Three of Birmingham’s most heavily congested and polluted commuter roads could be targeted with fresh restrictions after the Government launched a £225 million fund to tackle chronic air pollution.

The A38 through the city, the A452 Chester Road and the Great Charles Street Queensway and the A38 tunnels appear on a list of the UK’s roads most in need of intervention.

It was published as the Government announced it wants to ban the sale of all diesel and petrol cars and vans by 2040, although it hopes that the majority will switch to electric vehicles long before that.

And now Environment Secretary Michael Gove is set to unveil a £225 million fund for councils and transport authorities to instigate their own pollution busting measures.

But the Cabinet minister warned authorities he does not believe it is “necessary” to bring in charges to prevent vehicles entering city centres, adding the Government will work with them to determine the approach.

Nitrogen dioxide levels are too high in Birmingham.

The Government has been forced to unveil a £3 billion package of measures to tackle air pollution after losing a court challenge under which environmentalists successfully argued that policies were currently inadequate. Air pollution, mostly as a result of diesel vehicles, is linked to 1,500 premature deaths a year in the West Midlands due to chronic asthma, heart and lung conditions.

Birmingham City Council leader John Clancy has firmly ruled out a universal congestion charge, although the council is moving ahead with plans for a clean air zone around the city centre which will see the highest polluting commercial vehicles charged.

West Midlands Mayor Andy Street has promised to look at diesel car charges if the clean air zone does not prove successful and has called on Government to support a scrappage scheme - some cash discount incentive for people to swap their diesel for electric cars.

Andy Street

Mayor Street said: “We will look in more detail at the opportunities the Air Quality Plan presents and work with local authorities in the West Midlands to decide how we should act. This will have to include plans for the specific routes identified by the Secretary of State.

“Today’s announcement makes it even more important that across the West Midlands we continue to invest in rail, Metro, buses and cycling to give a clean, reliable alternative to cars.

“However, in the longer term, this challenge presents our region with a unique opportunity.”

He added that crucially the region’s motor industry and universities, which are engaged in research and development of electric vehicles and driverless cars, are well placed to capitalise on the shift in motoring.

Mr Gove pledged to work with local authorities developing “value for money and appropriately targeted” diesel scrappage schemes.

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He said: “If local authority areas can come up with scrappage schemes that are value for money and appropriately targeted then we certainly have no ideological or theological objection to them, and I will work with any particular local authority area that believes a scrappage scheme would be effective and value for money.”

The Government was ordered to produce new plans to tackle illegal levels of harmful pollutant nitrogen dioxide after the courts agreed with environmental campaigners that a previous set of plans were insufficient to meet EU pollution limits.

Despite Government efforts to delay publication of the plans until after the general election, ministers were forced to set out the draft plans in May, with the final measures due by July 31.

Campaigners have demanded the final plans should include Government-funded and mandated clean air zones, with charges for the most polluting vehicles to enter areas with high air pollution, as well as a diesel scrappage scheme.

Chris Crean from West Midlands Friends of the Earth said that stronger action is need now, not by 2040.

He said: “This is a cynical move by the government to grab the headlines by announcing changes for 23 years’ time and failing to enact measures which will curb pollution in UK towns and cities now. Lives will continue to be cut short because the government hasn’t got the guts to restrict where the worst polluting vehicles can go.”