The statement which could finally put a stop to Droppingwell tip...

The EA granted a permit variation in 2016 allowing Grange Landfill Ltd to resume dumping up to 205,000 tonnes of waste a year on the land, which was closed over public health fears in the 1990s.

The long-running saga now appears to hinge on BH05 – the fifth borehole drilled for groundwater tests prior to the Kimberworth site being allowed to reopen.

BH05 was installed by Grange Landfill without permission on council land beside the Droppingwell site in 2016.

It was destroyed the following year – although the operator continued sending “results” to the EA, a freedom of information request later revealed.

The council’s position has been that the EA said the borehole was desirable to protect public health rather than a requirement of the permit.

“This has been the council’s line ever since,” said a spokesperson for Droppingwell Action Group. “We have naturally challenged the council on this over the years to no avail.”

Compliance assessment reports on Droppingwell are written by a regulatory specialist at the EA every three months. Each of the last four reports says: “We require that BH05 be reinstalled prior to disposal activities commencing on site.”

Cllr Ian Jones, independent, tabled a motion at last November’s full council meeting, asking that any permission to reinstate BH05 be refused and access to the land denied.

The Labour group helped defeat the motion by 31 votes to 18, continuing the line that it would be better to have monitoring if the tip was going to go ahead.

The action group said it later contacted individual councillors at Rotherham West and Keppel wards but said it could not retrieve more detailed reasons from them for the motion being rejected.

The group’s spokesperson said: “Cllr Read and co have been hell-bent on opposing the last three of Cllr Jones’ motions and are clearly not checking their facts.

“Each of these ward councillors doesn’t seem to have any understanding of the issues we raise when we try to oppose the tipping going ahead.”

Cllr Jones said he was told by a couple of members after the meeting that they had not known enough about the subject to vote in favour of his motion.

He added: “This, I found, was a very damning indictment of how Rotherham Labour councillors work. The first thing new councillors are taught is how to scrutinise decisions by triangulating evidence. This decision was on the say-so of their leader, and we all know where that kind of decision-making got us in the past.”

Council leader Cllr Chris Read wrote to the EA on January 22, pointing out the “direct” inconsistency compared to what they had previously been advised – saying this was “deeply unhelpful” and required urgent clarification.

He added: “Put simply, if this latest statement is correct then the council will reverse its position on BH05, and tipping at Grange Landfill will become legally impossible. We will finally have reached the end of these last few years of protracted worry.

“If the statement in the EA report is incorrect, the council will remain open to BH05 being reinstated in the interests of health and safety for residents living nearby.”

The council maintains that it has always strongly opposed the tip reopening, with a unanimous vote in 2017 and “considerable time and resources” from its legal, planning and environmental enforcement teams, including taking external legal advice.

The EA said it would not comment to the Advertiser until it had responded to RMBC. A spokesperson added: “The letter to the council is likely to be sent later this week.”