: Asthma + Lung UK and the Clean Air Fund 
• Amount: £200,000
• Duration: Two years
• Programme: Health effects of air pollution

What are we doing together?

Air pollution devastates people’s health and is a major cause of health inequalities in cities. Improving air quality would help to close the health gap between the richest and poorest neighbourhoods.

This partnership is supporting the Healthy Air Coalition’s work to make Britain’s air cleaner and healthier to breathe.

The Healthy Air Coalition unites more than 20 non-governmental organisations, charities, and changemakers. It is working to reduce sources of air pollution, improve existing legislation, and advocate for new, stronger clean air laws. And they are doing this to protect the health of everyone in the UK.

With the Clean Air Fund, we are funding a team to coordinate the coalition’s strategy, policy, communications, and campaign activities for two years. The coalition team is hosted by Asthma + Lung UK.

Campaigning and influencing activities include:

• building an online and social media presence
• media engagement
• hosting events on clean air policy and practice
• and setting up working groups on special areas of interest, for example on wood burning. 

Aim of the partnership

We want to support the coalition’s efforts to create a stronger, broader, and more cohesive clean air campaigning sector. By building consensus on policy issues, we can have a bigger impact on the UK’s air pollution crisis.

The coalition is taking steps to grow its membership, bringing together organisations of all sizes to campaign for healthier air. This will give a platform to partners with fewer resources and amplify a wider range of voices on the issue of air pollution.

Connection to our strategy

This partnership supports two priorities of the Health effects of air pollution programme:

Generating high-quality evidence on air pollution as a cause of health inequalities

Members of the Healthy Air Coalition share our view that air pollution is a public health crisis. By sharing research and learning about the links between poor air quality and poor health, particularly within minoritised communities, we can strengthen the evidence base.

Engaging and amplifying voices of those most affected

The coalition creates a space for a range of different partners to come together. This includes organisations run by people with lived experience of the harmful effects of air pollution. It will bring new and diverse voices to clean air campaigning, including those excluded from policy discussions up until now.

A united coalition, with wide support from leading organisations, sends a powerful message. We hope it will increase the political will to act on air pollution and make policy change more likely.