Local Greenpeace campaigners have today pasted health warning stickers on diesel cars at the Williams Manchester and Citroen Manchester dealerships on Upper Brook Street.
They visited the showroom and labelled diesel cars with stickers that say ‘Diesel harms your health’. They took this action in a bid to make potential buyers aware of the illegal pollution many new diesel cars give out.
While car companies aren’t advertising the fact, two-thirds of brand new diesels being sold today are pumping out higher concentrations of toxic air pollution than they should, and that is poisoning us.
Martin Porter, local Greenpeace campaigner, said: “Manchester has some of the worst air quality in the country. We may have banished the smoke of the industrial revolution, but we have replaced it with the invisible killer of car exhausts.”
“This affects everyone who lives, works or plays in the city. When my children take part in football at the weekend they are breathing these toxic fumes. But what’s worst of all, what makes me most angry, is that many of the people driving diesel cars were tricked into thinking they were good for the environment. Car companies must stop being the road block to progress and start lobbyng for electric vehicles.”
Air pollution can cause asthma in otherwise healthy children, can stunt children’s lung growth permanently by up to 10%, and is linked to strokes, heart disease and diabetes in older people.
Since the ‘Dieselgate’ scandal, where VW was caught cheating tests, it’s come to light that car companies have been knowingly breaking air pollution standards with some new diesel cars emitting 15 times more toxic pollution than they are supposed to.
Diesel causes almost a third of the nitrogen oxides air pollution in the UK, and 90% of the nitrogen oxides on our roads
Greenpeace’s air pollution campaign is calling for the car industry to drop diesel and start making affordable electric cars.

Photo credit Steven Speed/Greenpeace

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