I
Ian Cloke
Guest
An Oxfordshire hotel has been fined ?12,000 after discharging sewage effluent into one of the ?cleanest rivers in the Cotswolds?.
Cowley Manor Hotel, based in Cowley, Oxfordshire, pleaded guilty to two offences of breaching its consent to discharge treated sewage into the River Churn on 22 December 2005 and 1 March 2006 contrary to Section 85 of the Water Resources Act 1991.
Cheltenham Magistrates? Court fined the company ?7,000 for one offence and ?5,000 for the second and ordered it to pay ?2,492 costs.
The court heard that the Environment Agency has classed the River Churn at the highest level for water quality, and that the importance of maintaining that level of quality was considered vital when approving consent to discharge treated sewage from the Cowley Manor Hotel into the river.
The consent allowed the hotel, which is run by a limited partnership called ?A Curious Group of Hotels?, to discharge properly treated sewage effluent into the River Churn.
The hotel was run by a business partnership, Cowley Manor Partnership, run by Jessica and Peter Frankopan until May 2005, when it was taken over by the 'Curious' partnership, which includes the previous partners.
But since June 2004, nine samples of the final treated sewage effluent from Cowley Manor Hotel have been taken and analysed and each sample has failed to meet at least one of the three consent limits. The limited partnership admitted two offences on 22 December 2005 and 1 March 2006.
Steven Cave, an Environmental Crime Officer at the Environment Agency, said: ?The company has consistently failed to meet its consent limits, which were set in 2001 to ensure that the discharged effluent had no adverse impact on the River Churn.
?The Churn is a particularly clean and vibrant river which hosts a wide variety of fish and wildlife, and the company?s repeated failure to meet its set limits has potentially put this diversity at risk.
?We are delighted at the fine handed out by the court today because it shows that businesses cannot disregard the impacts their everyday activities could be having on the environment.?
Cowley Manor Hotel, based in Cowley, Oxfordshire, pleaded guilty to two offences of breaching its consent to discharge treated sewage into the River Churn on 22 December 2005 and 1 March 2006 contrary to Section 85 of the Water Resources Act 1991.
Cheltenham Magistrates? Court fined the company ?7,000 for one offence and ?5,000 for the second and ordered it to pay ?2,492 costs.
The court heard that the Environment Agency has classed the River Churn at the highest level for water quality, and that the importance of maintaining that level of quality was considered vital when approving consent to discharge treated sewage from the Cowley Manor Hotel into the river.
The consent allowed the hotel, which is run by a limited partnership called ?A Curious Group of Hotels?, to discharge properly treated sewage effluent into the River Churn.
The hotel was run by a business partnership, Cowley Manor Partnership, run by Jessica and Peter Frankopan until May 2005, when it was taken over by the 'Curious' partnership, which includes the previous partners.
But since June 2004, nine samples of the final treated sewage effluent from Cowley Manor Hotel have been taken and analysed and each sample has failed to meet at least one of the three consent limits. The limited partnership admitted two offences on 22 December 2005 and 1 March 2006.
Steven Cave, an Environmental Crime Officer at the Environment Agency, said: ?The company has consistently failed to meet its consent limits, which were set in 2001 to ensure that the discharged effluent had no adverse impact on the River Churn.
?The Churn is a particularly clean and vibrant river which hosts a wide variety of fish and wildlife, and the company?s repeated failure to meet its set limits has potentially put this diversity at risk.
?We are delighted at the fine handed out by the court today because it shows that businesses cannot disregard the impacts their everyday activities could be having on the environment.?