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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 January 2018
Until recently environmental noise pollution has attracted relatively little attention from Parliament. However, currently, noise is rapidly moving up the political agenda both in the United Kingdom and in the European Union. This article focuses on neighbourhood noise and examines the efficacy of the substantive law as an instrument of environmental control. Potential difficulties in employing nuisance-based environmental standards for noise are also discussed. The article concludes with the author's suggestion that the law is in need of reform. However, there is no single solution to the problem. Regulation, whatever form it takes, will not, of itself provide the complete solution to noise pollution.
1. Tenth Report on Environmental Pollution, Cm 9149 (1984) 10.
2. Alberti, P. Noise, the most ubiquitous pollutant’ Noise and Health (1998) vol 1, p 3 Google Scholar. See also Baxter v Harland and Wolf (1990) IRLR 5 16, which concerned the plaintiff's suffering hearing loss due to his being exposed to excessive noise at work.
3. Eg a council house tenant threatened to ‘blow away’ environmental health officers when they arrived to confiscate his sound equipment (1998) 69 SPEL 98, citing Environmental Health News. See also the Daily Mirror, 28 January 1995, which reported a drunken neighbour burning two women to death for complaining about the noise he was making in his flat.
4. See the Daily Express, 6 November 1996, which reported the suicide of a widow who had been exposed to the noise of abusive neighbours over a lengthy period.
5. See eg D Hughes Environmental Law (London: Butterworths, 3rd edn, 1996) ch 11; J Leeson Environmental Law (London: Pitman Publishing, 1995) ch 11; S Wolf and A White Principles of Environmental Law (London: Cavendish Publishing, 2nd edn, 1997) ch 15; R Burnett-Hall Environmental Law (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 1900 ch 18; M Adams and F McManus Noise and Noise Law (London: Wiley Chancery, 1994); C Smith, N Collar and M Poustie Pollution Control: The Law in Scotland (Edinburgh: & T Clark, 2nd edn, 1997) ch 10; F McManus ‘Noise’ in C T Reid (ed) Environmental Law in Scotland (Edinburgh: W Greed/Sweet and Maxwell, 2nd edn, 1997) ch 7; F McManus Environmental Health Law (London: Blackstone Press, 1994) ch 3.
6. It is, of course, correct to state that noise from sources such as transport (including aircraft) can have a significant influence upon noise levels in any given locality. Indeed, such noise sources (or background noise levels) can present problems for environmental health officers who are attempting to measure noise levels generated by other sources.
7. See E A Ackerknecht ‘Anticontagionism between 1821 and 1864’ (1948) 22 Journal of the History of Medicine 562–592; N Longmate King Cholera (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1966); R J Morris Cholera 1832 (London: Croom Helm, 1976); M Pelling Cholera, Fever and English Medicine 1825-1865 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978); A Wohl Endangered Lives (London: Dent, 1983); F McManus ‘The Miasmatic Theory and Public Health Administration in Edinburgh, 1830-1879’ (1986) 38 Society for the Social History of Medicine, Bulletin 34-36; R Stanwell-Smith ‘In the steps of “King Cholera”: from Mevagissey to Kenya’ (1999) 41 Health and Hygiene 1. For an interesting account of the miasmatic theory on nineteenth-century Ireland, see J Robins The Miasma (Dublin: Institute of Public Administration, 1995).
8. Policing Pollution: A Study of Regulation and Enforcement (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982) p 33.
9. Ibid, p 34.
10. These statutes did not allow local authorities to erect new houses in the place of those demolished. This function was left to speculative builders. In the last analysis, the houses which were built in the place of those demolished were too expensive to re-house those displaced by the improvement scheme.
