The water regime in and around Straitgate Farm is not only complicated but important: There are springs and streams. There is groundwater and surface water. There are over 100 people reliant on the site for their drinking water. There are farms reliant on springs to water their livestock. There are wetland habitats in ancient woodlands. There are communities downstream vulnerable to flooding. There is even a Grade I Tudor manor house dependent on the water – including for its tearooms and mediaeval fishponds.
Clearly, based on previous posts, Aggregate Industries and its consultants are still a long way from producing an accurate hydrological picture of this sensitive area.
But overlooking that for a moment, could we trust AI to respect the water? Could we trust AI not to derogate it? Not to pollute it? Could we trust AI to do what it says it will do?
In an effort to win the keys to quarry Straitgate, AI has proposed a water monitoring plan:
That’s fine then, you might think. How sensible. What could possibly go wrong?
Plenty. Take a look at this DCC monitoring report for nearby Blackhill Quarry, and AI’s compliance – or rather non-compliance – with the Section 106 agreement for hydrological monitoring for that site:
If AI can't be bothered to fulfil its Blackhill obligations, what hope is there for Straitgate? What hope for people who lose their drinking water supplies? What hope for people whose supplies become contaminated? What hope for timely action, when the last three hydrological monitoring reports for Blackhill have either been submitted late or not at all, when surface flows haven't been measured since 2011? What use is the wording below, if AI doesn't comply with Section 106 agreements?
And there's the wider issue. There would be very many planning conditions for any quarry at Straitgate. Who’s going to monitor and enforce them all? Because we evidently can’t trust AI. And a warning from DCC obviously does no good either, judging by the previous year’s monitoring report for Blackhill:
That's the same monitoring report, by the way, that reminds us of the one metre left unquarried above the maximum level of the water table to protect groundwater at Thorn Tree Plantation at Blackhill; Thorn Tree being a site that did not have the same groundwater sensitivities as Straitgate; one metre being the level of protection that AI thinks it can do without at Straitgate; Straitgate being a site where the maximum water table is still unknown:
