COUNCIL tax payers in South Gloucestershire have been landed with a bill for more than £600,000 after the council made a stand against a planned waste incinerator near Avonmouth.

The council refused planning permission for Sita UK to build the £100-million plant next to the Seabank power station in Severn Road.

But the company appealed against the decision and won which has left the council picking up Sita's bill for costs due to a ruling by the Secretary of State.

Former planning chairman Alderman Peter Tyzack, pictured, said it was outrageous the council was being penalised when it was duly following the democratic process of deciding on a planning application.

He said: "It is quite wrong that the council is being taken to task over this. It is the planning committee's function to arrive at a balanced view and if it turns down an application, then it does so for what it believes to be the right reasons."

He said at the time when the refusal was made, planning law did not allow the council to take into account environmental issues such as burning materials which might be recycled in the future when new technologies are developed.

He said they were worried about the large number of lorries which would be clogging up South Gloucestershire's roads bringing in waste to feed the new plant.

The new incinerator, which will burn up to 400,000 tonnes of commercial and industrial waste a year, will create enough electricity to power about 50,000 homes - about half the number in South Gloucestershire.

Sita has said in the past the incinerator was aimed at meeting the challenge of dwindling landfill space as well as helping to meet the increasing energy gap. The kind of material that will be burned includes mixed packaging and plastics from shops, offices and factories that cannot currently be recycled.

The company believes it will be helping businesses by reducing the amount that the council will have to pay in landfill taxes.

After the council decided unanimously against the plant last summer, the company decided to appeal which led to a planning inquiry.

The issue is almost a carbon copy of what happened over the border in Bristol when the city council turned down planning consent for waste operator Viridor to build a £200-million plant in Avonmouth.

The city council took the case to the High Court in an attempt to prevent having to pay costs after losing an appeal. But the city council lost.

South Gloucestershire has decided not to take the matter to the High Court in the wake of what happened in the Viridor case.

A spokesperson for Sita said: "We are in discussion with the council and we are aiming to reach an acceptable settlement."