Stand Up and Scream: Hoads Wood Deserves Better

Chronicling the demise of a local woodland.

I’ll admit, before the events that this article is about took place, my knowledge of Hoads Wood was slim, mostly derived from national news coverage. England, and Kent specifically is quite abound with little scraps of forested ecosystems and its easy for some . In the same way you can’t go 20 miles here without reaching a coastline, you can’t travel 2 miles without liaising with the great spirit of the wood. It’s certainly something that has shaped me as a person since my birth. It is afforded the same status by my therapist as my mother and father; a parental figure, someone to guide me through the complications of life and yet simultaneously provide me with an escape from it all. To say that I feel a connection would be negligible to it’s true, all encompassing support.

Maybe that is why I am writing this article. Something inside me has found this whole palaver deeply uprooting, something worth feeling the familiar, black rockfall of righteous anger for. In this world where anger can be bought on the cheap by anyone with enough sociological knowhow and a social media account, I’ve often found myself fatigued at the sheer amount of negative action there is to be tackled. But this time, the anger lies closer to home. 10 miles away from my own ancestral links to the forest, to health, to genuine peace. On my doorstep.

Time to write.

Let’s Have Some Context…

The core of what makes Hoads Wood an interesting place is the unique mix of ancient tree remnants, acid grassland and sandy cliff faces made by the previous century’s quarrying efforts (around 1925-1950). Bluebells grace the hills it lays over in May, common indicators of an ancient woodland, and its mature, thick stands of oak, hazel and hornbeam indicate that it is at least 400 years old.

The birders in the area talk about nightingales, nuthatches and the great spotted woodpecker as prime targets of their binoculars, and a breadth of smaller species like tits and warblers also use its bountiful tree cover.

Ponds dot the landscape, filled every year with frogspawn and their proud creators. Rare great crested newts share these aquarian habitats, every standing body of fresh water a boon to their continued survival.

The great crested newt enjoying an evening swim, belly of burnt cheese on show for all

Rust coloured royalty, the heath fritillary flutters through bracken and open air above coppiced parts of the wood, its presence here as much a result of demanding conservation efforts as the will to live that drives it.

The bees are drawn down past the grass line to the bee orchid, a mimic of the bees female quarry. Velvety, delicate and under threat from consistent grassland destruction and grazing sheep, it shares the stage with twayblade and helleborine, both just aesthetically interesting as the former.

Twayblade, a beautiful if confusing member of the British orchid family.

The evening’s dwindling light plays host to two nationally moth species, the black veined moth and the broad-bordered beehawk, and the sub-angled wave has on occasion revealed itself to those lucky few.

The broad-bordered beehawk alighting on ivy, crimson perfectly inlaid with its dusty yellow body.

Such a luxurious life tapestry afforded the woods recognition as a Site of Scientific Special Interest in 1989. Seasonal grazing using highland cattle helps to restore some natural processes associated with the presence of large herbivores; something that England’s forests sorely need but severely lack.

Unfortunately in recent years the collected experience of this place has turned sour, with a well-publicised murder case involved a Met police officer darkening its leafy boughs for generations to come.

Sarah Everard was kidnapped, raped and murdered in 2021 by Wayne Couzens, a diplomatic protection officer who then proceeded to burn her body and dump it in Hoads Wood. A dark day in recent British history, and a prescient reminder to all the abuse of humans and nature by other emboldened humans. Couzens owned the part of wood that he dumped Sarah; he was its custodian, and yet he did what he did with no thought either of them.

When the last officer assigned to comb the forest bundled into the last police van, Hoads Wood once again lay quiet. Its involvement in this case is still something I struggle to wrap my head around, and hope that its fifteen minutes of fame would stay just that.

However Murphy’s Law, ever present in this nightmare of a modern world, seems to have had other designs.

So, What Has Happened?

On a bleary, frigid morning in January of 2020, a local resident made a call to Ashford Borough Council to report trucks for fly-tipping in Hoads Wood.

Not just one truck.

Not a small convoy.

24 hours a day for 7 days a week the resident reported loader trucks full of brick rubble and construction debris, some without legitimate number plates, entering with full loads and leaving with reset suspension.

A boilerplate response was given, telling him that enforcement was taking place, but none materialised.

In May of the same year, a walker took video footage of what can only be described as criminals prepping the land for wider tipping capability, or flattening and clearing trees to us laymen.

The beginnings of the uncovering tragedy that has befallen Hoads Wood.

Said video evidence was again sent to Ashford Borough Council, but again nothing tangible materialised. The world turned, unfazed or ignorant to the growing issue.

In 2023 the infected wound began to ooze. Residents called in reports to 101 (the non-emergency phone number for local authorities) of heavy machinery, plant equipment and a digger being transported into the green depths. Ashford Borough Council assure them that they are aware of the situation and that it is part of a legitimate multi-agency operation. This calms them as they believe that means something is finally being done about this stain.

