TC09599 - [2025] UKFTT 00918 (TC)

The following items are not entirely agreed upon by the witnesses and so we make the following findings of fact in the contested areas:

We find that the waste disposal was of waste that would not be ‘qualifying material’ for the purposes of the Landfill Tax (Qualifying Material) Order 2011. In making this finding we prefer the photographic and descriptive evidence in the bundle, showing and describing significant amounts of, for example, plastic and metal debris, to the evidence of Mrs Jones, who made the statement that the waste was ‘soils and stones’. Mrs Jones had not personally attended with any lorries depositing the material.

We find that the farmer had asked for the deposit to be made, and would have been aware of 410 lorry loads of waste driving onto the farmland to deposit the waste. In making this finding we prefer the evidence of Mrs Jones and Mr Weaver, who state that livestock were getting stuck in the ponds and hence the farmer asked JJCE (who had done work on the farm in the past) to infill the ponds, to the statement by Mr Graham that the farmer was unaware of the waste deposit. Whilst the farmer may have said that to Mr Graham, and may of course have been at the start of the deposits unaware of the nature of the deposits, we find it highly unlikely that over a period of 6 months the farmer (whether or not he had a broken leg) was completely unaware of the significant amounts of waste deposited at the farm, particularly in an area which had proved problematic to his livestock and hence would require checking by someone employed by the farm.