RUGBY ADVERTISER and OBSERVER: used by CEMEX!
On 23 June four full colour pages of a Cemex Community Matters "advertisement feature" appeared on front and back pages of Rugby's newspapers.
ALL THIS COULD BE YOURS FOR A SONG!!
WARWICKSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL
(Are they bullied?)
In Freedom of Information request, were forced to admit that the cost overrun of the RUGBY Western Relief Road, known locally as the CEMEX WAY, was influenced by Cemex. There was the threat of Cemex withdrawal of the infamous 1996 "Rugby cement plant planning permission for sale for 661,000 pounds" if the public did not pay for a bigger tunnel for Cemex to get their lorries in and out between their undermining quarries, on either side of the undermined public highway - Parkfield Road. So the public paid up - a couple of million quid!
QUOTE: "The tunnel was made larger at the request of Cemex."(unquote: in order for them to remove 200,000 tonnes of hazardous waste to deposit at the Southam landfill site in the returning clay lorries. Will they pay landfill tax on this??) "Cemex paid a contribution of 78,000 pounds only, towards the total cost of 900,000 for the tunnel and 2 million pounds retaining walls" (unquote: because the quarry undermined the public highway), "and agreed to vary the 1996 Section 106 agreement so that money that would be DUE BACK" (unquote: because it had a ten year life span only!!) " from the 1996 Section 106 agreement would be retained by WCC as a "contribution" to the cost of the tunnel. The contribution that would potentially have been lost was 661,000 pounds.
QUESTION: Why was the tunnel enlarged and made higher as shown in the photographs?
Non answer: "The new tunnel is enlarged compared to the old structure, thus raising its roof nearer to the Western Relief Road."
RUGBY BOROUGH COUNCIL allowed RUGBY CEMENT (now CEMEX) to undermine the public highway in a planning permission granted on 26 June 1947. QUOTE : " the application site boundary is TIGHT to Parkfield Road there are NO conditions preventing mineral extraction taking place tight up the highway boundary."
RUGBY WESTERN RELIEF ROAD alias the CEMEX WAY, was built BY the public, FOR Cemex. Why did Rugby need this "non-bypass" ? Because of the pollution from the CEMEX 1,000 HEAVY GOODS VEHICLES traversing the town each day - soon to increase massively with the import, by Cemex HGV, of 400,000 tonnes of waste each year, to the new polluting Cemex waste processing plant. BIO-AEROSOLS are us - 5,000 square metres of vents within 100 metres of housing; plus a 45 metre stack emitting PM10 and stack gas, toxic chemicals, volatiles etc. To add to the 24/7 pollution from Cemex co-incinerator main stack, and from several other low level stacks, all polluting the local area, and further afield - GREAT!
MOBILE PHONE MASTS NOT TO SPOIL APPROACH FOR DUNCHURCH ROAD RESIDENTS.
RUGBY BOROUGH PLANNERS say "NO!" : A unanimous "NO!" at the planning committee, recommended by officers, to Vodafone/02 mast on Dunchurch Road, in the posh area, as it would "spoil the street scene and entrance to Rugby." But despite petitions and hundreds of letters of objections they are planting masts in poor areas, within 10 metres of homes. How many dwellings have a view of the cement co-incinerator? just drive into Rugby on the Leicester Road or Western Cemex Way and enjoy the view!
WARWICKSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL, CARILLION, MOWLEM, CEMEX....
DEVELOPER DOES NOT PAY!
The general rule is that the developer would pay for a tunnel which he needs to make under a highway.
WASTE BURNING INCREASES EMISSIONS:
e.g. BENZENE 350,000 FOLD!
CEMEX RDF TRIALS CONCLUSIONS
Toxic pollution increases significantly during the low-temperature co-incineration of RDF waste and tyres in the calciner, (400,000 tonnes a year permitted), plus from the simultaneous "cooking" of various undisclosed industrial wastes in place of traditional raw materials. Plus new emissions that are unmonitored at the toxic kiln-bypass, and at the cement mills where PFA is mixed in. No monitoring data! One mill failed the bi-annual test - permitted 30,000 micrograms particulate in every cubic metre. These emissions are clearly visible at the site.
