A TYRE company has been fined £10,000 and three men given suspended prison sentences after a judge slammed the unsafe storage conditions at two storage sites.
One of the sites, next to the Leeds Liverpool Canal a short distance from Saltaire, saw hundreds of tyres stored at a mill site in an unsafe manner.
A judge said had these tyres caught fire it would have “severely impacted” the lives of residents and businesses in Shipley and Saltaire.
The case, brought by the Environment Agency, involved two sites – Ashley Mills in Shipley and Fairlea Mills in Luddendenfoot, next to the River Calder.
Both sites had been selected for inspection following a major fire at a separate tyre storage site in Bradford in November 2020.
Due to the environmental impact of that fire, the Environment Agency, working with Calderdale Council, Bradford Council, Kirklees Council, Wakefield Council and West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue, launched a project to look at all other sites to ensure they were operating legally.
Appearing at Bradford Crown Court on Wednesday were Shakil Ahmed, who owned and operated the Calderdale site, and the directors of The Tyre Waste Team Limited - Jamie Craggs and Levi Depass.
All three pleaded guilty to the charges put before them.
Ahmed, 43, of Spinners Close, Halifax, was charged with operating a waste site without the proper permit between September 2020 and the May 2021, failing to comply with an enforcement notice in February 2021 and failing to comply with a suspension notice in May 2021.
Those charges only related to the Calderdale site.
Jamie Craggs, aged 34, of Sedbergh Close, Bradford, and Levi Depass, aged 35, of West Royd Road, Shipley each pleaded guilty to three charges relating to their role as directors of Tyre Waste Team.
They were that between September 2020 and the June 2021 the company operated a waste site at Fairlea Mills “otherwise in accordance with an environmental permit, that between March 2021 and April 2021 the company committed a similar offence at Ashley Mills on Ashley Lane, Shipley, and another charge that between June 2021 and May 2022 the company operated the Ashley Mills site outside the remit of their environmental permit.
Tyre Waste Team was charged with three similar charges.
Judge Ahmed Nadim said by failing to stick to environmental permits, the defendants ran the risk of a catastrophic incident such as a fire.
The Shipley site saw tyres stored between a rail line and the Leeds Liverpool Canal.
Referring to the Shipley site, Judge Nadim said: “This particular offending was in a sensitive area – an area reputed for local interest, Saltaire.
“Had there been an eruption of fire, the local business community and residents of that area would have been severely impacted.”
He said the lawbreaking came about because the defendants wanted to avoid costs. He said: “Your conduct was deliberate, intentional and you flagrantly disregarded your legal obligations.
“I reject the argument that the offending came about because of the adverse market conditions to which the Covid pandemic contributed.
“It was entirely within your power to restrict the number of tyres being stored on the site, and entirely in your gift to stop receiving additional tyres. It was entirely within your power to install fire breaks to mitigate risk.”
Ahmed was sentenced to ten months imprisonment suspended for 18 months, 250 hours of unpaid work and was ordered to pay £2,500 in costs.
Craggs and Depass were both sentenced to 12 months imprisonment, suspended for 18 months, 250 hours unpaid work and ordered to pay £2,500 in costs.
Tyre Waste Team Limited was fined £10,000 fine and ordered to pay costs of £2,500.
The company’s defence team pointed out that Tyre Waste Team made just £1,600 gross profit last year, and may struggle to pay the fine within the required two year period.
Judge Nadim replied: “If the company must cease to exist, then it must cease to exist. It has been engaged in conduct that has created risk.”
He pointed out that the company’s finances showed Tyre Waste Team Ltd did have assets worth over £30,000.
He said: “If the company goes into liquidation and the assets are depleted so the fine is not met, then your clients will have some problems on their plate.”
After the case a spokesman for the Environment Agency said: “If either site was to have caught fire, there would have been a major effect on water quality, due to the proximity of a watercourse next to each site as a result of fire water runoff, which is likely to have been highly polluting.”
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