Essex County Council criticised for refusal to compensate residents near waste transfer station

Date Published: 16/05/12

Essex County Council has refused to pay compensation to a couple who suffered noise nuisance from a nearby waste transfer station in the same way as they paid two other households following a Local Government Ombudsman report in 2006.

The current Local Government Ombudsman, Anne Seex, says in her report issued today: “There is no justification for treating them differently to the two other residents who have received loss of value payments.”

In 2006 the then Ombudsman found fault by Essex County Council and Epping Forest District Council in the way the County Council granted a licence for a waste transfer station. He decided that the District Council wrongly gave advice that the waste transfer station had an established use, and the County Council granted a licence without taking adequate steps to ensure the advice was soundly based. These faults caused an injustice to two residents who had complained to him and who suffered noise nuisance from vehicle movements associated with the site. Both Councils accepted the Ombudsman’s recommendation that they should share the cost of paying £15,000 and £100,000 to the two residents.

Another couple, Mr & Mrs R, live directly opposite the entrance to the site. They suffered the same noise nuisance as the two residents who complained at the time. An independent valuer says the waste transfer station has reduced the value of their home by £30,000. If they had complained to the Ombudsman in 2006 the Councils would have made a payment to them to reflect that reduced value.

In 1999 Mr & Mrs R were among residents who complained to the District Council. In 2008 they contacted the District Council to seek a similar payment to those recommended by the Ombudsman. The District Council refused so Mr & Mrs R complained to the Ombudsman in 2009.

The Ombudsman asked both Councils to get an independent valuation of Mr & Mrs R’s home. The valuer said their home had been reduced in value by £30,000. The District Council accepted the valuation and has paid £12,000 to Mr & Mrs R. The County Council, however, did not agree with the valuation and has refused to pay anything.

The Ombudsman recommends that Essex County Council should pay £18,000 to Mr & Mrs R as 60 per cent of the £30,000 reduced value of their home. 

Report ref no 10 018 575

A headteacher reduced children as young as four to tears, then bragged about "breaking" them to shocked colleagues, a tribunal has been told.

Eiros Hall was said to have mocked, humiliated and violently manhandled pupils at a nursery school in an alleged reign of terror lasting years.

Pupils broke down and cried when they learned Mrs Hall was to take their class, the General Teaching Council for Wales (GTCW) heard.

She felt so free to intimidate youngsters at school she angrily ordered a six-year-old with a speech impediment to "talk properly", it was claimed.

Mrs Hall, in her late 50s, was headteacher at Ardwyn Nursery and Infant School in Welshpool, from 1997.

A shocked whistleblower told how she felt powerless to hold her to account when she witnessed her abuse of pupils.

Elen Peate said she was shocked by her behaviour but unable to act as Mrs Hall doubled as the school child protection officer. As a newly-graduated teacher, she was inexperienced and initially unsure what to do.

Mrs Hall is accused of unacceptable professional conduct towards pupils at the school. She denies 14 allegations ranging from shouting at pupils in an aggressive manner to mocking a child whose father died in a road accident.

None of the pupils can be identified and all of them are referred to by a letter of the alphabet ranging from A to J. Mrs Hall is also alleged to have targeted special needs pupils in an array of incidents covering a period from September 2005 to 2009.

She is no longer at the school and details of the allegations against her were only passed to the authorities when a new deputy head began. A GTCW professional panel, sitting in Cardiff, will hear from four whistleblowers who were all teachers at the school.