Warwickshire excavation company fined for allowing sediment-contaminated water to enter a brook
During May 2018, AT Contracting and Plant Hire Limited allowed water contaminated with sediment to enter a tributary of Padbury Brook near Barton Hartshorn in Buckinghamshire.
Following this incident, the company proposed an Enforcement Undertaking to the Environment Agency, which was accepted. The Environment Agency accepted the company’s negligence wasn’t down to dangerous or foolhardy behaviour and that the company had worked quickly to solve the issue and taken full responsibility for the incident.
Enforcement Undertaking
AT Contracting and Plant Hire Limited paid £15,000 to the Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust.
In addition to the £15,000 payment, the company completed a number of other actions. This included stopping the discharge, removing the pollutant from the watercourse and improving water management.
Enforcement undertakings allow companies and individuals to make good some of the environmental damage they cause, including through a financial contribution to an environmental project.
Fines for the illegal export of banned household waste
A former company director has been fined for exporting banned household waste.
Between 27 and 15 July 2019 the man had caused his company to export some 382 tonnes of household waste in 22 sea containers from its site in Droitwich via Southampton and Felixstowe. The waste included 1,590 nappies and sanitary items, 1,338 electrical items and 33,639 tins and cans. The illegal cargo was bound for Indonesia. The man had agreed to sell tonnes of plastic bottle waste to a broker at £270 per tonne.
Other contaminants found in searches by investigators from the Environment Agency were items of clothing, textiles and rags, unopened plastic bags, glass, wood, golf balls, toys, a used toilet brush and food and drink cartons.
The offence was discovered on 4 July 2019 by Environment Agency officers who conducted initial inspections of some of the containers. The inspections recorded significant evidence of contamination, flies and, in some containers, a rotting decomposing smell. The containers were deemed unfit for export at that stage and prevented from onward shipment to Indonesia. All the containers were returned to the site in Droitwich for reprocessing.
Breach
The man was charged with breaching Regulation 55(1) of the Transfrontier Shipment of Waste Regulations 2007:
- Regulation 55(1) makes officers of bodies corporate guilty of offences and liable for punishment where the offence committed by the body corporate is shown to have been committed with the consent or connivance of the officer or is attributable to neglect on their part.
The man had previously pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to causing his dissolved company, Berry Polymer Ltd, to export the waste.
Penalty
The man was fined £1,200 and ordered to pay costs of £10,000.
Man jailed after he illegally imported and burnt waste
A man from Essex has been jailed after he persistently imported and burnt waste on a large scale at 2 sites in Essex.
In June 2020, officers visited land at Bradwell-on-Sea after firefighters raised concerns following several fires at the site. The officers found large quantities of waste on the site, including waste electricals, household waste, and demolition waste. They also discovered piles of burned waste.
The officers made several further visits and attempted to work with the man, offering him opportunities to stop his activities and clear the site. The man failed to clear the site and gave officers several different, conflicting accounts.
In September 2020, officers attended another site owned by the man in Latchingdon. They found piles of burning waste. Essex Fire and Rescue attended and discovered a gas cylinder amongst the embers before immediately requesting fire engines to attend.
Environment Agency officers identified large piles of soils heavily contaminated with bricks, concrete, paving slabs, and plastics. They were told by a fire officer that the site was a “cause for concern”.
The man was given chances to stop depositing, spreading and burning waste at the site. He was advised that all waste on site must be removed by a licensed waste carrier. The man failed to engage with this.
Penalty
The man was sentenced to 14 months imprisonment. An order was also made requiring the man to clean up both sites upon his release from prison.
The man was also ordered to return to court in September 2023 for the consideration of claims for prosecution costs and the confiscation of the proceeds of his crimes.
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