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Gloucester incinerator: City Hall and Urbaser have been sued by neighbours, including Jeremy Irons
  • The Gloucester City Hall and the multinational Urbaser are facing a lawsuit by several citizens at the initiative of the CommunityR4C association when it has been known that the costs of £500 million initially declared by the authorities after the full filing of the Javelin Park incinerator’s contract were really £633 million.
Zero Zabor @zero_zabor 2019ko otsailaren 01
Herritarren protesta Gloucesterreko Javelin Park erraustegiaren atarian. (Argazkia: Squarespace)

As Eguberriotan published in England and ARGIA a week ago, the scandal was unleashed when it was achieved by the push of activists to show the public the contract of the incinerator Javeling Park being built in Gloucester: instead of the £500 million advocated so far by the authorities and the company Urbaser, the papers show that it will be more than £733 million. The decision of Sid Saunders to go on a hunger strike for fifteen days before the Gloucester City Hall was decisive for citizens to have access to this information.

Promoted by the environmental monitoring association CommunityR4C, a group of citizens has come to the courts asking the City Hall to restart the bidding for the entire waste plan. The association, which brings together actress Jeremy Irons and other personalities, has defended during the decision-making process the existence of alternatives for a better, cleaner and cheaper management of waste without incineration and has denounced that the Gloucester and Urbaserri City Council have spent half a million pounds in the campaign to maintain the integrity of the contract until the judges forced them to show all the papers.

“The decision has been very difficult – said Patricia Watson, a waste expert and a voluntary director of the team. But both the company [Urbaser] and the council have decided that this project is more expensive than any other in Britain to get the least environmental benefits."

Another CommunityR4C manager, Tom Jarman, said: "Concealing a 30% increase in costs to citizens and their own audit committee, that is what a public authority cannot be allowed to do," he added.

The CommunityR4C partnership has tackled the Gloucester incinerator project from the outset, as shown in the 2016 video presented by Jeremy Irons: