Contractor appointed to clear Hoad’s Wood

… but still no definite start date is set

Efforts to clear some 30,000 tonnes of illegally dumped landfill waste from Hoad’s Wood have eventually made progress with the appointment of a contractor.

Campaigners had hoped the Environment Agency would have begun clearance operations by the end of July, but lack of evidence of any such work prompted legal action from the group Rescue Hoads Wood, which instructed legal counsel Leigh Day to send a letter to the EA in a bid to get it to commit to a concrete timeline to clear the site.

The EA responded with the assurance that it would indeed clear Hoad’s Wood but stated that a ministerial directive about the site had not stipulated a timeframe for clearance and it would follow its own process.

In turn, Rescue Hoads Wood asked Leigh Day to follow up with a message to the effect that if the clearance did not start by Monday, October 28, it would consider escalating with formal legal proceedings.

The EA finally launched a tender process to find a contractor. It went live on Monday, September 16, and it has now been announced that Acumen Waste Services has won the contract to clear the site.

An EA statement said: “There are a number of plans that need to be approved by our project team before works can start on site. We are reviewing all other consents and licences required for the works to occur in a SSSI. We have been liaising with partners including Natural England and Forestry Commission about expediting the issue of any authorisations needed.

“We held a series of project start up meetings with Acumen and have begun working with them to review the necessary environmental authorisations needed to begin the clearance works. All of which have been productive and collaborative.

“We have completed internal due diligence and intelligence checks on the suppliers proposed to be used for waste management and disposal in this project. No concerns have been raised.”

Despite the appointment of a contractor, there are still concerns that a specific start date for clearance has not been set so timelines might continue to slip.

It is also worth noting the EA’s comment that its monitoring had “shown no significant water quality impact [of the illegal dumping] on the River Beult”. Many feel it is only a matter of time before the river is affected and pressure needs to be applied for the EA to commit to a deadline rather than dragging out the process yet further.

• To learn more about Hoad’s Wood, click here