As you well know, residents and businesses have suffered for more than a decade from Donoghue’s dust and chemical pollution, noise, work out-of-hours, speeding HGVs, transport of uncovered waste and illegal parking.

For the past two years, Barnet councillors, the most affected residents’ representatives, the Environment Agency and Council officers have been meeting quarterly at the Council to find the best way forward.

Thanks to people speaking up…

• Donoghue is now a high public interest site for both the Environment Agency and Barnet Council.
• Alarming findings from an independent monitoring report highlighted:
  • Donoghue breaches its daily tonnage limit.
  • Site samples included traces of unauthorised toxic substances, including asbestos.
  • Donoghue’s methodology for handling and recording waste needed to be improved.
• Barnet Council conducted a deep cleaning of The Vale and Claremont Road.
• The Environment Agency placed an air quality monitoring station next to the site – although to our surprise it was prematurely removed on Friday 22 February.

This has put pressure on Donoghue to comply with regulations and resulted in more cleaning and dust suppression mechanisms on site.

On the other hand, very little has been achieved to improve the life quality of directly affected residents and businesses. More worryingly, there has been no news of any relocation site.

Under these circumstances, our frustration has been growing. To make matters worse, residents feel angry and betrayed because of Barnet’s Mayor’s decision to include Donoghue in Barnet’s New Year’s Day parade and the recent consultation on the introduction of width restrictions in Somerton Road.

See the recent media coverage on the situation.

See also: Why Donoghue’s Relocation Cannot Wait