All partners remain committed to protecting the local community and environment
The Environment Agency has today (Wednesday 19 November) convened local partners as a major investigation into illegal tipping at a site in Kidlington continues.
Meeting with agencies from across Oxfordshire, including Oxfordshire County Council, Thames Valley Police and National Highways, the Environment Agency provided an update on the joint efforts to protect the local environment and address safety concerns from the local community. This comes as the Agency continues to explore several lines of inquiry to bring those responsible to justice.
All partners remain committed to protecting the local community and environment through co-ordinated action.
This investigation is being led by the Agency's National Enforcement Crime Unit, which is staffed by highly skilled waste crime investigators. Specialist officers also remain on the ground to monitor the site and ensure the local community and environment are protected from harm.
Following the first report of waste being tipped in Kidlington, the Environment Agency responded immediately with officers attending the site on 2 July. EA officers then quickly identified the landowner and issued them with a cease-and-desist letter to ensure further tipping was prevented.
After officers became aware of continued criminal activity on site in October, a court order was sought and granted to close the site. Since this was granted on 23 October, no further tipping has taken place. For both safety reasons and because the site is now a live crime scene, members of the public should avoid entering the site.
Anna Burns, Environment Agency's Area Director for The Thames, said:
I share the public's complete disgust at this shocking case of environmental crime.
We took immediate action to stop the illegal tipping in Kidlington, and working with partners across Oxfordshire, we are hunting down those responsible to deliver justice for the local community.
We have several lines of inquiry we are pursuing, and I urge the public to contact the police or the Environment Agency with any information.
Thames Valley Police Chief Superintendent Ben Clark said:
The Environment Agency is responsible for investigating and prosecuting offences related to environmental crime such as this, and we will continue to support them in finding and prosecuting whoever has done this. We are actively working with our partners to address the safety risks posed by the illegal dump to protect the public should there be any danger to the local community and surrounding road network.
Councillor Judy Roberts, Oxfordshire County Council's Cabinet Member for Place, Environment and Climate Action, said:
Along with our partners, we have been dealing with this awful environmental crime for several months. An incident of this scale has obviously caused considerable problems for all parties involved.
With winter coming, we are continuing to work urgently work with the Environment Agency, Cherwell District Council, and National Highways in the shorter term in order to facilitate mitigation and environmental protection measures, especially for the River Cherwell.
Pete Martin, Director of Customer Experience at National Highways, said:
Illegal waste dumping is utterly unacceptable. It poses a serious risk to both our environment and the safety of the roads that communities rely on every day.
We are supporting the Environment Agency in their investigation and will do everything we can to assist in ensuring those responsible are held to account.
The Environment Agency continues to assess any risks to nature and the potential environmental impact of the waste on local air quality and water quality. Monitoring of water run-off from the site remains in place and being carried out at specific locations on the River Cherwell. Work is also being done with partners across the local area to mitigate the safety risks around fire and flooding.
Information from the public is vital in progressing the investigation into this illegal tipping and ensuring those responsible are held to account. The Environment Agency urges anyone with information to call its 24-hour incident hotline on 0800 807 060.
