06/03/2026
๐ฆ๐ฎ๐
๐ผ๐ป ๐ฃ๐ถ๐, ๐๐ผ๐ต๐ป๐๐ผ๐ป๐ ๐๐ด๐ด๐ฟ๐ฒ๐ด๐ฎ๐๐ฒ๐ ๐ฅ๐ฒ๐ฐ๐๐ฐ๐น๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐๐๐ฑ - ๐๐๐/๐ฎ๐ฐ/๐ฌ๐ต๐ญ/๐ฉ๐๐ฅ ๐ฒ๐
๐ฝ๐ฎ๐ป๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป ๐๐ฎ๐ ๐ฟ๐ฒ๐ณ๐๐๐ฒ๐ฑ ๐ผ๐ป ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฐ๐๐ต ๐ ๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ฐ๐ต.
When the news broke on Wednesday, we posted a brief acknowledgement. This is the fuller picture. For those who want to understand not just what happened, but why it matters, and why the result was closer than it should ever have been on questions of public health.
๐ง๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฑ๐ฒ๐ฐ๐ถ๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป
This application was submitted in August 2024 and spent eighteen months in the system. A community meeting took place on 4th February 2026. Fourteen days later, the application was called to the planning committee for 4th March. The officer recommendation to approve would have landed in the committee pack in the week before that meeting. Key technical evidence, including Dr Andrew Rollinson's critical peer review of the application, appears to have been given limited weight, and it was only published on the planning portal two days before the committee sat.
After a meeting that ran for nearly six hours and swung more than once, the committee refused the application by five votes to three. We are grateful for that outcome. But a three-to-five split on a proposal carrying these health and environmental risks should give us pause. Health and wellbeing are not items to be placed on a scale against other considerations. They are obligations. The committee overturned their own officers' recommendation which was to approve. That is significant, and it is a testament to those councillors who held the line.
๐ ๐ฝ๐น๐ฎ๐ป๐ป๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐ฑ๐ฒ๐ฐ๐ถ๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป ๐ถ๐ป ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฏ๐ฎ๐น๐ฎ๐ป๐ฐ๐ฒ, ๐ฏ๐๐ ๐ผ๐ป ๐๐ฐ๐ฎ๐น๐ฒ๐ ๐๐ต๐ฎ๐ ๐๐ฒ๐ฟ๐ฒ ๐ป๐ฒ๐๐ฒ๐ฟ ๐น๐ฒ๐๐ฒ๐น
Cambridgeshire County Council's own planning balance graphic, presented at the meeting, placed "health concerns" on one side of the scales. But in the officer materials, health was not treated as a health question. It was framed, in places, as a matter of health perception โ the suggestion being that residents' concerns reflect an impression rather than a measurable reality.
That framing deserves scrutiny. The Public Health report published in January 2026 acknowledged directly that the regulatory system is not always joined up, is not set up to enable the best assessment of potential harms to health, and does not instil public confidence when there are problems. It recognised that cumulative impacts on health and wellbeing need to be better understood. It also acknowledged that the community has had insufficient agency throughout this process. On the other side of the scales the circular argument running through the planning approach appears to be this: because it seems difficult to identify which operator is responsible for a given impact, it would be unfair to prevent any operator from expanding. Public Health, to their credit, did not accept that logic. If this volume of complaints is being raised, the appropriate response is to find out what is actually happening. That is the correct position, and we thank the Public Health team at Cambridgeshire County Council for holding it.
๐ง๐ฟ๐ฎ๐ณ๐ณ๐ถ๐ฐ
The same problem appears in the traffic assessment. Because this application spent eighteen months in the system, a major and broadly welcomed Science Park scheme was approved in the interim. The argument presented was that it would therefore be unfair to allow those subsequent decisions to weigh against this application's traffic impact.
Follow that logic to its conclusion. Any applicant whose application takes long enough to process would appear to benefit from being able to ignore whatever development accumulates around them in the interim. The roads deteriorate. The cumulative burden grows. But each application, assessed in its own window, sees only its own contribution. The 332 HGV movements sought here do not become acceptable simply because the number of approved developments grew while the paperwork was in the system. The second ground for refusal reflects exactly that point.
๐ฆ๐๐ผ๐ฐ๐ธ๐ฝ๐ถ๐น๐ฒ ๐ต๐ฒ๐ถ๐ด๐ต๐๐ ๐ฎ๐ป๐ฑ ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฐ๐ผ๐ป๐๐ฎ๐ถ๐ป๐บ๐ฒ๐ป๐ ๐ฐ๐ผ๐ป๐๐ฟ๐ฎ๐ฑ๐ถ๐ฐ๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป
There is a specific technical point that received insufficient attention. The EA permit allows pile heights of 4.6 metres, with a critical 1-metre freeboard (gap) below the wall. The existing planning consent already allows 6 metres, already 400mm over the wall top, with containment already compromised before any expansion was considered. The officer recommendation proposed 6.7 metre piles behind a larger wall, which was presented as an improvement. It was not. The freeboard at that height would be 500mm, actually 50% reduction in containment protection compared to the EA's own standard. Throughout, the planning recommendation deferred entirely to the EA as the competent authority on pollution control. You cannot cite the EA as your safety net while recommending conditions that undermine the EA's own position. This was a near doubling of throughput with the introduction of external IBA crushing, with 50% less containment protection, against a background of unresolved complaints that the same process had characterised as perception rather than evidence. The officer also excluded drainage as a concern on the basis that the site is hydrologically separate. That argument depends entirely on containment holding. The pit requires continuous pumping to prevent flooding, and that water drains into Kings D**e. Erode the containment and you create a potential pathway for dust and particulate matter from the JARL compound into that drainage system, and from there into the waterway the same process deemed safe to dismiss.
