EMERGENCY CLOSURE OF WOODLANDS ROAD,
SPODDEN VALLEY, ROCHDALE
- more questions than answers?

16th May 2005

[1. photo of notice and blocked road]
The public have just been banned from Woodlands Rd in the Spodden Valley
under an Emergency Road Closure by Rochdale Council’s Highway’s Department.

Immediate risks to public health have been cited.

“To prevent the public coming in contact with asbestos waste”

Incredibly, it has been suggested, by the site’s developers, that local people have
removed soil from known asbestos tips

This is a direct quote from the developers’ press release:
“On a routine inspection last week, we discovered an area where land had been
unofficially removed from the site. This is worrying."
“It is a danger to the individual or individuals concerned who came to the site and
potentially a danger to the community”
NONSENSE!

First of all – our campaign has always asked for public health to be paramount.
Please see our archived media releases for more information…
www.spodden-valley.co.uk

An emergency road closure for up to 19 months:
Would the developers benefit from this dramatic action?

Let’s take a look back over what has been going on at this site in the last 12 months…

Woodlands Road wasn’t immediately closed off when the developers ordered the
destruction of woodland and the ripping-up of tree roots that disturbed soil on the
site in May 2004
[2. capped coal pit photo]

The road wasn’t immediately closed when local residents warned Rochdale
Council’s Contaminated Land Officer of ‘exposed fibrous material’ in upturned
tree roots in the north of the site in May 2004.
[3. photo of fibre in tree roots.
4. Scan of Paul Bradford’s reply]

The road wasn’t immediately closed when Rochdale Council’s Contaminated
Land Officer wrote a draft designation of contaminated land for the site in late
May 2004. (Although this was only made public because of a Freedom of
Information Act search in early 2005).
[5. photo of front page of document]

The road wasn’t immediately closed off when JCB’s started to dig open trial pits
on the asbestos factory site or core samples for soil testing on the site in
June/July 2004.
(check for masks in these photographs)
[6. photo of JCB] [8. photo of workers]

Roads weren’t immediately closed off when mud from soil samples clinging
to test equipment and sacks were left to dry in the sun and wind within metres
of footpaths.
[9. photo of muddy equipment]

The road wasn’t immediately closed off when an MMC employee (and former
T&N employee) confirmed the existence of exposed asbestos on the site in a
letter dated 10th September 2004.

The road wasn’t immediately closed when after months of inaction, local people
had independent laboratory test confirm that huge piles of exposed fibre in the
site’s woodland contained Amosite (brown) asbestos in September 2004.
[10. partial scan of certificate]
[11. photo of pointing to pile of exposed asbestos]

The road wasn’t immediately closed off when BBC reporter Mark Handscomb
broadcast a report on Radio 4’s You and Yours Programme about exposed
asbestos on the site in January 2005.

The road wasn’t immediately closed off after Countryside Properties director
Ian Simpson was proven incorrect to say that local people were wrong about
exposed asbestos on the site in March 2005.

The road wasn’t immediately closed off when decontamination work went on
for over 6 weeks on beside Woodlands Rd. (February-March 2005)
At first without any proper barriers or warning signs at all.
[12. early photo of decontamination work]

Or when asbestos removal workers were seen not wearing masks or protective
clothing properly.

Or when an MMC Estates employee told passers by that the work was merely
collecting up some rubbish that had been dumped there by local trouble makers.
[13. scanned extract from letter]

Or when asbestos removal workers were seen dragging sacks of asbestos
waste up rock-strewn steep inclines.
[14. photo of dragging sacks]

The road wasn’t immediately closed off when BBC reporter John Thorne,
on the follow up You and Yours report, saw bags of asbestos waste beside
Woodlands Rd whilst the decontamination site was abandoned whilst the
decontamination workers had gone to the local chip shop in February 2005.
[15. 16. photo of red bags]

Woodlands Road was used by walkers, horse riders and cyclists whilst the
decontamination work went on a few metres away.
[17. photo of walkers 18. photo of cyclists]

We have been assured that the air monitoring conducted detected
‘zero asbestos fibres’
Why haven’t we seen these test results?
[19. photo of air monitoring equipment]

The road wasn’t closed immediately closed off when asbestos waste
could still be seen littered on the land that had supposed to have been
decontaminated A FEW DAYS BEFORE. (February 2005)
[20. photo of dated newspaper and exposed fibres]

Consultants have been seen walking over land that the Forestry Commission
had been told they couldn’t conduct measured surveys of tree stumps in order
to prosecute for the criminal act of unlicensed felling.
[21. photo of yellow jackets]

DID FEARS OF ASBESTOS CONTAMINATION SAVE THE DEVELOPERS
FROM A CRIMINAL PROSECUTION?

