Fresh calls over future for former landfill site

Council leader Simon Tagg says he is pleased odour problems have improved but residents living close to Walleys Quarry still need certainty

A year on from the closure of a controversial landfill site, a council has called for the government to help with planning its long-term future.

The Environment Agency (EA) shut Walleys Quarry in Silverdale, Staffordshire, in November 2024, and in February this year the company operating it went bust before abandoning the site.

Contractors working for the EA are now managing the former landfill, but a long term solution was yet to be settled.

An EA spokesperson said: "Although we are not responsible for the site, we remain committed to working alongside partners to secure a long term, stable and sustainable future for it."

"We are acting under discretionary powers to arrange for steps to be taken to remove a risk of serious pollution from odour," they said.

"We have instructed contractors to carry out further capping and drainage works."

'Permanently cap site'

Bosses at Newcastle-under-Lyme Borough Council said complaints about odour from the landfill had fallen from 4,300 in the first 10 months of 2024, to a few per month.

Conservative council leader Simon Tagg said he was pleased odour problems had improved but residents still needed certainty.

"The site needs permanently capping and restoring, but the financial burden of that should not fall on local taxpayers," he said.

The Environment Agency says a contractor is now on site, working to prevent pollution from the site

"It was the government that overruled local planning authorities and authorised the site's use for certain types of waste, so we feel it is for government to bear its responsibilities."

"The questions of how this site came to be the source of misery for residents, and how then the problem was able to continue over several years, need answering.

"Not just to provide an explanation to those who suffered for so long here, but so that the same miserable situation does not happen again elsewhere."

Campaigners have previously been told the government felt a public inquiry was not the best use of public money.

In October, nature minister Mary Creagh said her position had not changed.