Action pledged on sludge spreading

Concerns have been raised about the effect on health

Campaigners against the dumping of untreated animal sludge on farmland have been promised action.

Residents of two villages in rural Perth and Kinross have mounted a long-running campaign against the practice and called for a ban to be introduced.

The communities of Blairingone and Saline have attempted to link the spreading of the waste to ill-health among residents, including skin problems, rubella and viral meningitis.

During a debate in the Scottish Parliament on Thursday, Deputy Environment Minister Allan Wilson said the regulations were being tightened and that the "fields of filth' would be a thing of the past.

George Reid raised the issue at Holyrood

Mr Wilson said "much progress" had already been made on the issue.

He said a Scottish Executive-backed group on agriculture was consulting on the code of practice covering such issues.

And he said new European animal by-products regulations had been agreed in Brussels which would take effect in Scotland.

But he said an immediate ban was not possible because of limited treatment facilities and the costs it would impose on the industry.

Blood on land

The Scottish National Party MSP George Reid, who has been at the forefront of the campaign, said that proposals from the Environment Minister Ross Finnie had not gone far enough because they still allow the spreading of blood on land.

Mr Reid, who is also the parliament's deputy presiding officer, said: "The minister should walk through frozen fields with a gelatinous red goo lying on the top, gulls pecking at it.

"The minister should walk through silage destroyed in the so-called process of fertilisation with blood and guts smeared thick on it - foxes running through it and cats trailing it into the house.

"The minister says that this 'isolated and extreme' activity is now, after a whole series of actions, behind us. He says that it would not be appropriate to take immediate action.

The minister should walk through silage destroyed in the so-called process of fertilisation with blood and guts smeared thick on it

George Reid MSP

"Are you sure minister? Can you categorically tell parliament that it is over?"

Mr Reid said further investigations were needed by the parliament and warned that "today does not mark the end of the road".

The issue was first raised by the Blairingone and Saline Action Group, which called for MSPs to safeguard public health and the environment from the effects of spreading sewage sludge on land.

The Transport and the Environment Committee carried out an inquiry and in their report expressed their "surprise and concern" that the waste products could be legally spread on land at any time of the day or night.

It branded the activity "unacceptable" and called on the executive to tighten the regulations to ban it.