11. The leading case on the subject is Gateshead MBC v Secretary of State for the Environment (1994) JPL 255. For a general discussion of the relationship between planning and pollution, see: S Tromans and M Clarkson ‘The environmental Protection Act 1990: Its Relevance to Planning Controls’ (1991) JPL 507; S Tromans ‘Town and Country Planning and Environmental Protection’ (1992) JPL Occasional Paper 6; and M Purdue ‘The Relationship between Development Control and Specialist Pollution Controls: Which is the Tail and which the Dog?’ (1999) JPL 585.
12. These statutes laid the foundation of modem food law. However, the purpose of the legislation was not always clear. In brief, the latter Act made it an offence to sell ‘unfit’ food and also food which was not of the ‘nature, substance and quality’ demanded by the purchaser. The case law on the interpretation of these concepts is particularly confused, with the courts displaying uncertainty as to the purpose and function of the law, namely, whether the standard set by the Act was geared to protecting human health or simply food quality, that is, commercial quality. The well-publicised Lanark Blue cheese case a few years ago (Clydesdale District Council v Errington Lanark Sheriff Court, 5 December 1995, unreported) centering on the interpretation of the modem version of this legislation namely s 8(2)(b) of the Food Safety Act 1990, epitomises judicial unease with the concept of unfitness. See F McManus ‘Unfit Food’ (1996) 41 J Law Soc Scotland 105. See now s 14 of the Food Safety Act 1990, which deals with ‘nature, substance and quality’ in relation to food. See F McManus Environmental Health Law (London: Blackstone, 1994) pp 127–129.
13. See eg A Wohl Endangered Lives (London: Dent, 1983); Report on the Nuisance Removal Act up to July 1849 (HL Paper XL 1,1849); Housing of the Working Classes in Scotland (2nd Report) PPXXX1 (1884-85). See generally, Annual Reports of the Board of Supervision of the Poor in Scotland (1880-95).
14. G Richardson, A Ogus and P Burrows Policing Pollution (Oxford Oxford University Press, 1982) p 63. See also K Hawkins Environment and Enforcement (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984) ch 7.
15. The celebrated case of Kruse v Johnson (1898) 2 QB 91 centered on the legality of a byelaw which forbade the playing of musical instruments in certain circumstances. The author made an unsuccessful attempt in 1997 to ascertain the number of local authorities in Scotland which possessed byelaws to control noise.
16. See R Macrory ‘The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland’ in G Enyedi, A Giyswyt and B Rhodes (eds) Environmental Policies in East and West (London: Taylor and Graham, 1988) p 188.
17. Eg the provisions of the Public Health (Scotland) Act 1867.
18. As far as Scotland was concerned, it was not until 1897, with the passage of the Public Health (Scotland) Act, that authorities were placed under a duty to perform various public health functions.
19. Town and Country Planning Acts were passed in 1909, 1919, 1932, 1943 and 1947. See Telling and Duxbury Planning Law and Procedure (London: Butterworths, 10th edn, 1998) pp 4–5.
20. Cmnd 2056 (1963) ‘Final Report on the Problem of Noise’ (London: HMSO, 1963). See B W Clapp An Environmental History of Britain (Longman; London, 1994) p 144.
21. The gist of Pt III was that the relevant local authority would measure noise emanating from premises in the relevant noise abatement zone and enter that figure in a noise register. After the relevant figure was entered, the occupier of the premises was placed under an obligation not to allow the noise from the premises to exceed that figure. While the Act allowed local authorities to include premises of any nature and size in a noise abatement zone, the government intended that such zones be restricted to industrial/residential or commercial/residential areas.
22. See J Rowan-Robinson and P Watchman Crime and Regulation (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1990) p 42.
23. Above n 14 p 35.
24. Farrier, in focusing attention on the importance of the role played by the general public in pollution control argued that in 1985 the Canadian Law Reform Committee did not believe that Canadians recognised an environmental ethic supporting the protection of the environment for its own sake. See D Farrier ‘In Search of Real Criminal Law’ in T Bonyhady (ed) Environmental Protection and Legal Change (Sydney: Federation Press, 1992) p 113.
