A young businessman has been ordered to pay a landowner almost £50,000 compensation after his company fly-tipped waste near a fishing lake.

Prabhdeep Cheema, 22, opened waste processing business Hillcrest Aggregates on an industrial estate in Canal Road, Higham, in 2020.

The company took hundreds of tons of mixed and often contaminated waste into its yard.

The owners of the estate became concerned about the company’s activities and after Cheema was challenged by them he arranged for the area to be cleared.

However, he failed to supervise or manage the clearance and ignored evidence that his staff were fly-tipping the waste.

As a result, much of the waste was dumped on land adjacent to a fishing lake next to the estate and nearby in Canal Road.

An investigation by Gravesham council’s environmental enforcement team found Cheema was unlicensed to transport or process waste and had no documentation relating to the transfer or processing of it.

The court agreed his actions and failures resulted in a substantial unlawful deposit of waste, which posed a serious risk to the local environment.

The landowner also faced substantial clear up costs.

Earlier this month at Sevenoaks Magistrates Court, Cheema from Painters Ash Lane, Northfleet, pleaded guilty to failing in his duty of care to ensure controlled waste was treated and disposed of correctly.

He was fined £2,000 and ordered to pay costs of £1,350, a victim surcharge of £190, and full compensation of £48,981 to the owner of the land on which the offence was committed.

After the court hearing, Cllr Shane Mochrie-Cox, Gravesham council’s cabinet member for community and leisure, said the outcome should serve as a reminder that individuals can be held responsible for fly-tipping offences even if they have not dumped the waste themselves.

He said: "Cheema was ultimately responsible for what happened to a substantial amount of waste, which was dumped with no regard to the local environment or the cost and inconvenience to the landowner.

"It is only through a degree of good luck that we did not find ourselves having to deal with a devastating contamination of the fishing lake.

"It is unusual in cases such as this for the courts to order the defendant to pay an affected landowner full compensation, which reflects the level of contamination suffered and the expense the victim faced.

"I hope that the courts hearing future cases follow this excellent example so that private landowners can be assured that the whole system, from the council to the courts, work to get the right results for them.

"We have worked hard to educate businesses and residents of their responsibility to ensure their waste is being disposed of legally by those with the necessary documentation that allows them to do so.

"This case should reinforce the fact that we will not hesitate to investigate and prosecute those who ignore that advice, and will always ask the courts to exercise the full range of measures available to them.

"We do not tolerate fly-tipping in Gravesham and continue to investigate and take action, including prosecutions such as this, against those responsible for it."