A FARMER has been ordered to pay £7048 for illegally discharging slurry into a river due to a leaking pipe.
Timothy Juckes, 48, of Tredington, near Tewkesbury, pleaded guilty to illegally discharging slurry into the River Swilgate, on November 14 and 15, 2022. He was fined £1086 and ordered to pay costs of £5528.50 and a victim’s surcharge of £434.
Cheltenham Magistrates’ Court heard that Environment Agency officials attended the site after receiving reports of pollution and conducted a survey which identified Juckes’s as the source. They also noted a strong slurry smell, brown discoloured water, and some dead fish. Water samples showed oxygen levels were low and there were elevated levels of ammonia in the river.
The defendant told the officers he had started pumping slurry from one lagoon to another and had laid the pipe within the watercourse. He said he would normally support the pipe over the river, but on this occasion did not want to carry equipment on a tractor across a wet, re-seeded field.
He also said he did not put the pipe across the bridge as he was tending sheep and a stock box could not get over the bridge with the pipe there.
The exact charge was that between November 14/15, 2022, Juckes caused a water discharge activity, namely a discharge of slurry, into the River Swilgate, except under and to the extent authorised by an environmental permit, contrary to Regulation 38(1)(a) and Regulation 12(1)(b) of the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016.
Following the court case, an Environment Agency spokesperson said: “This has resulted in unacceptable pollution of a local brook, causing significant harm to fish and other aquatic wildlife.”
- Anyone concerned about pollution or an environmental incident can call the Environment Agency’s 24/7 incident hotline on 0800 807060.
