Pesticides campaigner 'disgusted' at appeal

CHICHESTER environmental campaigner Georgina Downs has expressed 'total disgust' at the Government's decision to appeal against the recent landmark High Court ruling on pesticides.

By The Newsroom

Published 22nd Dec 2008, 08:37 BST

Updated 8th Jun 2018, 04:31 BST

Last month the High Court ruled that the current system for authorising pesticides in the UK did not comply with the relevant EU Directive. But last week, junior minister at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Lord Hunt, confirmed that DEFRA secretary Hilary Benn had been given leave to appeal.

Ms Downs had fought a seven-year battle to achieve the High Court judgement against the Government over its fundamental failure to protect people in the countryside from pesticides.

The High Court judgment from Mr Justice Collins handed down on November 14 made it clear that the Government had been acting unlawfully in its policy and approach in relation to the use of pesticides in crop spraying. It found that public health, in particular relating to rural residents and communities exposed to pesticides from living near regularly sprayed fields, was not being protected.

For full story see West Sussex Gazette December 24