Council tax payers may have to cough up to pay the cost of an unsuccessful prosecution against an animal rendering company accused of causing foul smells while disposing of carcasses.

Fats and Proteins (UK) Ltd was said to have let sickening, disgusting and nauseous' odours escape from its Nightingale Hall Farm plant.

But last Thursday the firm was cleared at Carlisle Crown Court of breaking a condition of its operating license.

The cost of the four-week trial is estimated to run into several hundred thousand pounds - a judge will now have to decide who pays.

The bill could be met out of public funds, which means taxpayers nationally would end up footing the bill.

Or it could be met by Lancaster City Council, which brought the prosecution of the company through its environmental health department.

It took a jury more than seven hours to reach the not guilty verdict, clearing Fats and Proteins.

The company was taken to court after local people complained of revolting smells from Nightingale Hall Farm.

Lancaster City Council claimed the firm broke one of the conditions of its licence, which says that no offensive odours should be detectable outside the boundaries of its plant.

It said the company committed a criminal offence, by allowing offensive smells to escape from the plant every day from Tuesday, May 8, to Saturday, May 12, in 2001 - at the height of the foot and mouth crisis.

But the company pleaded not guilty, saying the smells were caused by government officials insisting the plant cut corners.

Edwin Metcalfe, managing director of Fats and Proteins (UK) Ltd said MAFF officials decided that the speedy destruction of possibly infected animal carcases - some of which had apparently been dug up after previously being buried - was more important than maintaining an odour-free environment.

He said the Intervention Board set up during the epidemic effectively took responsibility for his factory out of his hands.

Defence counsel Rex Tedd QC said: "The company was no longer master in its own house. Odour control was being sacrificed in the interests of controlling the virus."