๐ง๐ถ๐ฝ๐ฝ๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฏ๐ฎ๐น๐ฎ๐ป๐ฐ๐ฒ: ๐ถ๐ป๐ฐ๐ถ๐ป๐ฒ๐ฟ๐ฎ๐๐ผ๐ฟ ๐ฎ๐๐ต ๐ฎ๐ป๐ฑ ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฟ๐ฒ๐ฐ๐๐ฐ๐น๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ด๐๐บ๐ฒ๐ป๐
There is a further point that was absent from the presentations to committee. IBA and IBAA are always considered waste by the EA. Any percentage of IBAA mixed into another material renders the entire mix as waste. IBA is classified as mirror-hazardous, not non-hazardous as presented to the committee, which is why the site operates a quarantine area. The material must be tested to confirm non-hazardous status, and its composition is variable. Its use is governed by RPS247, a temporary EA exemption now in its fifth year with no permanent replacement in place. None of this was acknowledged in the presentation.
The international context was also ignored. Countries such as the Netherlands and Germany require IBA to undergo further treatment to reduce environmental risk before reuse. That gap in UK practice was not identified in the presentations. Instead, the committee was offered recycling policy as a straightforward benefit, with no clarification of the risk profile of the material underpinning it. If the chemical and toxicological risks of incinerator bottom ash processing are ever properly admitted into the assessment, those scales would look very different. For those who wish to understand the detail, Saxongate has published two briefing documents: the IBAA Toxic Legacy report (October 2025) and the IBA pH Briefing Note (September 2025), available at the links below:
http://ukwin.org.uk/IBA/Saxongate-IBAA-Toxic-Legacy-October-2025.pdf
http://ukwin.org.uk/IBA/Saxongate-IBA-pH-Briefing-Note-September-2025.pdf
๐ง๐ต๐ฎ๐ป๐ธ ๐๐ผ๐:
None of this would have reached Wednesday's committee in the condition it did without the sustained effort of many people.
Thank you to Cllr Roy Gerstner, who provided and paid for a coach so that residents could attend in person. That gesture meant more than logistics. It meant the committee saw a community that had shown up.
Thank you to every resident who travelled, who wrote, who signed, who shared, and who stayed engaged throughout this process. The applicant may appeal, and we will need to keep each other informed. Please stay on our mailing list, and if you are not already on it, message this page or email us at [email protected].
Thank you to Cllr Samantha Hoy and Cllr Councillor Chris Boden for standing up for what was right, and for ensuring the grounds for refusal reflect the genuine concerns of this community. Our MP Steve Barclay also raised objections and supported a call in request to the Secretary of State.
Thank you to the Public Health team at Cambridgeshire County Council for taking their responsibilities seriously when others sought to characterise those same concerns as perception rather than evidence.
Lastly, thank you to those in the local press who are reporting this accurately and including the detailed information. The devil here really is in the detail.
๐ง๐ต๐ฒ ๐ด๐ฟ๐ผ๐๐ป๐ฑ๐ ๐ณ๐ผ๐ฟ ๐ฟ๐ฒ๐ณ๐๐๐ฎ๐น
For the record, the application was refused on the following grounds:
1. The proposed increase in throughput of waste and hours of operation of Building 1 would intensify issues with noise and dust which would adversely affect the health and well-being of the local community contrary to Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Minerals and Waste Local Plan (July 2021) Policy 18 and Fenland Local Plan (May 2014) Policy LP2 and Policy LP16.
2. It has not been demonstrated that the proposed development, when considered cumulatively with other existing and recent development decisions, would not have an unacceptable impact on highway capacity and related air quality and is therefore contrary to Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Minerals and Waste Local Plan (July 2021) Policy 18 and Policy 23 and Fenland Local Plan (May 2014) Policy LP2, Policy LP15 and Policy LP16.
๐ช๐ต๐ฎ๐ ๐ฐ๐ผ๐บ๐ฒ๐ ๐ป๐ฒ๐
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The refusal is significant. ๐๐ ๐ถ๐ ๐ฎ๐น๐๐ผ ๐ฎ ๐บ๐ผ๐บ๐ฒ๐ป๐, ๐ป๐ผ๐ ๐ฎ๐ป ๐ฒ๐ป๐ฑ๐ฝ๐ผ๐ถ๐ป๐. The regulatory questions around water quality, PFAS, containment and cumulative impact do not disappear with a planning refusal. We will continue to monitor, to document and to hold the relevant authorities to account.
If you want to be ready to act when decisions affecting this site arise, please join our mailing list by messaging this page or emailing [email protected].
Saxongate Residents Group