RUGBY BOROUGH COUNCIL Environmental Health Department: "On this occasion we felt there were no specific comments we needed to make." Increased toxic emissions of no concern and interest to them then, but there remains doubt as to whether they have actually read (understood?) the Cemex tables? Or by what legitimate democratic process they (??) decided not to bother - on behalf of Rugby residents.
CEMEX 27/01/11:
"Although the trial outcomes do show an increase on the baseline they are still well below the Emission Limit Values which for dioxins and furans, for example is 0.1 nanograms per cubic metre. A nanogram is one billionth of a gramme."
MRS P: "We are delighted with this ruling. Even though Rugby suffers badly from the way the cement plant, (which is now a co-incinerator for waste), was planned, and where the prevailing wind blows the pollution over the town, at least this case may help others with protecting the environment, and their health, and that can only be to the good!"
The Supreme Court has taken an important step towards securing access to justice. The Court has decided that what people should be expected to pay when they take cases to court may depend on what an ordinary person should be expected to pay rather than expecting them to risk all their assets.
The fear of paying the costs of an opponent, often a big organisation with expensive lawyers, makes most people think twice before they venture off to court. For many years this has been a particular impediment for cases about the environment, where people being altruistic are even less likely to want to risk losing lots of money.
Such was nearly the fate of Lilian, who lives in Rugby, and has campaigned tirelessly against the expansion of the cement works there.
In 2008 the House of Lords found “ despite acknowledged withholding of information by the Environment Agency “ that EU law had been complied with in the assessment of the potential environmental impact of the cement works.
The government and the Environment Agency, who had both opposed her case, put in bills totalling more than £88,000.
Following a tortuous appeal of its own decision to award costs against Mrs Pallikaropoulos in favour of the public authorities, the Supreme Court has now recognised that EU law relating to costs of legal cases may not have been approached in the right way. Citing its powers last used in the
*Pinochet extradition case to avoid injustice by a court of final appeal, it has decided to re-open the matter and ask the European Court of Justice what to do.
The expectation is that the European Court will favour an approach that renders justice affordable. The spectre of adverse costs should not have a "chilling effect" on those who seek the court's help in protecting the environment.
Environmental lawyer Richard Buxton, Mrs Pallikaropoulos' solicitor, said:
"It has become obvious for some time that the costs rules here are just unacceptable. The pressure has been mounting for change and particularly over the past year there have been some key decisions pointing in favour of improving access to justice. This Supreme Court decision suggests a real turning of the tide." The decision is consistent with the Ministry of Justice's own recent proposals to make litigation generally more affordable.
It may be some time before Luxembourg delivers the last word on the matter but the effect of the Supreme Court decision should immediately be to make the courts cautious not to not inhibit environmental challenges through allowing proceedings to become too expensive.
LINK:
The judgment of the Supreme Court and press statement in *R (Edwards &
Pallikaropoulos) v Environment Agency and others* [2010] UKSC 57 is available at http://www.supremecourt.gov.uk/news/judgments.html.
The underlying issue in the case is whether the current costs rules in domestic courts (i.e. the loser pays) should continue to be applied in cases involving the environment. The Aarhus Convention, to which the UK is a signatory, requires that costs in proceedings relating to the environment not be "prohibitively expensive." This principle has been given direct effect in domestic law via directive 85/337/EEC on Environmental Impact Assessment, which applies to development likely to have significant environmental effects.
The appeal before the Supreme Court was of a decision by that Court's costs officers that it was open to them to apply the "not prohibitively expensive" principle at the detailed assessment stage, meaning that costs awarded by the Court could be reduced on assessment to nil. The Supreme Court disagreed with the costs officers “ it is not within their jurisdiction to reduce costs on that basis."