Why didn’t the developers let Rochdale Council and the HSE have the results
of the asbestos tests conducted in July 2004 as soon as they were available?

Is it because doing so could have left the developers open to a criminal
prosecution?

In papers only made public by the developers in April 2005, it appears that
tests conducted by Encia in July 2004 concluded that there was an ‘absence
of any asbestos contamination in the subsoil’. Encia also recommended
(at para 9.6) that the Local Authority and Forestry Commission be informed
of these findings.

[photos of felled trees- please take them from ‘before and after section’
and the photo showing the beech tree and federal Mogul sign. 22, 23, 24 .25 +]

Such findings may have enabled the Forestry Commission to allow its officers
the opportunity to go on site and complete a measuring survey of the volume
of unlicensed timber felled? (more than 5 cubic metres within a 4-month period
can be an offence under the Forestry Act 1967). According to advice taken by the
Forestry Commission and DEFRA solicitors, it has been suggested that this
evidence was required for a criminal prosecution. This is despite the fact that
the felling contractor had admitted that much more than 5 cubic metres had been
felled on 15th/16th May 2004. A forestry consultant, commissioned by the developers
also accepted that the 1967 Forestry Act had been breeched.

In late 2004 the Forestry Commission concluded that their inability to investigate the
site within a 6-month period was the reason why matters were not taken further.

The Encia report was dated July 2004. The 6-month ‘cut-off’ date for the prosecution
of a summary offence was 15th November 2004. If the Forestry Commission had
been given a copy of the report, there could have been ample time to gather
evidence for a prosecution.

Why did this not happen?
Who did it benefit?

If admitted breaches of the criminal law are not prosecuted- despite huge amounts
of evidence- what faith may people have in other aspects of health and safety,
regulatory and planning law on the site of the world’s largest asbestos textile factory?

For example,

JCB’s have been photographed disturbing the large piles of crushed asbestos
factory that dominate part of the site.

The Managing Director of Encia, the company involved in the site survey work for
the planning application said that he did not know about this rubble. This was
also confirmed by a director of Countryside Properties (Northern) Limited.

Here are photographs of the piles of ‘elusive’ crushed asbestos factory with
wagons taking it off site. We do not know where to. Councillors have asked
but as yet there is no answer.
[photo 25]
The wagons were uncovered. They drove through the streets of Rochdale and
beyond.
(Turning left off the site past a “no left turn” sign!)
[photo of sign- 26 . Photo of wagon on Rooley Moor Road -27 ].

We were promised that all removal work was stopped and that the rubble
was to be tested for asbestos dust and fibre content.

Requests for samples of rubble for independent tests to be commissioned
by Save Spodden Valley were refused by the developers. Unspecific
‘Health and Safety’ grounds were cited to deny a fully protective clothed
scientist from taking small samples under the strict supervision of the
developers- and for the developers’ experts to have possession of control
samples fro their own scrutiny.

The developers conducted their own tests. They employed a company
called Encia.
This is the same company that provided information to the Environmental
Statement published with the December 2004 planning application
that concluded:

“Of particular note is the absence of any asbestos contamination”.
[scanned image of paragraph- 28]

Encia told councillors on Thursday 12th May 2005 that their tests on the
rubble for asbestos were ‘negative’.
However, it is understood that the Health and Safety Executive’s Laboratories
(HSL) have conducted their own tests and CONFIRMED traces of asbestos.
Unfortunately, these results are not automatically available to the public
- a Freedom of Information Act search has to be done.

These photographs were taken on Sunday 15th May 2005:
They show dry rubble being excavated from the same piles of crushed
asbestos factory, tipped onto an open trailer and driven through the streets
of Rochdale.
[3 Photos: next to pile-29, driving on site-30, on the road-31]

A year and a day after the destruction of the woodlands, a day after a
community protest on this road shamed Countryside Properties
(why else would they not allow children’s paintings to be put on the mesh fences?)
[many photos of May 15th protest- 32, 33, 34,]

On May 16th Woodlands Rd was IMMEDIATELY closed in an EMERGENCY notice
because it has been suggested that local people have removed soil from the site.

No proof was presented!
No representatives or government bodies appear to have been consulted!
Nobody even liaised with local councillors!

Countryside Properties or MMC made NO mention of this extremely serious
allegation at a meeting of Councillors, the Head of Rochdale Planning Department
and a Save Spodden Valley representative. (May 12th 2005)

After reading this, please remember the photographs you have just seen.

NOW THAT WOODLANDS ROAD IS CLOSED, NO MORE PHOTOGRAPHS LIKE
THESE MAY BE TAKEN IN THE NEAR FUTURE.

WHO DOES THAT BENEFIT?

Public vigilance has held the developers to account repeatedly over the
past 12 months.

What happens now?

The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth would be a good start.

...............................................................................................................................................................

STATEMENT ENDS.

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