The Tories think their war on traffic rules is a vote magnet. Here’s why they are wrong

A policeman uses flares to guide the traffic during a heavy smog in London in December 1952. Photograph: Trinity Mirror/Alamy

Once so clogged with noxious fumes that it earned the nickname the Smoke, London has been battling pollution for more than a century. From the Great Stink to the Great Smog, successive public health emergencies have for decades prompted ambitious anti-pollution measures, gradually transforming the capital for the better.

The Victoria Embankment containing Joseph Bazalgette’s pioneering sewer system, the magnificent Abbey Mills pumping station and the groundbreaking Clean Air Act 1956 stand among other initiatives as testaments to the unflinching conviction of past leaders in tackling London’s pollution problems head-on.