River Earn polluted by 1,000 tonnes of silt

Dec 4 2009 by Alison Lowson, Perthshire Advertiser Friday

A CONSULTANT, whose breach of regulations resulted in one of the worst cases of pollution in two top Perthshire angling rivers, will have to wait until next year to discover his fate.

Perth Sheriff Court was told that hundreds of tonnes of silt were swept downstream into the waterways after an earthen dam was breached at a former reservoir near Crieff.

The pollution was described as “one of the worst incidents” Scottish Environment Protection Agency officers in Perth have had to deal with.

Sentence on 50-year-old Richard Philp, of Queich Court, Milnathort, had been deferred until Wednesday for background reports after he previously admitted failing to get a licence from SEPA to carry out work at the Whitehouse of Dunira Estate on March 17 and 18 last year.

Sheriff Lindsay Foulis, who noted that the maximum penalty was £40,000 or six months imprisonment, told Philp that the appropriate way of dealing with the case was community service because of his “extremely straitened” financial circumstances.

But solicitor John Bain said the accused’s elderly mother had died on Tuesday – and he was the sole beneficiary of her will.

“She owns a house in Kinross and, albeit there’s a mortgage, it has substantial equity.”

Philp hadn’t had a chance to discuss with his wife whether they should sell the property or move into it and he urged the Sheriff to defer sentence further until matters had been finalised.

The court was told last month that “substantial damage” had been caused to eggs recently spawned by salmon, brown trout and sea trout in both the Tullybannocher Burn and the River Earn.

The pollution also adverse effected other aquatic life over a 15-kilometre stretch of the waterways.

The accused had been a consultant contracted to carry out work at the small loch to establish a fishery on the estate. Approximately 1,000 tonnes of silt had to be removed.

The reservoir had been drained but the burn continued to flow through the middle of it, where heavy machinery was being operated.

Samples taken by SEPA officials downstream of the excavation work contained 237 times as many suspended solids as those above the site.

“This is one of the highest results in terms of suspended solids any of the officers involved had seen,” stated depute fiscal Janine Bates.

She added: “Mr Philp should have ensured that appropriate pollution prevention measures were put in place. It appears that no such measures were even considered before work began.

Mr Bain said it had been the accused’s one and only contract as a consultant. He was now a plumber.

Sentence was deferred until February 3.