£10,000 raised for fresh legal challenge against Sowerby Bridge incinerator
Campaigners want a judicial review after Calderdale Council decided to give a permit to a local firm to burn waste
An initial £10,000 fundraising target to raise cash for a legal challenge to a controversial council decision to grant an environmental permit for an incinerator has been met.
Resident Malcolm Powell has now filed an application at court seeking a Judicial Review into Calderdale Council’s decision to grant the permit to Calder Valley Skip Hire to operate a small waste incineration plant at its Belmont, Sowerby Bridge, site.
The company previously won planning permission to operate the incinerator on appeal after the council had refused it, but it needs the environmental permit to do so.
The council granted the permit last November – it was the second time of asking with a previous application being unsuccessful.
Mr Powell, who had set the legal ball rolling in the same way over the previous permit application – which ended up effectively being refused by Planning Inspector John Woolcock following a public inquiry – set up the Just Giving fundraiser to support his legal case.
Supported by local campaigners – worried about potential health impacts – including the Benbow Group, it can be found online at https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/malcolmscott-powell and the campaign group has said this being kept open for now until it is known how the matter progresses.
“If permission (for a review) is granted and the council do not concede, the matter will have to go to a substantive hearing and then further funds will be needed,” say the group in an email to supporters.
Mr Powell’s Judicial Review claim has now been filed – as of February 20 – with the court and served on both the council and the company.
These have 21 days from date of service to file a response with the court and then seven days to serve it on the claimant, says the Benbow Group.
At the end of the 21 day period, the court will send the papers to a Judge to review and determine whether permission is given to proceed to a substantive hearing.
The group says this is realistically not going to go to a Judge for a decision on the initial stage before March 17.
The grounds for Mr Powell’s claim, seeking that the permit should be quashed, argue the council failed to give “adequate and intelligible” reasons for its decision and it failed to reach a conclusion on many of the issues raised, says the group.
The council’s Cabinet member for Public Services and Communities, Coun Danielle Durrans (Lab, Ovenden) said at a recent meeting of the full Calderdale Council that relevant officers within the council have deemed the incinerator can meet the appropriate legislative requirements and the environmental permit that has been issued would therefore not be rescinded.
“The council will respond to the Judicial Review should one be issued and the cost of which would be unknown,” she said.