25. Under Pt III of the EPA, where a local authority is obliged to serve an abatement notice on the author of the relevant nuisance. An offence is committed only if the relevant terms of the notice are flouted.
26. There is little doubt in the author's mind that this has dissuaded many local authorities from taking statutory action. Empirical research is, however, required to confirm this view.
27. See eg Kirklees Metropolitan Council v Field (1998) Env LR 337 and Lowe v South Somerset DC (1998) JPL 458. See generally G Wigmore (ed) Nuisances (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 1998) ch 3.
28. The author recently interviewed environmental health officers in several London boroughs involved in enforcing noise law. Those interviewed were generally supportive of the law of nuisance. Generally speaking, it was felt that the concept of nuisance gave them ‘discretion’ when dealing with noise problems. It allowed them to act in a ‘reasonable’ way. Indeed, one official recently proudly informed the author that he always acted ‘within the band of reasonableness’! This finding was recently supported by the findings of an NSCA survey where only 18% of local authorities in England and Wales considered that nuisance was no longer an appropriate standard to use: see the National Society for Clean Air (NSCA) Noise Survey 1998, p 14. In the 1999 Survey only 13% of local authorities considered that nuisance was no longer an appropriate standard: see p 12. Furthermore, the official periodicals of Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (CIEH) (namely, the Environmental Health News and Environmental Health Journal) and the Royal Environmental Health Institute of Scotland (REHIS) (REHIS Magazine) which contains regular articles submitted by practising officers, have not been overly critical of the concept of nuisance.
29. In the 1999 NSCA noise survey amplified music was top of the list of causes of complaint for 62% of respondents in the NSCA study. See p 7.
30. M A Santos Limits and Scope of Environmental Law (Springfield, Illinois: Thomas, 1995) p 3.
31. In This Common Inheritance (Cmnd 1200) (1990) p 208 it was stated that it was less easy to set priorities on the levels of noise which can cause nuisance but which do not damage health.
32. This Common Inheritance Annual Report (Cmnd 3556) (1997) p 12.
33. Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, 21st Report (Cmnd 4053) (1998) Setting Environmental Standards, p 105.
34. Royal Commission Report on Environental Pollution, 10th Report (Cm 9149) (1984) p 72.
35. See D Robinson ‘Public Interest in Environmental Law —Commentary and Analysis’ in D Robinson and J Dunkley (eds) Public Interest and Perspectives in Environmental Law (London: Wiley Chancery, 1995) p 303.
36. E Ashby and M Anderson The Politics of Clean Air (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981) p 153.
37. G Richardson ‘Strict Liability for Regulatory Crime: the Empirical Research’ (1987) Crim LR 295 at 299.
38. See M Adams and F McManus Noise and Noise Law (London: Wiley Chancery, 1994) p 151.
39. For a general account of the relevant substantive law, see Adams and McManus, above n 38; C Penn Noise Control (London: Shaw and Sons, 1995); D Hughes Environmental Law (London: Butterworths, 3rdedn, 1996) ch 11; J Leeson Environrnental Law (London: Pitman Publishing, 1995) Ch 12. Amongst the more important legal controls which have relevance to neighbourhood noise are those under the planning system (that is, the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 and the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997); Pt V of the Housing Act 1996 (which allows public and private landlords to evict neighbours causing nuisance and annoyance); the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, which allows a court to make anti-social behaviour orders (see P Forte ‘Anti-social Behaviour Orders and Neighhour Nuisance’ 1999 SLT 209); the Control of Pollution Act 1974, Pt III, which deals, inter alia, with noise from loudspeakers and construction sites; the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, ss 63-65, which deal with raves, etc; the Licensing Act 1964 and the Licensing (Scotland) Act 1976, which allows licensing justices and boards to attach conditions to licences relating to noise.
