Environment Agency News Release

On 27th June 2007, Kingsnorderley Building & Restoration Ltd and Langdon & McGeever Ltd both were sentenced at Telford Magistrates Court in relation to pollution of an unnamed tributary of the Borle Brook.

The charges were brought by the Environment Agency under Section 85 of the Water Resources Act 1991. Kingsnorderley Building & Restoration Ltd pleaded guilty to one charge and was fined £2,500. Langdon & McGeever Ltd who had previously pleaded guilty to two charges, formally entered a plea to a third charge at Court. The company was fined £12,500 and ordered to pay costs of £10,000.

For the Environment Agency, Prosecution Counsel Patrick Limb told the court that Hawkswood House is an old established house that had old barns in the adjoining field. In 2001 work commenced to convert the barns into three residential properties by Kingsnorderley Building & Restoration Ltd. Langdon & McGeever Ltd was subcontracted to do all of the plumbing.

On 17 March 2004, a member of the public reported that heating oil was leaking into the top pool of their garden. An Environment Agency officer attended the scene and confirmed the observation and arranged for contractors to cleanup.

The following day, an Environment Agency officer attended the site and met with a representative from Kingsnorderley Building & Restoration Ltd who had traced the source of the oil and identified that a connection in the oil pipework had leaked on one of the properties.

Between May and July 2005 and between July and August 2005, two further oil pollution incidents were investigated by the Environment Agency. On both occasions the pollution was due to corroded pipework at the properties.. On the third occasion the oil had travelled one and a half miles downstream to an unnamed tributary of the Borle Brook.

Speaking after the case, Jane Woodhall, an Environment Agency officer involved in the investigation said: ‘The Environment Agency reserves the right to prosecute individuals who repeatedly pollute the environment.’

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