No penalty for dumping
Environment Court judge Brian Dwyer said Laidlaw was left ‘holding the can’
A judge has expressed sympathy for a Bluff local body politician who admitted dumping 51 truckloads of contaminants onto Invercargill City Council land.
Bluff Community Board member Graham Laidlaw was sentenced in the Invercargill District Court yesterday after admitting discharging refined aluminium dross onto council land at Awarua in circumstances where it may have entered water.
Refined aluminium dross is a by-product of aluminium manufacturing at the Tiwai smelter. It was intended to be used by an associate company of Taha Asia Pacific in the preparation of mineral fertiliser, but when the volume exceeded its capacity it looked at alternative uses.
In 2012, Laidlaw came to an agreement with Taha where he would use the refined dross for surfacing tracks on his farm near Bluff. Taha did not tell Laidlaw of its potentially toxic nature, the judge said at Laidlaw’s sentencing indication in November.
Taha’s manager had advised Laidlaw that Environment Southland had given the material the ‘‘big tick’’ as being suitable for use on the tracks, the judge said.
Laidlaw accepted this in good faith. After learning of the potential for the refined dross to contaminate water supplies Laidlaw tried to get Taha to remove it, but the company went into liquidation. Laidlaw was left ‘‘holding the can’’, the judge said.
Matters came to a head when the material discharged into a waterway on his property and he was told by the council that removal was his responsibility, or he would need resource consent to keep it on his farm. He subsequently scooped it off his farm tracks and dumped it onto council land where Taha had a building for the storage of refined dross.
Environment Court judge Brian Dwyer said it was impossible not to feel sympathy for Laidlaw’s plight. He accepted that when Laidlaw dumped the material onto council land he must have been aware of the capacity for the material to cause problems, but it had to be looked at in context.
Defence lawyer Fiona Guy Kidd said Laidlaw was in an untenable situation: his actions were those of a ‘‘stressed and desperate victim’’.
The judge agreed. There was no suggestion the refined dross
had entered water on the council land and he discharged Laidlaw without conviction.
As a condition of his discharge, Laidlaw offered to pay $12,000 towards the city council’s $190,000 costs of removing the aluminium dross from its land to the landfill near Winton.
Convicting Laidlaw would have been out of all proportion to the offending, given the context it was done in and its low level of seriousness, the judge decided.
If convicted, Laidlaw would have lost his position on the Bluff Community Board, his ability to obtain insurance may be impacted and there would have been the stigma of conviction and a blot on his good character.
The charge was another chapter in the ongoing saga of the mismanagement of aluminium dross by Taha Asia Pacific from the aluminium smelter, the judge said.
‘‘This saga has led to the issue of interim and full enforcement orders from the Environment Court, a conviction of Taha and its manager in this court, physical harm to persons who have come into contact with the material and massive expense to the Southland community.’’
After the sentencing, Laidlaw said he was pleased with the sentence.
‘‘I wouldn’t wish this on anyone, what I have gone through with councils and lawyers and costs, it’s horrendous.’’
City council chief executive Clare Hadley said the council respected the judicial process and had met with Laidlaw at a restorative justice meeting. ‘‘We acknowledge Mr Laidlaw was in a difficult position, however it is unfortunate that his actions have resulted in costs to council, and therefore ratepayers.’’