‘I’ve had five mothers ring or turn up at my door, and lawyers fluttering about… I need you to tell me what to do, and I promise I’ll listen.’ So says Susan McIntyre, star of Netflix’s Toxic Town (pictured), as she sets about building a group of mothers of children with birth defects to bring legal action against Corby Council for environmental negligence around toxic waste from steelworks.
The show has taken Britain by storm. One of the standout moments is the group of local mothers swelling in number at every meeting.
The law firms representing classes of people affected by environmental wrongdoing, like the mothers in Corby, are faced with the difficult job of getting those affected to come forward. But how likely are people in the UK to do so?
A recent survey by Thorndon Partners asked a nationally representative sample of the population exactly that: what would motivate them to sign up to an environmental claim?
A key aspect of the Corby case is the growing belief among mothers that the council was responsible for the statistically high number of birth defects. But can that belief be assumed in all cases?
Our study found that 62% of the public believe a company is guilty even if they are merely accused of environmental wrongdoing, when nothing has yet
been proven.
Public anger at businesses believed to have damaged the environment is borne out in many ways, but the same percentage of the population (62%) would join a legal action if they were directly affected.
People also vote with their wallets. We found that 44% of the UK population would stop buying the products or services of a company that was being investigated by a regulator for alleged environmental transgressions, jumping to 56% if the investigation confirmed damage to the environment.
Des Collins, who represented the Corby mothers, set out their motivations: ‘It’s about pursuing money, getting the compensation that your son might need, but I believe why you’re doing it: for you, it’s about justice.’
Public attitudes bear this out. Exposing the duplicity or bad behaviour of the offending company was nearly twice as powerful a motivator for people to join a legal action than compensation, though money does still have some pulling power.
But what does justice look like to the average person?
The two most popular punishments were forcing the corporation to foot the bill for any cleanup (74% of the public support this) and to issue a public apology (supported by 67%).
Do not let the importance of ‘softer’ punishments such as forced apologies fool you: the public can be draconian. Over half of the population would support criminal prosecutions, including prison time, for directors at businesses responsible for causing environmental harm.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the public is most supportive of affected communities bringing litigation against environmental damage. For many communities, these cases cannot be brought without financial assistance. In Toxic Town, this comes in the form of the ‘no win, no fee’ arrangement for Collins’ law firm.
Another route is third-party litigation funding. Over a third of the public would actively support litigation financed by a funder, even if they knew the funder stood to turn a profit if the case was successful.
Ultimately, the community is only one group that could front an activist case against a polluting business. Some 51% of the UK population are supportive of shareholders bringing claims against environmentally damaging businesses, while 45% support businesses taking a stand against a competitor.
For Corby residents, the ‘bad guy’ was Corby Council and its failure to properly clean up the toxic waste from the town’s historical steelworks.
Today, the bogeymen for UK residents are water firms. Despite oil and gas being the top sector that the public would support environmental legal action against, the most egregious activity that the public wants to see punished is the pollution of rivers and seas.
The water industry has already been targeted with novel claims regarding widespread sewage pollution, with one such case in the Competition Appeal Tribunal against six water firms recently dismissed.
It is perhaps no surprise that, compared with the average of 62% that would join environmental actions in general, the appetite to join litigation against water companies is higher. Some 68% of the public would join a mass legal action if their health was affected by sewage pollution caused by water firms; 71% would sign up if they believed their bills had been increased unlawfully.
A whopping 75% of the public supports water companies being sued for damages for polluting Britain’s waterways.
The polling study into public attitudes to environmental litigation in the UK was published in late 2024, before Toxic Town started streaming on Netflix. It remains to be seen whether the show will have a similar impact on the public’s understanding of environmental litigation as Mr Bates v the Post Office had on perceptions of class actions more broadly.
Charles McKeon is co-founder of Thorndon Partners, a communications and research firm specialising in legal disputes
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