They couldn’t be further from the truth.

In July of that year, the local parish council visits the site as part of a review for a separate planning application. As a result of seeing the absolute state caused by this nightmare, they begin to attempt liason with Ashford Borough Council and their bosses at Kent County Council, but to little avail.

At the same time other plotholders report illegal activity to the police, the Council and the Environment Agency, being passed from one to the other to the other. The Environment Agency log the activity but do nothing else.

A storage container ostensibly used as a work shed by the criminal tippers.

One resident of Bethersden, the local village, even got in touch with his local member of parliament Damian Green to raise the issue, but was handily rebuffed when Green told him that the parish council was dealing with it. Said parish council didn’t get a direct reply on the developing situation till January 2024, 7 months after they first reached out.

In August 2023 police appear to begin operations to investigate, asking a local farmer if they can launch drones from his field. However, shortly after that one of the plot holders receives a reply from the police, stating that they believed no crime had been met.

The dumping continues unabated. Some residents said that some of the trucks that actually had number plates would come back on searches as not having passed their MOT’s, therefore being a hazard out on the road. One woman times the trucks for 24 hours, logging one passing her house every 8 minutes.

Contaminated water is known to be leaching from the site, with the potential to cause huge issues for surrounding water habitats.

Fast forward to January 2024. A local resident is asked by the police for consent to them using their garden as a drone launch site. They can’t use the previous one they say, as it has since been compromised by the rogue landfillers they spent the last 4 years ignoring. At the same time, increased pressure from a news article and TalkTV footage finally produces some form of action.

The Environment Agency makes steps to secure the sites entrance from being used physically and by court order, but it is eons too late to be considered preventative by any mark.

The contents of these dump trucks had not been just rubble as first thought, but what can only be described as “domestic waste”. The rogue drivers had created a rubbish tip that was in many places 12 to 15 feet deep. 33,000 tonnes of material has been added to Hoads Wood. 4 acres (more than 2 full size football fields) are completely destroyed, and soon residents report the wafting smell of rotten eggs, classic odour of the local rubbish tip. The smell is hydrogen sulphide, a toxic compound that is absorbed through the skin and produces severe health effects (seizures, vomiting, skin irritation) with enough exposure.

Stagnant ponds and mounds of rotten refuse choke the trees. Bluebells would grace the ground in profusion but instead we must settle for blue bottle caps and pen lids.

A local contractor is contacted for a quote for the cleanup but he is then not granted access to the site until April, 3 months later. After a flash of news articles that raises national interest and outrage, a communication from the government comes in November stating that contracts had been signed with a waste management company to begin clearing.

The bill for this clean-up sits at £15 million.

This will not reverse time or matter, and that stupendous cost does not cover the decades it will take for the obliterated ecosystem to heal.

It does not cover the costs of the police surveillance operations that were put together like afterthoughts.

It does not cover the paid hours wasted by various governmental and council departments playing hot potato with the issue.

It does not cover the distress experienced by local residents for over 1000 days.

Resolution, Whatever That May Be

As of the writing of this article, there has been legal recourse drawn against 3 men in connection this incredible crime. Arrested on the 5 February 2025, they have since been released after interview. Further investigation of their employers is now taking place. The BBC had a fantastic article investigating some of this, with a company called All Skips coming under the spotlight, so much so that its director resigned.

The rise in illegal tips across my county is a resurgent issue, with similar ones popping up in Eastchurch, Rochester, Canterbury and Sittingbourne. The Environment Agency calculated in 2023 that every year one fifth of England’s rubbish, equivalent to 34 million tonnes, is illegally managed. When you hire the services of a skip company, whether online or physically, what assurance do you have that halfway to the designated waste site trucks aren’t pulling off the road and dumping everything in your favourite idyllic glen, your place to be away?

Another illegal dumping site at Raspberry Hill Park Farm in Sittingbourne, linked inexorably to All Skips Ltd.

This issue can be attacked from a myriad of angles.

Educating from the ground up to instil care and explain the natural world we live in and the balance we are trying to achieve.

Proper and timely enforcement, to deter and penalise those who would cross the line.

More funding for environmental bodies to monitor this activity with some level of totality.

Reducing household waste, both at the producer and the consumer level.

Governmental and bureaucratic transparency so the people at the levers of power are kept accountable for ignorance and delay.

Developing a voice of national unity the interests of our shared world.

On the first and last points I want to engage you. This is primarily the point of why I write and I hope that with more of this, not just from me but from the other incredible people on this platform and beyond, we can start to build something better than the refuse we are inheriting.

Thank you for reading! I never know how to end a piece; it’s my literary Achilles heel. So instead of that, let me simply ask for your comments, your discussion of the issue and for you to subscribe if you feel like I am worth the time. It’s been my pleasure once again.

Adam Kavanagh
Paradaida