Marine protection agency admits procedural errors in grant of dredging licence

The Marine Management Organisation has agreed that its grant of a licence for dredging at a naval base in Devon and disposal of the silt off Cornwall should be quashed.

The admission came after judicial review proceedings were brought over the activities at HM Naval Base Devonport and the disposal at Whitsand Bay.

Speaking before MPs on the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee earlier this week, John Tuckett, the MMO’s chief executive, said: “In the course of preparing for the judicial review we did find that we had made two minor procedural omissions and we acknowledge that. We do not believe in any way that they affected the integrity or the appropriateness of the decision to award the licence.
 
“We took the decision, rather than wasting everyone’s time and money in a judicial review process, to seek consent orders from the interested parties whereby the existing licence could be quashed, thereby enabling a new licence to be applied for and go through the process and be revalidated.”

The consent orders are still to go before a judge.
 
The MMO, which licenses, regulates and plans marine activities in the seas around England and Wales, has rejected claims that the material disposed of is ‘toxic’.

“The MMO only authorises disposal to sea of sediments that have levels of contamination below agreed international guidelines. All sediments disposed to sea at the Rame Head South disposal site were independently tested and found to be below these guidelines,” it said.