BOROUGH of Poole would never put an incinerator at Mannings Heath, says cabinet environment member Cllr John Rampton.

Responding to the Daily Echo’s story detailing the public consultation on waste management plant plans, Cllr Rampton claims he would never allow an incinerator to be constructed at the Poole site on Ling Road.

Businesses and residents have less than two weeks to comment on the waste plan consultation, which was published last year and includes Mannings Heath as a suggested location for a variety of waste management uses.

While the consultation document does include details of a 40-metre high chimney stack at the Mannings Heath site, Cllr Rampton said: “I want to reassure residents as portfolio holder there are actually no plans whatsoever to build an incinerator at Mannings Heath

“Not even the remotest possibility that there ever will be an incinerator built there.”

Cllr Rampton says the most likely future for the Mannings Heath site, should anything happen there at all, is as a sorting depot for waste from blue bins.

However, the consultation document - open for public responses until July 21 - details facilities being considered at Mannings Heath such as recovery of energy by thermal treatment; processing of waste to produce fuel; recycling; security shredding; processing waste to enable transportation for recycling/recovery elsewhere, and waste transfer.

Cllr Rampton said: “This consultation is a theoretical list of what could physically go on each of the sites identified as waste sites - but there are no proposals or plans whatsoever for any incinerator in Poole.”

“Poole council would never put an incinerator on that site.”

A number of local businesses say any waste management plant at the Mannings Heath site could impact trade.

Other concerns raised included the possibility of extra lorries on already congested roads and environmental damage.

Cllr Rampton said: “What worries me is that people who live and work nearby are going to get very frightened and think there’s going to be an incinerator next door.

“When these sites were put in that document, which is a statutory document, all the things that could theoretically be place on there were included. But there are no actual plans to build anything.

“The only reason this document exists is because the government makes the county council do it. It has no real bearing on anything”

To comment on the draft waste plan visit dorsetforyou.com/consultation or call the minerals and waste management team on 01305 228585