Dimensional stone suppliers are warning that the cost of a new regime of visits to mineral extraction sites, for which the quarries will have to pay, will have to be passed on to customers. Under the new scheme, mineral planning authorities (MPAs - normally county councils) have been told by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) to charge £288 a visit and that best practice dictates there should be at least four visits a year.

The new rules, designed to make sure planning permissions are strictly adhered to, came into effect on 1 April, but quarry operators think they are beyond a joke. Most MPAs were still mulling over the changes when NSS contacted them early in April, but Somerset County Council were quick off the mark and sent out a letter on 8 March telling quarry operators that they would be getting the \'best practice\' four visits a year and that they did not intend to \'reward\' compliant sites with fewer visits. To accommodate the visits, Somerset council told NSS it did plan to employ extra staff, although how many had yet to be decided.

The letter came as a shock to Richard England of Ham & Doulting Stone Company in Charlton Adam. He told NSS that if the MPS visited his four quarries four times a year they would be visiting some of them as often as he does. "We only take 100 or 200 tonnes a year from some of them. We always thought it was important to have these quarries to provide the choice that people want, like it says in the Symonds report. But these visits are going to cost us £4,600 a year. It\'s just another nail in our coffin."

Mike Lawrence, of Ham Hill Stone Co, only has one quarry, but as a small operator said the £1,152 a year he would have to pay for the visits represented an extra £1 a tonne on the cost of producing his stone. "That\'s going to mean an extra £1 a tonne on the price of our stone because I don\'t have the slack in my overheads to absorb that."