Newtownstewart farmer fined £5,000 for pollution offence

A Co Tyrone farmer was fined £5,000 plus £37 court costs at Strabane Magistrates’ Court yesterday for a pollution offence.

Mr Ivan Hamilton of Bunbeg Road, Newtownstewart, was fined with making a polluting discharge so that it entered a waterway, namely an unnamed tributary of the Strule River. Water from this river is diverted via an inlet lade to Rocks Lodge Fish Farm. The polluting discharge resulted in a number of fish suffering distress and fatalities.

On 27 August 2007 a Water Quality Inspector acting on behalf of the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (formally the Environment and Heritage Service), observed a growth of sewage fungus along the inlet lade. Investigation was continued on 28 August 2007 and the source of the polluting discharge was traced to a farm owned by Mr Hamilton.

Analysis of two samples taken on 27 and 28 August 2007 confirmed the waterway was grossly polluted, containing poisonous, noxious and polluting matter which would have been potentially harmful to fish life in Rock Lodge Fish Farm.

Notes to Editors:

1. Mr Hamilton was charged under Article 7 (1) (a) of the Water (Northern Ireland) Order 1999.
2. For media enquiries please contact DOE Press Office 028 9054 0014 or out of office hours, contact the EIS Duty Press Officer on pager 07699 715 440 and your call will be returned.