NORTH Herefordshire MP Sir Bill Wiggin believes farmer John Price should not have been jailed for causing damage to the river Lugg, adding that a fine would have instead have been a deterrent for potential future offenders.

Mr Price, aged 68, was sentenced to 12 months in custody last week after causing what, District Judge Ian Strongman described as "ecological damage" to the river in Kingsland, near Leominster.  

The area is protected as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) due to its importance for nature. Full restoration is expected to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds.

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Mr Price was also told that he will have to pay £600,000 in costs, and has been disqualified from being a company director for three years.

He pleaded guilty to the following charges:

  • Causing, conducting, or knowingly permitting activity in contravention of an environmental permit (flood risk activity, on or before December 3, 2021)
  • Failing to comply with a stop notice issued by Natural Resources Wales (by removing material, desilting, and reprofiling the river bank and removing bankside vegetation, December 15, 2021)
  • Performing an operation to damage a Site of Special Scientific Interest (between November 1, 2020, and November 30, 2020)
  • Conducting, causing or knowingly permitting activity in contravention of an environmental permit (flood risk activity, between November 1, 2020, and November 30, 2020)
  • Conducting, causing or knowingly permitting activity in contravention of an environmental permit (discharge of silt into the river Lugg, between November 1, 2020, and November 30, 2020)
  • Carry on a prescribed process capable of causing environmental pollution without authority (land management and cultivation practices, between November 1, 2020, and November 30, 2020)
  • Perform operation to damage site of Special Scientific Interest (on or before December 15, 2021)

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“I support tougher sentencing especially where it is used to protect the public from dangerous people such as burglars, rapists and murderers," said Mr Wiggin.

"However, a man who has been convicted of damaging a riverbed is not the same sort of threat to our society. So I don’t believe that the taxpayer is being well served by giving him a custodial sentence.

"While I respect the division between Parliament and the judiciary, I am very disappointed that the Judge chose to make an example of him and sentence him to 12 months in prison when a fine would have served as a deterrent for potential future offenders.”

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