A BARRY businessman has been ordered to pay fines and costs totalling £4,600 after admitting offences relating to the tipping of waste.

Stuart Robert Brock, trading as Ace Site Services of Atlantic Trading Estate, Barry, pleaded guilty to two offences contrary to the Environmental Protection Act.

He was fined £2,800 and ordered to pay £1,800 towards the costs of Environment Agency Wales, who brought the prosecution.

The court was told that on February 14 last year, a tipper lorry marked Ace Site Services was seen by Agency officers entering a site known as Gilbert Gardens, Cadoxton.

The vehicle was loaded with waste materials which consisted of soils and sub soils mixed with vegetation. The site does not have a waste management licence, and was known to the Agency officers. A few minutes later the same lorry left the site empty.

Checks on the vehicle led the Agency to Brock, whose company is based at Atlantic Trading Estate, Barry.

The subsequent investigation established that his company had deposited other waste materials at Gilbert Gardens and that he had failed to properly complete duty of care transfer notes which provide an audit trail of waste movements.

Although Gilbert Gardens had exemptions registered with the Agency, the types of waste deposited at the site were not consistent with the exemptions and the site had merely been used as a waste disposal route.

Following the case an Agency spokesman said: "This incident could have been avoided had the company followed the standard duty of care procedures.

"It is not sufficient for anyone to rely upon a letter confirming the registration of an exemption with the Agency as a means to use a site for waste disposal.

"Exempt activities cover a variety of waste types and processes and checks should be made to establish the type and location of the exempt activity.

"Where the Agency establishes negligence on the part of an individual then they must also face the consequences of their actions."