Mayer Parry loses High Court battle for interim relief

Full details of the High Court’s decision in the case were released today.

The hearing, into interim relief, followed on from the initial court case in September.

This saw metal recycler Mayer Parry Recycling – now part of the UK’s largest metal recycler European Metal Recycling – arguing that it should be allowed to issue PRNs for packaging in scrap metal (such as drums) rather than the steelworks. Currently the Environment Agency says that the steelworks are the accredited reprocessor for PRNs. But, Mayer Parry argues that a separate court case found that its material was not waste and so it should be eligible to issue the PRNs.

The High Court judge decided to refer the case to the European courts. But, in September he decided that the money that the steelworks, ASW and Corus, would gain from sale of the PRNs in the period before the European case, should be put in an account and left untouched until the Euroepan verdict was issued. The winner would then get the PRN money. In today’s papers, the judge says that the interim relief is “not appropriate”.

“All these considerations satisfy me not to grant any relief in that the applicant should be accredited in place of ASW.”
In the event, the interim relief court hearing saw Corus drop out of the action because Mayer Parry sought to target grade 3B, a grade of scrap which it sold to ASW and not Corus.

The Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions and the Environment Agency along with compliance scheme Valpak all joined in support of ASW and Corus in the interim relief case.