A BURY man who ran an illegal waste transfer station and landfill site has been fined £21,000 after pleading guilty to 11 environmental offences.

David Briggs, who trades under the name of Briggs Demolition from Wellington Street, was also ordered by Bury magistrates to pay £6,309 in costs to the Environment Agency, which brought the prosecution.

Estelle Palin, prosecuting, told the court how Briggs was bringing construction and demolition waste and also plastics, metals and domestic waste onto his site in large quantities.

He sorted the waste there and some went off for recycling. But a significant proportion was landfilled into the site, which is next to the River Irwell and the Manchester, Bolton and Bury Canal.

After receiving complaints, the Environment Agency warned Briggs that bringing waste onto the site was illegal, but he continued for a further eight months.

The court was told how Briggs had recently started to co-operate with the Environment Agency and Bury Council in planning to clean up the site.

He has agreed to pay for initial investigations into the extent of contamination of the land and the magistrates said that they had reduced the fines to enable him to have enough money to contribute to the clean up of the contamination of the land.

The clean-up is needed to prevent the risk of pollution to the river and groundwater under the site. Potential costs for the clean up could be hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Environment Agency special enforcement officer Paul Heaton said afterwards: "Mr Briggs was effectively running an illegal waste transfer station and landfill site, without planning permission or a waste management licence to make sure that the site was environmentally safe.

"Working with Bury Council and the Greater Manchester Geology Unit, we dug trial pits at the site to find out what sort of impact Mr Briggs' activities could have had on the environment.

As well as waste including plastics, ash, paint tins, car parts and asbestos we also found evidence of liquids and gases that are produced when waste rots in the ground.

"A licensed site would be monitored and would be required to have the proper infrastructure to collect these gases and noxious liquids that are generated when wastes rot down.

Briggs had previously been refused planning permission for a waste site at Hinds Lane on the grounds that the impact on the environment and the area would be unacceptable.