MP plea for immediate tip probe
Reporter: Ken Bennett
Date published: 27 January 2009
Oldham MP Phil Woolas has appealed directly to the Minister of Environment to launch an immediate investigation into a tipping permit at a controversial landfill site.
It comes after 150 householders aired their concerns about Birks Quarry at a public meeting.
Now the MP for Oldham East and Saddleworth has written to the Minister, Jane Kennedy, asking her to call in a permit application for review before a decision is made about the quarry on the Austerlands-Lees border.
Locals raised concerns at the meeting on Thursday with top council, environment and planning officials — 24 hours before the deadline for comments expired.
The letter from Mr Woolas followed his own 1,400 word objection he had sent earlier to the Environment Agency’s permitting officer.
In that letter, Mr Woolas highlighted many of the issues raised at the meeting.
He said that if the permit was granted, residents would face severe noise, dust and mud nuisance over a period of at least six years as 18,000 lorries enter and leave the site.
To underpin his concerns, his letter sent to Jane Kennedy over the weekend says: “I, and my constituents, and officers of OMBC, are firmly of the opinion there is serious risk of damage to the local environment and safety of residents and road users.”
The meeting, hosted by councillors Barbara Beeley, Derek Heffernan, Alan Roughley and Mike Buckley, was attended by Geoff Willerton, the council’s planning chief, and Bill Darbyshire, general manager of the Environment Agency for Greater Manchester.
Opengoal, the Royton-based tip operator, and the Planning Inspectorate were invited but did not attend.
Despite repeated assurances from the EA, some residents linked their worries to the High Moor tip, a mile away.
Mr Darbyshire emphasised the two tips were totally different. Birks Quarry, if a permit was granted, was for inert waste, including building materials, while High Moor carries domestic rubbish.
Planning permission for Birks Quarry to be used as a tip was given 20 years ago by the Planning Inspectorate on appeal following repeated legal battles by Oldham Council.
The Environment Agency has until February 9 to decide if it will grant a permit.
John Battye, leader of Oldham Council at the time the council vigorously opposed the plans, said £250,000 of council taxpayers money had been spent fighting the application which the council lost out on appeal twice.
He said: “Mr Woolas’s letter to the Minister stresses not to take any decision until an investigation had taken place.”
