Flintshire politicians slam delay on 'Red Route' scheme

The proposal had been agreed, and would see traffic to Holyhead diverted from the Aston Hill, where air pollution is high because of the number of lorries and cars.

And Mark Tami, MP for Alyn & Deeside, has slammed the decision to freeze the scheme.

He said: "The red route is clearly the only option which is going to reduce air pollution in Aston, Higher Shotton, Queensferry and Sealand.

"This has to be the Welsh Government's number one priority here. The impact of these fumes being spewed out next to homes, shops and schools is awful. Children's health must come first."

The project was being led by Ken Skates, but after he left the cabinet responsibility has now passed to Lee Waters MS.

Me Waters said: “Since 1990, Welsh emissions have fallen by 31 per cent. But to reach our statutory target of net zero emissions by 2050, we need to do much more.

“In the next 10 years, we are going to need to more than double all the cuts we have managed over the last 30 years if we are going to keep temperature rises within safe limits. That means changes in all parts of our lives. Transport makes up some 17 per cent of our total emissions and so must play its part.

"We need a shift away from spending money on projects that encourage more people to drive, and spend more money on maintaining our roads and investing in real alternatives that give people a meaningful choice."

But this argument has not convinced Mr Tami, who responded: "Yes, we need to reduce carbon emissions, yes, that is going to involve trying to promote transport other than cars and lorries, but there isn't some magic wand to make that happen; if there was, we'd have done it by now.

"What the Welsh Government are promising is a long term solution, but the children along the Aston Hill can't wait for the long term when they're breathing dangerously polluted air now. Building the red route doesn't mean junking carbon cut targets at all, but it does mean taking action now to protect children's health and I have yet to hear anyone argue convincingly that there is something more important than that.

"The message from me is clear - I back the red route and the Welsh Government needs to turn around and make it happen, fast."

Jack Sargeant, the recently re-elected Member of the Senedd for Alyn & Deeside has also raised his concerns about the delay with the Minister in the chamber in Cardiff.

He said "Deputy Minister, you will know that the content of this statement will have a big impact on residents in my constituency, particularly children, who are significantly impacted by the air pollution that this investment was supposed to address.

"Can I ask you, Minister, how confident are you that this will be addressed by the outcome of the review and that any future measures will have a measurable impact on air pollution on roads in Alyn and Deeside?"

Lee Waters replied: "In terms of air quality, this is one of the issues that this Senedd is going to have to face: what goes into a Clean Qir Bill, how ambitious and bold we want to be about that, what package of measures improves air quality.

"There is a vision for simply building bypasses all across Wales, to shift the problem from one place to another. I'm not convinced entirely that that deals with the issue of air quality.

"Clearly, as tailpipe emissions fall away, as cars are increasingly electrified, that's going to have a significant impact on local air quality within town centres, and behaviour change is a very important part of it, too. If we can achieve modal shift, we can reduce traffic, we can reduce pollution and we can reduce congestion. We can do that quicker than we can through heavy engineering interventions, and we can do it cheaper, and reproduce other benefits too."

Mr Sargeant has now also sought an urgent meeting with the minister to challenge the delay to the route.