CUMBRIA County Council has renewed its concern over plans to transport nuclear and asbestos waste from Scotland to a landfill site in Cumbria.

Tim Knowles, Cumbria County Council’s cabinet member for the environment, slammed moves to transfer ‘high volume, low level radioactive waste’ to the Lillyhall landfill site near Workington.

Earlier this year, the site - operated by the Waste Recycling Group - was given permission by the Environment Agency to accept the waste, despite the council’s opposition.

Coun Knowles said: "To expect Cumbria to be the dumping ground for their very low level waste beggars belief.

"If a landfill is good enough to accept this material – and I don’t agree that it is – then at least put it in a Scottish landfill rather than shipping it into Cumbria. We need to take a stand now, otherwise Cumbria will be accepting a Trojan horse for the future.

"The country as a whole, including Scotland, has benefited, and will continue to benefit, from the willingness of the people of Cumbria, and West Cumbria in particular, to accept higher level radioactive wastes for treatment and storage pending eventual disposal. But everybody has a responsibility to look first to their own capacity for managing their waste arisings before looking elsewhere.

"Communities are rightly concerned about the dispersal of radioactive waste, even at the lowest levels, and activity like this jeopardises community support for the development of very significant national infrastructure essential for both low carbon energy generation and legacy higher activity radioactive waste.

We have asked Chapelcross to explain the full range of options they have considered to date, particularly the alternative landfill sites considered."