40. For a general account of United Kingdom air pollution law, see: S Ball and S Bell Environmental Law (London: Blackstone Press, 4th edn, 1997) chs 11 and 12; D Hughes, N Parpworth and J Upson Air Pollution (London: Jordans, 1998); R Burnett-Hall Environmental Law (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 1995) chs 9 and 10. For an overview of the law of Scotland relating to air pollution, see C T Reid Environmental Law in Scotland (Edinburgh W Greedsweet and Maxwell, 2nd edn, 1997) chs 2 and 5.
41. P Lowe and S Ward (eds) British Environmental Policy and Europe (London: Routledge, 1998) p 8. For an account of the effect of ambiguity in certain aspects of water law, see W Howarth ‘Accommodation without resolution? Emission controls and environmental quality objectives in the proposed EC Water Framework Directive’ (1999) Env LR 6.
42. The number of institutions concerned with the enforcement of noise law in the United Kingdom has, effected its status and development. This topic will be dealt with later in the article.
43. See J McCormick British Politics and the Environment (London: Earthscan, 1991) p 10.
44. W Howarth ‘Poisonous, Noxious or Polluting: Contrasting Approaches to Environmental Regulation’ (1993) 56 MLR 171 at 172.
45. Which bears the rather clumsy rubric ‘Statutory Nuisances and Clean Air’.
46. The Nuisance Removal Acts 1846 and 1856 as well as the Public Health Act 1848 had similar provisions dealing with statutory nuisances.
47. EPA, s 80. In Falmouth and Truro Port Health Authority, ex p South West Water Ltd (1999) EGCS 62 it was held that there was no duty on an enforcing authority to consult with the author of a nuisance prior to serving an abatement notice.
48. Contained mainly in s 80(9) of the EPA.
49. Much case law has centred around how detailed and specific the abatement notice need be in order to be valid. See eg East Staffordshire Borough Council v Fairless (1998) Times, 26 October; Kirklees Metropolitan Council v Field (1998) Env LR 337 and Lowe v South Somerset District Council (1998) JPL 458. See also Budd v Colchester BC (1999) Times, 14 April.
50. Cf enforcement in the planning system. See J Rowan-Robinson and A Ross ‘Enforcement of Environmental Regulation in Britain: Strengthening the Link’ (1994) JPL 200 at 200.
51. See also the Noise and Statutory Nuisance Act 1993 and the Noise Act 1996 which deals with night noise. The latter employs the use of fixed standards.
52. (1978) 1 WLR 50.
53. See eg A Lambert Flat Management Ltd v Lomas (1981) 2 All ER 280.
54. See D Robinson ‘Public Interest in Environmental Law — Community Analysis’ in D Robinson and R Dunkley (eds) Public interest Perspectives in Environmental Law (Chichester: John Wiley, 1995) p 299. Robinson cites the House of Lords case of Cambridge Water Company v Eastern Counties Leather Ltd (1994) 2 WLR 53 as an instance of judicial reluctance to expand the common law. Another recent instance of the courts displaying a pronounced reluctance to expand the common law of nuisance is seen in the House of Lords case of Hunter v Canary Wharf Ltd (1997) Env LR 488. In that case the House rejected the proposition that the interference with the receipt of television signals amounted to a nuisance at common law.
55. See eg RHM Bakeries Ltd v Strathclyde Regional Council 1985 SC (HL) 17 and Kennedy v Glenbelle Ltd 1996 SCLR 411. For a discussion of the concept of culpa and the Scots law of nuisance see F McManus ‘Culpa and the Law of Nuisance’ 1997 JR 259.
56. Cambridge Water Company v Eastern Counties Leather Ltd n 55 above.
57. 1996 SCLR 411.
58. The gist of the action was that the occupier of the basement of premises (the first defender) had commissioned the second defender to carry out works to a load bearing wall in the basement. The work was negligently carried out, the upshot of which was that the pursuer's premises were damaged. The pursuer raised an action both in negligence and in nuisance.
59. 1996 SCLR 411 at 414.
