'Wrong on All Counts:' My Comments to the Open Floor Hearing on the Covanta Incinerator Plan for Stewartby

Yesterday I spoke at the first session of the open-floor hearings being conducted by the Infrastructure Planning Commission on the application by US waste giant Covanta Energy to build a 600,000 tonne capacity incinerator at Rookery South pit near Stewartby. As I have explained previously, I have not been involved in the Council's formal submissions to the application process being conducted by the IPC, having received a warning letter from lawyers for Covanta. They had noticed that, like so many residents of this area, I am opposed to the principle of us being established as a magnet for lorries bringing waste from areas far and wide for burning using an environmentally damaging waste technology in the form of incineration. Indeed, I have campaigned against these abominable plans since they were published, well before I became Mayor. Not wanting to place the Council at any risk, I have instead taken part in the process as an individual, and did so again at the hearing yesterday.

The open-floor hearings have been taking place yesterday and today, at the Forest Centre in Marston Moretaine and at Stewartby Village Hall, and there is a residents' protest taking place at Stewartby Village Hall this evening which I will be attending. It is essential that we all make our voices heard loud and clear that these are the wrong plans, in the wrong place. This is the message I gave in my comments to the hearing yesterday, and I have reproduced below the notes from which I spoke:

I wish to start by making clear I am speaking today in a personal capacity. As Elected Mayor of Bedford Borough I am of course the leader of the Council, but you have heard the Council's formal representation given separately. My longstanding views on these proposals are well known, and I campaigned against the plans before becoming Mayor. I have therefore not been involved in any of the Council's formal submissions to the IPC. I have instead taken part in your processes as an individual, and it is on this basis that I address this hearing today.

I wish to make a number of points regarding the application for the incinerator, which I consider to be fundamentally flawed in several respects:

Firstly, the project will have a damaging effect on the wider environment. The climate change impact of mass-burn incineration, is greater than several other viable waste treatment technologies. Mass-burn incineration is an inferior technology, and one that I reject wholeheartedly. I am instead committed to more sustainable methods of waste treatment, on a smaller, more appropriate scale.

These methods are more consistent with the principles of reducing, re-using and recycling as much of our waste as possible prior to any final disposal. Measured against these basic principles, which should be underpinning how we deal with our waste as a society, mass burn incineration is the wrong answer to the wrong question.

Mass burn incineration may tick the box marked 'anything but landfill,' but frankly we can do so much better for our communities now and for future generations.

The next point I wish to make relates to the hugely damaging impact of the extraordinary number of lorry movements over local roads which will result from this proposal. The vast capacity of the proposed plant will mean a huge number of lorries travelling to and from the site, causing significant harm to the local environment and local air quality. In addition, the roads over which the lorries will be travelling will be roads not designed for such traffic. These lorries will cause congestion, cause littering of local roads and cause real harm to the quality of life for local residents.

For decades, communities in and around the Marston Vale have experienced the importation of waste from Londonand other areas, with a number of landfill sites in operation. With landfill in the area reducing over the coming years, residents should rightly expect not to have to continue to experience the large-scale importation of waste from elsewhere into the Marston Vale. This would be inevitable under these plans, due to the vast capacity of the proposed facility. I consider it frankly unacceptable that local communities here should be expected to fulfil a role as a dumping ground for waste from elsewhere, with rubbish brought from anywhere across the country for burning in a plant with a capacity of over 500,000 tonnes.

The incinerator's size will also be hugely detrimental in terms of the damage it will do to the landscape of the Marston Vale. The local topography means that this vast plant will, if approved, be a dominant feature of the landscape for miles around and, I am sad to say, will stand as a monument to the failure of democratic processes.

For there is a coalition of opposition across local politicians, residents groups and councils, who know that this proposal is wrong for Rookery Pit, wrong for Stewartby, wrong for the Marston Vale and wrong for Bedford Borough. You will hear that the local authorities are opposed to it, even in a context in which they are seeking alternatives to the use of landfill, and of course the payment of landfill tax. I don't know if the proposal belongs anywhere, but I certainly know it doesn't belong here

As stated earlier, I have long campaigned against these plans, and as Mayor, residents have told me very clearly that our Borough would suffer enormously if the incinerator were to be built. I re-emphasise: the incinerator is wrong on all counts for our communities, and is simply not wanted by local residents.

The planned incinerator is too big, too dirty and just plain wrong. I have no doubt you will hear this sentiment time and time again during these hearings. I hope you will heed this clear, essential message.

Many thanks.