Archived press release

Mass shareholder protest for bypass builders

23 May 1996

Friends of the Earth today called on members of the public to buy (via Friends of the Earth) single shares in Costain plc in order to protest over the firm's plans to build the Newbury bypass. Shareholders will be able to directly challenge the Costain Board of Directors at the company's Annual General Meetings and ask how the company can justify its role in the controversial road.

It is hoped that at least 1000 protest shareholders will attend the company's next AGM making it the largest ever turn out of campaigners at a large firm's annual meeting. Over 600 have already pledged to buy shares and Friends of the Earth is appealing to its 100,000 strong membership to join in the action too.

Costain has been widely held to be the Highways Agency's favoured bidder but the announcement on who has won the contract has been severely delayed by the proposal to set up a European nature reserve on the route of the road following the discovery of the rare Desmoulin's Whorl Snail there. No final announcement is expected until the Department of Transport and the Department of the Environment have completed negotiations on how best to deal with any possible legal challenge over damage to the snail's nature reserve.

However, any deal struck between Government departments on how to rescue the snail will not salvage the credibility of the road. The bypass will provide few long term benefits to the people of Newbury and even the Chairman of Tarmac plc is quoted as saying that the road will not solve local traffic problems and criticised the Government for the environmental impacts that the road will cause.

Tony Juniper, Deputy Campaigns Director at Friends of the Earth said:

"Costain is isolated and vulnerable. Even its competitors believe the environmental costs of the road are unacceptable. This firm will certainly be taking on a huge risk in building the Newbury bypass, not least because there could be long delays brought about by legal challenges under European environmental law".

ENDS

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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust