Issue - meetings
WALLEYS QUARRY - ODOUR ISSUES
Meeting: 23/04/2024 - Cabinet (Item 3)
3 WALLEYS QUARRY - ODOUR ISSUES 
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Additional documents:
Decision:
That the contents of the update report be noted.
Minutes:
The Leader introduced an update report on Walleys Quarry looking at the complaints, monitoring information, actions of the Environment Agency (EA) and the Borough Council.
The Interim Chief Executive referred Members to section 2 of the report, stating that complaints in January had been high, peaking in February and since then there had been a reduction – with just twenty in March. It was good to see that the MMF at Silverdale Road had now been replaced.
Since the last update, Council had received a report that there had been a breach of the Abatement Notice and it had been resolved that the Council would now start to prepare appropriate legal proceedings, which was now ongoing.
There had been some data collated since the completion of works by Walleys Quarry which had been required by the EA as part of the Suspension Notice. They had also installed additional Geo-Membrane.
In terms of the EA update, there had been no compliance assessment reports issued and in terms of the H2S data adjustment, the EA provided an update statement confirming that a report was yet to be published.
The Leader stated that, although complaints were down there were still reports of odours and urged members of the public to continue reporting. The big news was that the Council had identified a breach in the Abatement Notice. This had been reported to Full Council on 10 April and the Leader asked what the latest position was on that.
The interim Chief Executive stated that officer had been talking to lawyers and the King’s Council regarding the next steps. The next stage is to issue a letter to the Secretary of State for permission to undertake legal action against Walleys Quarry.
The Leader stated that the Secretary of State should be asked to grant permission as soon as possible so that a case for legal action could be prepared for the breach of the Abatement Notice.
Members welcomed the actions taken in respect of the next stage.
Resolved: That the contents of the update report be noted.