Hoads Wood illegal waste “supersite” finally cleared at £15m cost

The Environment Agency-led clean-up operation began in June 2025 and has seen 2,500 lorry loads of waste removed from the woods by specialist contractors to a landfill site in Essex.

The countryside charity CPRE Kent, residents and Kent Wildlife Trust joined forces in 2024 to campaign for the clearance of the waste, which was piled up to 15ft (4.6m) in places.

They welcomed the work’s completion but some are concerned the criminal gangs may return to dump waste.

One of the organisers of the ‘Rescue Hoads Wood’ campaign said the cleared site would now be “catnip” to both organised gangs and opportunist fly-tippers.

He told the BBC: “Our biggest fear now is people are going to be able to access this site and start dumping on it again and unless the authorities are quick it will happen again.”

The Environment Agency (EA) said it was extending the current restriction order in place that prohibits access and had dug ditches to make the site inaccessible to waste trucks.

Matthew Higginson, the EA’s area environmental manager, said the regulator, police and local authorities had a joint “trigger plan” in place.

“That will bring all law enforcement partners to work together closely and much more quickly to stop anything like this happening in the future,” he said.