However, the Court also heard argument from Mrs Pallikaropoulos that the question of how prohibitive expense should be assessed by reference to an objective standard (i.e. what the "ordinary person" can afford to pay in the course of a straightforward judicial review), and from the government that it should be by reference to the individual claimant's means.
The Court decided that the question of how prohibitive expense should be assessed was not "acte clair" and therefore a reference to the European Court of Justice was required. When the House of Lords originally did not protect Mrs Pallikaropoulos against adverse costs, and then ordered costs against her when she lost, it may have adopted the wrong approach and so the matter should in the interests of justice be re-opened.
Lord Hope, delivering the judgment of the Court, referred to the costs order against Mrs Pallikaropolous and said, "It is to say the least questionable whether in taking [the purely subjective] approach, which has now been disapproved by the Court of Appeal in *Garner v Elmbridge Borough Council*, [the Court] fulfilled its obligations under the directives."
*Garner* was a case earlier in the summer involving development affecting the historic setting of Hampton Court Palace, where Mr Garner had mounted a public interest challenge but had been fiercely opposed by the local authority and developer interests by threats of costs. The Court of Appeal eventually enabled the case to proceed by granting protection from adverse costs and judgment is still awaited on the substance of the case.
Further information: Richard Buxton, Cambridge, solicitors to Mrs Pallikaropoulos
STILL WAITING!
As the Supreme Court deliberates about what is "prohibitively expensive" and what is an "ordinary person" and what the Aarhus Convention actually means, and how the UK is to implement this? And what authority the Costs Officers have - as the government funds three of the most highly paid lawyers James Eadie QC; James Maurici; Charles Banner to challenge the decision of the Costs Officers 15 January 2010. Can/should the Law Lords revisit a previous decision? Res Judicata encompasses (i) cause of action estoppel - which is "absolute, subject only to fraud and collusion." (fraud and collusion eh? plenty of food for thought there!!) and (ii) issue estoppel - is subject to an exception for "special circumstances" - changes that have emerged since the proceedings began, including a change in the law.
In the case of PINOCHET the House of Lords had, and the Supreme Court now has, "jurisdiction to re-open its decisions as necessary to avoid injustice."INJUSTICE abounds as although we, the people of Rugby, right from 2003 to this day, made good our case the various judges in the case decided in their wisdom that, the Environment Agency, although proven to have "been unfair and to have hidden all the environmental and air quality impacts and reports from the public", had "substantially complied with the law." Therefore the judges would issue no remedy, and would penalise the public in general, and me in particular, for complaining about this sham process and "insultation."
The Environment Agency lawyers seem to have misdirected the Courts, including the House of Lords, all along - stating that no-one in the whole of Rugby was concerned about the cement plant and its emissions, that there was no public interest, and I was one affluent person all alone with a private campaign. Surely that is fraud and collusion and unjust? CEMENT EMISSIONS MIRACLE
Not only that but also the EA also colluded in the misleading and deception of the public and took no corrective action against Rugby Cement who during the IPPC consultations bombarded households with colourful leaflets and flooded the local papers with articles, stating such as " the burning tyres in our cement kiln gives off only harmless carbon dioxide and water vapour." A MIRACLE indeed! Why don't they patent it? An emission-less cement co-incinerator plant? Ha! STILL WAITING!
For the "evidence" to support the claims in this letter above. So...what are the "maximum annual releases assessed as environmentally acceptable by the Environment Agency when the original IPPC permit was determined"? Did they tell the public or consult? No! Of course they hid them from the public, and from the courts, hiding the AQMAU Air Quality Assessment Unit report, and the H1 Environmental Assessment. Also the plant only had planning permission for 1,000,000 tpa cement production - so how did the EA assess the emissions for 2,000,000 tonnes at IPPC stage?
Or were they hiding the production as well?CEMENT CO-INCINERATORS MAXIMUM POLLUTION
Which Cement co-incinerator is the worst? We have asked also for the "maximum annual releases permitted for each individual cement co-incinerator" - as "in their IPPC applications and considered environmentally acceptable." LESS PROTECTION FOR THE PUBLIC
(download)