60. See F McManus ‘Culpa and the Law of Nuisance’ (1997) JR 259 at 270.
61. 1996 SCLR 411 at 416.
62. Nettleship v Weston (1971) 2 QB 691.
63. See F McManus, above n 60 at 214.
64. (1936) 2 KB 468.
65. See also E Reid ‘The Basis of Liability in Nuisance’ (1997) JR 162.
66. When the defendant has been negligent in the common law sense, an objective test would, of course, apply — Nettleship v Weston n 63.
67. S Elworthy and J Holder Environmental Protection (London: Buttenvorths, 1997) p 7.
68. See now the Food Safety Act 1990.
69. M Smith and A Pearson ‘The Value of Strict Liability’ (1969) Crim LR 5 at 14.
70. See F McManus ‘The EC Green Paper on Future Noise Policy and its Impact on the United Kingdom’ (1999) 5 European Public Law 125 at 139–140.
71. According to Richardson, Ogus and Burrows (above n 14, p 43) the concept of nuisance offers the opportunity for considerable latitude in interpretation.
72. A good example of this is Hunter v Canary Wharf Ltd (1997) 2 WLR 684. There the Court of Appeal, in determining whether the interference with the reception of television signals constituted a nuisance in law, took into account the fact that tall buildings were now quite common. However, this issue was not discussed in the House of Lords.
73. Hunter v Canary Wharf Ltd (1997) 2 WLR 684.
74. See eg Watt v Jamieson 1954 SC 56.
75. For a fuller discussion of this issue see J E Penner ‘Nuisance and the Character of the Neighbourhood’ (1993) 5 E L 1. One of the factors which the courts take into account in determining if a given state of affairs is unreasonable is if the state of affairs is in conformity with the locality in question. The courts in the United Kingdom have never found it easy to articulate the locality principle in noise nuisance cases: see eg Webster v Lord Advocate 1984 SLT 13; Kennaway v Thompson (1980) 3 All ER 329; and Dunton v Dover District Council (1978) 76 LGR 87.
76. See F McManus and E Russell Delict (Chichester: Wiley, 1998) pp 214–215. For a contrary view, see J McLaren The Common Law Nuisance Actions and the Environmental Battle — Well-Tempered Swords or Broken Reeds? (1972) 10 Osgood Hall LJ 505, where the learned author argues that, at least as far as Canadian nuisance law is concerned, the law of private nuisance is sufficiently malleable to allow the courts to take into account wider environmental factors in determining nuisance cases. Furthermore, in doing so, the judges have shown ‘a considerable degree of environmental sensitivity’ . Brief mention should be made of the fact that the courts are willing, in most cases, to take into account noise criteria formulated by official bodies such as the World Health Organization: Murdoch v Glacier Metal Co Ltd (1998) EGCS 6; (1998) Env LR 732. See World Health Organization Environmental Health Criteria 12 — Noise (1980); British Standard 4142 and the standards laid down in the Wilson Report are also relied upon where relevant. See Noise, Final Report of the Committee on the Problem of Noise (Cmnd 2056) (London: HMSO, 1963).
77. Section 81(5) of the EPA allows a local authority to take civil proceedings in the High Court (this would normally take the form of an interdict or injunction) if it was of the opinion that statutory notice proceedings under the Act would not afford an adequate remedy.
78. J Alder and D Wilkinson Environmental Law and Ethics London: Mcmillan, 1999) p 205.
79. See p 280, above.
80. See N Hawke Environmental Health Law (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 1995) pp 426–446; G Wignall Nuisances (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 1998) ch 3; and D Ormandy Law of Statutory Nuisances (London: Chadwick House Group, 1997). It has already been commented upon by the author that the procedure contained in Pt 3 of the EPA is complicated and has generated a surfeit of case law often decided on fine distinctions: F McManus ‘The EC Green Paper on Future Noise Policy and its Impact on the United Kingdom’ (1999) 5 European Public Law 125 at 141. Indeed, the Noise Working Party recommended that consideration be given to establishing an offence of strict liability in relation to premises which generated a noise nuisance: Report of the Noise Review Working Party (London: HMSO, 1990) p 11
81. See J Alder and D Wilkinson, n 78, 21.
82. See n 28, above.
83. J Rowan-Robinson and P Watchman Crime and Regulation (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1990) p 221.
