Tip’s weedkiller rap

DUMPING ground . . . the High Moor tip

Leak costs High Moor chiefs £20k

TIP bosses have been fined £7,000 after weedkiller leaked out of a containment system.

Onyx, which operates High Moor in Scouthead, were also ordered to pay £13,000 costs after pleading guilty to breaching pollution controls.

Oldham magistrates heard yesterday how Environment Agency officers, who visited the tip in January, last year, found that leachate had escaped into the base of the former quarry.

This liquid, which drains from landfill, formed two pools which contained more than 18 times the permitted level of mecoprop — commonly used in weedkillers.

The firm was told to remove it as a priority but two days later, it remained at a similar level.

Jennie Frieze, prosecuting, said groundwater from the site fed into private water supplies, in particular Thurston Clough Brook and Wall Hill Brook.

Describing mecoprop as dangerous, she said: “It is accepted the agency is not in a position to say whether leachate escaped from this site, whether it got into ground water, how much and for how long, but the potential for harm was enough to raise concern.

“This site is in a particularly sensitive area.

“Not only is it close to villages, but it does lie over groundwater which supplies private drinking supplies.

“The agency accepts this failure was not deliberate. It was careless.

“It also accepts that the lack of action was not prompted by financial motivation and the defendant, for the purpose of this prosecution, does have a good character.”

Ray Clarke, defending, said the “isolated” incident was confined to two days during the third highest rainfall since 1914.

He added: “Staff were trying to manage the site. They were also battling with the elements.”

He said that the leachate escaped within a “contained area,” extra pumps were brought in and temporary measurers taken to contain any potential breach.

At the time, it was classed by the Environment Agency as having potential for minor impact.

Improvements have since been carried out.

Mr Clarke said it was not known whether any of the mecoprop had been flushed out by the rain from an old landfill site near-by.

He said the firm had co-operated fully and added: “The company want to apologise for this breach. It takes its responsibility very seriously and any lapse is unacceptable.”