Ella's mother Rosamund outside the High Court in London (Image: PA)
The mother of a schoolgirl killed by air pollution has demanded an official apology over her daughter’s suffering and a “legal right to clean air”.
Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, nine, suffered a fatal asthma attack in February 2013 after being exposed to excessive air pollution.
In a landmark coroner’s case in 2020, she became the first person to have air pollution listed as a cause of death at an inquest in the UK.
Ella’s estate, over which her mother Rosamund acts as administrator, is now suing three government departments for compensation over her “illness and premature death”.
Rosamund said her High Court challenge against ministers, which will head to trial, will be about “holding their feet to the fire” and establishing a “legal right to clean air”.
She said she wanted “an apology, first and foremost … for what Ella went through”.
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“We got it from the London Mayor, we expect the same from the Government,” she said.
Her daughter “suffered greatly”, Rosamund said, adding that the family’s former lawyer and new attorney general Richard Hermer KC had “equated Ella’s suffering to torture”.
Ella lived 25 metres from the South Circular Road in Lewisham, south-east London – one of the capital’s busiest roads.
She died after having endured numerous seizures and made almost 30 hospital visits over the previous three years.
Speaking the day after the Euro 2024 final, Rosamund said of her daughter: “Yesterday we thought about how much she would have enjoyed the football.
“It’s very sad how much she has genuinely missed out on, it was a life truly cut short. That will never go away.”
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Her lawyers estimate the case to be worth ￡293,156 in potential damages. However, the Government, which opposes the claim, believes it is worth ￡30,000 if successful.
At a preliminary hearing in London on Monday, lawyers discussed issues in the case ahead of an estimated 10-day trial at a later date.
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The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the Department for Transport, and the Department of Health and Social Care are disputing the claim.
Government lawyers previously denied its actions “amount to a breach of human rights” and denied that any such alleged breach, if proven, would be “causative of Ella’s injuries and death”.
A government spokesperson said: “Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah’s death was a tragedy and our thoughts remain with her friends and family.”
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