84. Since 1995 the monitoring of waste sites has been the responsibility of the Environment Agency in England and Wales and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) in Scotland.
85. K C Wheare Government by Committee: an Essay on the British Constitution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1955) p 23.
86. Empirical research is required, of course, to ascertain to what extent, if any, this proposition is true.
87. A person affected by a noise nuisance can, of course, invoke the private law of nuisance to gain redress. However, this, is of course, costly. The person concerned would not only have to enlist legal assistance but he or she would, almost inevitably, have to commission an acoustician to take noise measurements. Mention should, however, be made of s 82 of the EPA, which allows private individuals who occupy land the enjoyment of which is affected by noise to take action before the magistrates and sheriff courts. This is rather unique in UK environmental law.
88. Richardson, Ogus and Burrows (above n 14, p 63) argue that, ‘the policy of persuasion is deeply rooted in the British tradition of pollution control, perhaps of regulatory controls in general’ . Similarly, Macrory argues that discretion and practicability are hallmarks of British environmental law and policy: see R Macrory ‘The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland’ in G Enyedi, A Giyswyt and B Rhodes (eds) Environmental Policies in East and West (London: Taylor Graham, 1988) p 188. See also T Jewell Law in Environmental Decision-Making — Public Law and the Environment (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998) p 85.
89. See p 280 above.
90. See eg W V H Rogers Winfield and Jolowicz on Tort (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 15th edn, 1998) pp 496–512; R F V Heuston and R A Buckley Salmond and Heuston on the Law of Torts (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 1996) pp 57–64, B Markesinis and S Deakin Tort Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 3rd edn, 1994) pp 418–434; Clerk and Lindsell on Torts (London: Sweet and Maxwell, 17th edn, 1995) 18-05-1822; F McManus Delict (Chichester: John Wiley, 1998) pp 214–223; W Stewart Delict (Edinburgh: W Greedsweet and Maxwell, 3rd edn, 1998) 2-12-2 - 19.
91. Rowan-Robinson and Watchman, above n 83, 191.
92. See K Hawkins Environment and Enforcement (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984) p 10.
93. It is not suggested, of course, that a noise regime based on quantitative standards would offer little or no scope for negotiation to take place between the officer and the offender. For a discussion of the function of negotiation, inter alia, as far as water pollution law enforcement is concerned, see generally Richardson, Ogus and Burrows, above n 14.
94. See K Hawkins Environment and Enforcement (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984) p 7. See also W Carson ‘Some Sociological Aspects of Strict Liability’ (1990) 33 MLR 396.
95. In the main, the NSCA Surveys of 1997, 1998 and 1999.
96. See above n 49. It will be recalled that the Batho Committee recommended that, in order to obviate the difficulties surrounding noise abatement notices the author of a statutory nuisance should be made strictly liable (Report of the Noise Review Party (London: HMSO, 1990). It is suggested that there is much to commend this approach.
97. NSCA Noise Survey (Brighton: NSCA, 1999) p 8.
98. Ibid, p 8. In Scotland the relevant figure was 21%. 99.
99. Ibid, p9.
100. Levels of complaints to local authorities are increasing at a higher rate in Scotland. Ibid, p 19. The number of complaints submitted to local authorities in England and Wales almost doubled between 1991-92 (81,198) and 1995-96 (164,115) Environmental Health News, 12 September 1997.
