‘We’ve got to find answers’: Corby families affected by cancer searching for truth about toxic waste sites | Cancer

In 2018, Alison Gaffney and Andy Hinde received devastating news that their 17-month-old son, Fraser, had a rare form of leukemia.

The stem cell transplant was preceded by two years of grueling treatment, including chemotherapy, radiotherapy and immunotherapy. Fraser, then three years old, made a “miraculous recovery” from surgery before doctors declared the cancer in remission.

At this point, as Fraser began to heal and grow stronger, Gaffney, 36, began searching for answers. She couldn’t stop thinking about the comments made by hospital staff when her son was diagnosed. “We lie awake at night wondering how Fraser got cancer,” a counselor told him.

Gaffney said the botched disposal of millions of tonnes of contaminated waste following the closure of Europe’s largest steelworks in Corby, Northamptonshire, in 1979 had “always been a known thing”. A civil lawsuit filed in 2009 attributes the city’s negligent cleanup of the site to a series of birth defects in local children in the 1980s and 1990s. It was later dramatized in the 2025 Netflix series Toxic Town.

Gaffney increasingly began to associate the case with his own. “[Fraser’s cancer is] “It’s not genetic,” he said. “So what are the reasons? … It must be towards town. All these kids [with] cancer.

“Everyone in this town knows someone with a kid [with] cancer. “This is not normal.”

Gaffney and Hinde began connecting with other families at Corby who had similar stories to their own (including some of Gaffney’s former classmates at Brooke Weston Academy), and the group began compiling detailed records about those affected. They are currently running a campaign representing approximately 130 families with cases of childhood cancer dating back to 1988.

The group is calling on the local authority to investigate links between childhood cancer cases in Corby and the decommissioning of the facility. Later this month, public health officials will release their analysis of whether the town has a disproportionate number of childhood cancer cases relative to its population of 70,000.

“All we want to do is try to protect future people so they don’t have to endure the pain that we did,” Gaffney said.

The ruling in the 2009 civil case acknowledged that between 1983 and 1997 millions of tonnes of contaminated material from the steelworks were “almost always” transported from Corby south to Deene Quarry in the north, that “large quantities” of toxic waste were carried and deposited on public roads, and that “significant amounts” of dust were created by reclamation.

However, reference was also made to Environment Agency reports in 1997 which found that stocks of contaminated material left at the Deene Pit were subsequently removed in “large quantities”.

Gaffney believes waste was dumped not only at the Deene Quarry site but also in other parts of the city. On Thursday he welcomed a “major step forward” after North Northamptonshire council said it would test land that may have been contaminated and investigate where toxic waste was dumped.

Gaffney said city staff admitted at the meeting that they didn’t know where contaminated waste might be. “They said, ‘We don’t know where these sites are. We have no documentation, nothing about this.'”

North Northamptonshire council told the Guardian that information it had seen since then “suggests that the waste was disposed of at Deene Quarry, a former landfill on the outskirts of Corby”, but added: “People have recently raised concerns about potentially contaminated areas of land where they believe waste may have also been disposed of historically.”

“We are thoroughly reviewing historical records to see if there is any information that suggests the destruction may have occurred elsewhere. This work will take time.”

Gaffney said they were shocked by the transparent nature of the meeting with the council. “Local authorities don’t normally throw up their hands and take this on, but we’re really proud of them for doing this and saying they want to protect their people like we do.”

The council’s announcement was also welcomed by primary school pastoral leader Tonia Shalgosky, whose nine-year-old daughter Bella was diagnosed with blood cancer in June this year.

“I had to shave my nine-year-old daughter’s head because her hair was falling out from the drugs she was taking to kill her cancer. So it’s actually in our best interest, in Bella’s best interest.” [for the council] “To share this information,” he said.

“There are so many people in town diagnosed with childhood cancer that I think it’s too much to ignore; it needs to be taken into consideration. This can’t be normal.”

Meg Lyons, 31, who works in sales and now lives in London, said families deserved “complete and absolute truth and transparency” from the council.

Lyons’ 11-year-old sister Eve died on June 24, 2017, after being diagnosed with a rare bone cancer when she was nine years old. Lyons said Eve, who is fundraising for Stand Up To Cancer, was “one of the loveliest, funniest and kindest people.”

Lyons said he remembers the impact his mother’s steel mill closure had on the town. “He said he couldn’t put his hand in front of his face because [of] red ash.”

“This has been going on since I was probably three years old. This is excessive time and neglectful of the people of Corby.”

Lyons’ cousin Maggie Mahon was one of several families named in a lawsuit against Corby council in 2009 after her baby was born with clubfoot. Her husband, Derek, was one of the truck drivers involved in removing waste from the steel mill. Their story was told in the TV series Toxic Town and showed Maggie kicking the dust out of her husband’s jeans.

Gaffney said the campaign group was approached by whistleblowers involved in the dumping of waste in the town.

One of the people involved in removing the waste was Gaffney’s father. “He drove his truck and threw it in the trash.” [the waste in a] pond,” he said. “Everyone had lost their jobs back then, so everyone took on whatever job you could do.”

“He didn’t even have a license to drive a truck. He said: ‘Me and the other guys didn’t have a license, but they made us drive these big trucks through town and just unload them,'” he said.

Attorney Des Collins, who joined the 2009 civil lawsuit, now represents Gaffney and other cancer families. He said only a legitimate public inquiry would ensure the full truth would come out.

“Environmental testing to rule out causality is a highly complex process that requires stringent parameters and oversight to ensure the findings can be trusted,” he said.

“No matter how sincere the council’s new approach may be, I must point out that, in my experience, only a legitimate public inquiry has the capacity to both reassure the public that the full truth has been established and highlight the lessons to be learned.”

The council’s leader, Martin Griffiths, said in a statement that the meeting with Gaffney and Hinde “marked the beginning of the parties’ determination to work together in an open, positive and constructive way for the benefit of Corby residents”.

The council said it was committed to full transparency and would set up a working group, including Gaffney, to examine public health and contamination issues in Corby.

Gaffney hopes testing will begin on the field in Corby once the group is established. “Now I hear the stories of every family that comes in and it’s so hard. If anything, it gives us more of a struggle,” she said.

“Every time it crumbles and makes your fight stronger because you think: ‘We have to find answers for these kids.’”