LONDON - Environment Secretary Michael Gove was Thursday asked to explain why Britain is persistently breaching the legal limit for nitrogen dioxide and why the government, eight years after anti-pollution legislation came into force, failed to produce a plan that adequately addresses the issue.

The British parliament's EU Energy and Environment Committee has written to Gove raising its concerns over the failure to tackle air pollution.

On May 17, 2018, the European Commission announced that it was referring Britain to the Court of Justice of the EU for significant and persistent exceeding of the nitrogen dioxide limit set out in EU legislation, and for failure to take appropriate measures to keep periods when limits were exceeded as short as possible.

A spokesperson for the committee said: "Given that the UK is likely to have left the EU by the time the Court of Justice makes its ruling, members have asked whether the government would still comply with any ruling or pay any fine demanded. They have also asked what systems will be in place post-Brexit to ensure the UK Government complies with air quality legislation."

The letter to Gove also sets out some of the concerns expressed by local authorities over a lack of support from the government for their efforts to reduce nitrogen dioxide and asks what steps the government is taking to help local authorities in towns and cities to meet the legislative requirements.

Lord Teverson, chair of the committee, told Gove in the letter "Given the significant health impacts of poor air quality (the Royal College of Physicians estimates it contributes to 40,000 early deaths a year in the UK), and that the directive has been in force for eight years, why has the government not produced an adequate plan?"

He added: "Given that both legal action in the UK and infraction proceedings at an EU level have been going on for some years, it would appear that this is not a matter that the UK government has treated with the necessary seriousness until recently."