Court decides milk was not pollution

Express Dairies successfully challenged a conviction for "causing polluting matter" to enter a brook following a motorway emergency.

The High Court in London heard that an Express Dairies milk tanker had a tyre blow-out on the M5 southbound in February last year.

A delivery pipe sheared, causing the release of 4,000 litres of milk.

'Avoiding danger to life'

Tanker driver Kevin Pinches pulled off on to the motorway hard shoulder near Lydiate Ash, Bromsgrove, and the milk ran into Battlefield Brook via roadside drains.

Express Dairies was convicted by Evesham magistrates in June last year.

Lady Justice Hale and Mrs Justice Hallett, sitting in London, ruled the company was entitled to rely on a defence under the Water Resources Act.

That states that a person shall not be guilty of an offence if causing pollution was the result of "avoiding danger to life or health" in an emergency situation.

Plane discharging fuel

Legal experts believe the ruling could in future apply not only to milk but to oil and other polluting materials carried in tankers.

The justices took the view that the "emergency" defence could only apply if the discharge itself was necessary "to preserve life or health", as in the case of a plane discharging fuel before an emergency landing.

The court quashed the conviction imposed on Express Dairies and set aside the accompanying �5,000 fine and �6,000 legal costs order.

The Environment Agency, which was the prosecuting authority, has 14 days to consider whether it should press for a rehearing of the case before the magistrates in the light of Thursday's ruling.