Investigation by Amy Lewis and Senior Producer Cat Dinneny
Over 30 families have come together for the first time to demand answers about their children’s birth defects which they believe were linked to toxic waste from the closure of Corby’s former steelworks.
The scandal was the subject of the Netflix series Toxic Town, and since it aired earlier this year ITV News has been told 40 more families have come forward to the solicitor representing the original families.
They include more than 10 whose children died as a result of the defects.
Those impacted have called for North Northamptonshire Council to provide more details on where the toxic waste was dumped, as calls for a public inquiry grow amid fears the waste is still causing impacts to this day.
“There’s got to be a reason why this has happened.”
For decades, Margaret Finlay has blamed herself for her baby daughter’s death. Tortured by thoughts she could have done more to protect her, she even tried to take her own life.
Carrie-Anne was born by emergency caesarean at 29 weeks in 1988. She died two days later, a post-mortem examination revealing her lungs had not developed properly.
We met Margaret at The Steel Bar in Corby, a music venue on the edge of the town that shares a car park with the local football club.
She has come for a meeting, but told us she rarely leaves the house because of her panic attacks. “I’ve been ill ever since my little girl was born,” she said.
“There’s got to be a reason why this has happened. Babies don’t just die,” she added. “My other children are healthy. To this day I can’t cope. I’m under the doctor, I don’t leave the house. There has never ever been an explanation why and I blame myself.”
She has spent the last 30 years wondering what she could have done differently… until she watched the Netflix series.
It tells the story of a landmark court case which linked birth defects to the reclamation of Corby’s steelworks.
The plant was one of the largest in Europe until it closed in the 1980s. For more than a decade, open-top trucks with dust containing toxic chemicals were transported and dumped all over Corby.
In 2009, 18 families went to the High Court to successfully argue North Northamptonshire Council (then called Corby Borough Council) had negligently dumped the waste, with airborne waste from the reclamation, resulting in multiple birth defects.
None of those attending were part of the 2009 case with some of those present told they could not be part of the original proceedings because their children had died.
Since the Netflix series aired earlier this year, more people in Corby, like Margaret, have started asking questions about whether the harmful waste from the town’s steelworks is to blame for their own deficiencies, miscarriages and infant deaths.
“When I watched the series, it really shook me up,” Margaret told us.
“My daughter said maybe that was what was wrong with Carrie-Anne. I lived on Westfields Road at the time, it’s not that far from the steelworks and my husband worked in the steelworks as well. I never even thought about putting the two and two together until I saw the programme.”
She added: “It brought it all flooding back again, all the pain. The pain never goes away, never ever. It doesn’t ease. Time doesn’t heal, you just live with it day in and day out. It’s not just me in this situation. They need to admit it was their fault.”
“I know I’m not alone.”
Margaret was contacted by Tracey Taylor who, similar to Margaret, worked next to the steelworks for years. Her daughter, Shelby-Anne, died just four days old with ear, heart, liver and lung deformities.
Tracey provided crucial evidence in the 2009 case but was ultimately excluded because her daughter had passed away. For Tracey, the 2009 case was always the tip of the iceberg.
That is what led her to organise a meeting, bringing around 30 families together who have lost children or who have deformities, and who think it might be linked to the steelworks.
Addressing the crowd, who had gathered in a semi-circle at The Steel Bar, she said: “I’ve always known there’s been more angel babies, more people affected and more people’s health affected than just the original 18 that were in the first court case.
“I did say to Des [Collins, the lawyer who represented the families in 2009], I know I’m not alone. But at that time there wasn’t social media and news reports and papers like there are today.”
Tracey has spent the last five weeks sending out questionnaires to people who had started airing their concerns online after Toxic Town thrust the issue back into the news agenda.
She then invited dozens of them to a meeting to share their stories together for the first time, and ITV News was also invited along. No one, apart from Tracey, was involved in the 2009 case.
Tracey added: “It was very hard for me to be there with those 18 parents, even though they welcomed me with open arms, knowing that I was there without a child and they all had their child. At the back of my mind and in my heart, I knew that there was more people out there who had angel babies like my Shelby-Anne.”
It was at this meeting that we also met Aimee Duffy and her six-year-old son Thomas. He is missing fingers on one of his hands, his right leg is shorter than his left and one of his feet is two sizes smaller than the other.
Thomas Duffy was born with several limb deficiencies, and his mother wonders if waste from the steelworks is to blame
Thomas was born 30 years after the steelworks closed, but having ruled out any genetic abnormality with vigorous testing over the last few years, Aimee is wondering whether the land their house is built on is to blame.
She said: “I live right next to Corby and I think maybe that’s why Thomas’ hand and arm is the way it is. Every test has come back normal.”
ITV News reporter Amy Lewis has been following the story of families in the Corby area who believe their health has been affected by toxic waste
Her fears are exacerbated by the fact a whistleblower revealed to ITV News that the toxic waste was dumped at multiple sites across Corby, not just at Deene Quarry.
“There’s a chance that where I live could be built on toxic wasteland. I don’t know if it was dumped there.”
“The people in Corby have not received justice.”
The lawyer who represented the families in the 2009 High Court case, Des Collins, says he has been contacted by around 40 families this year.
He is calling for a public inquiry, and pushing North Northamptonshire Council to reveal all of the locations where the waste was dumped.
He told ITV News: “I think the people in Corby have not received justice. A small number of mothers who got together and fought this case did receive justice, but the people of Corby were ignored completely.
“What we didn’t have to establish [in 2009] was precisely where [the waste] was moved to. In order to establish that it’s still causing problems, we have to know where it is. This week we’ve sent a third letter to the council saying you’ve got to tell us.”
ITV News contacted North Northamptonshire Council for an interview, and they replied with the following statement: “Waste from the former steelworks was moved to Deene Quarry, a former landfill site on the outskirts of Corby where it was buried.
“This site is managed under an environmental permit held by North Northamptonshire Council and compliance with the conditions of the permit are regulated by the Environment Agency – gas and water sampling takes place on a yearly basis as part of the requirements of the permit.”
But having waited nearly 30 years to get justice for Shelby-Anne, Tracey won’t be deterred.
Closing the meeting, she said: “The land needs to be sorted. Let’s show them that Corby people are fighters and let’s get this sorted.”
Are you worried that you have been affected by toxic waste in Corby? Please email yourstory@itv.com.
If you have been affected by this story you contact Samaritans or Sands.
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