101. S Elworthy and J Holder Environmental Protection (London: Butterworths, 1997) p 7.
102. M Smith and A Pearson ‘The Value of Strict Liability’ (1969) Crim LR 5, at 9.
103. This is a topic which is currently under-researched. Empirical research is required.
104. See also K Hawkins, above n 14 at p 202 where he argues that the ‘moral context of the act makes any prosecution deserved’.
105. The Royal Commission on Local Government in Scotland which reported in 1969 concluded that environmental functions should be related to local communities. Noise as a specific pollutant was not, however, mentioned. Royal Commission on Local Government in Scotland (Cmnd 4150) (1969) para 522.
106. August 1999.
107. Over the years a rather conservative approach has been adopted towards depriving local authorities of their functions. For example, while it would have seemed logical to allow the new Food Safety Agency to enforce all aspects of food hygiene law, it will not do so. Local authorities will retain this function. Again, while the problems concerning the notification of infectious disease between local authorities would be solved if one agency had control of the enforcement of the law, there seems little support for taking this function away from local authorities.
108. Howarth argues that moral disapproval of environmentally unacceptable practice is readily translated into proscriptive laws in the industrial sphere but relatively rarely in the sphere of individual behaviour. see W Howarth ‘Environmental Law — Changing Lifestyles’, paper to conference on ‘Developments in Environmental Law Towards the 21st Century’, University of Aberdeen 1996.
109. D Vogel ‘Comparing policy styles: environmental protection in the US and Britain’ (1983) 42 Public Admin Bulletin 75.
110. There is an interesting parallel here with the other extreme of the spectrum of environmental law, namely that relating to food hygiene, where, thus far (with certain exceptions), the strong arm of the law stops short of food production handling in domestic dwelling houses notwithstanding the fact that many instances of food poisoning occur because food is not properly handled in the home.
111. See M Kidd Environmental Law (Cape Town: Juta, 1997) p 121.
112. Law Reform Commission of Canada Report Our Criminal Law (1976) pp 5–6.
113. See D Robinson and J Dunkley ‘Public Interest and Environmental Law — Community and Analysis’ in D Robinson and J Dunkley (ed) Public Interest Perspectives in Environmental Law (Chichester: Wiley, 1994) p 204.
114. J Rowan-Robinson and P Watchman Crime and Regulation (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1990) p 217.
115. See generally N Haigh (ed) Manual of Environmental Policy: the EC and Britain (London: Cartermill, 1991); J Holder The Impact of EC Environmental Law in the United Kingdom (Chichester: Wiley, 1997); H Somsen (ed) Protecting the European Environment (London: Blackstone Press, 1996); P Lowe and S Ward (ed) British Environmental Policy and Europe (London: Routledge, 1998); A Kiss and D Shelton Manual of European Environmental Law (Cambridge: Grotius, 1997); and D Gillies A Guide to EC Environmental Law (London: Earthscan, 1999).
116. See F McManus and T Burns ‘The Impact of EC Law on Noise Law in the United Kingdom’ in J Holder (ed) The Impact of EC Environmental Law in the United Kingdom (Chichester: Wiley, 1997) pp 185–190.
117. For a detailed discussion of the EC Green Paper and its possible impact on the United Kingdom, see F McManus ‘The EC Green Paper on Future Noise Policy and its Impact on the United Kingdom’ (1999) 5 European Public Law 125.
118. Ibid, p 146. See also P W Alberti ‘Noise, the most ubiquitous pollutant’ (1996) 1 Noise and Health 3.
119. See generally The United Kingdom National Air Quality (Cm 3587) (1997) and the Air Quality Regulations 1997, SI 1997/3043.
120. Future Noise Policy COM (96) 540 final, 2.
121. Eg the expression could cover noise from industrial premises as well as noise from house parties and the like.
122. Eg noise from my next door neighbour's lawnmower or washing machine which annoys me are examples of neighbourhood noise. The source of the noise could, of course, fall within the ambit of EC noise policy since the sources of the noise are products.