A WOMAN who has spent all her savings on a legal battle over a drainage system is representing herself in the High Court today.

Claire Crossley, a company director from Powick, has vowed to overturn what she regards as a "miscarriage of justice" after a neighbour complained about a reed bed drainage system she installed on his land.

Mrs Crossley was served with an abatement notice on the system two years ago, after her neighbour complained to Malvern Hills District Council.

She unsuccessfully challenged the notice at Droitwich Magistrates Court, and then lost her appeal at Worcester Crown Court last June.

The property management director, of Kings End Road, said she had run up costs of more than £60,000 during the legal battle.

She claimed her neighbour had allowed her to install the system but had then changed his mind.

Mrs Crossley also said the council had not consulted her about their decision, after initially giving their consent to the installation of the sewage work.

The council's environmental health officer, Andy Ferguson, described the system as a "stinking mess" in the evidence he gave at the appeal.

But Mrs Crossley is determined to continue with her fight, and was due to appear in the highest court in the land in London today.

"I regard it as a matter of principle. I think I have been treated very badly by the council and they failed to exercise a duty of care," she said.

Processing raw sewage through reed-beds has become very fashionable for green-minded landowners.

Fashion designer Stella MacCartney was this year granted permission to install the reed beds at her £1.3m Worcestershire mansion at Bishampton, near Pershore, and Prince Charles has a similar scheme at Highgrove in Gloucestershire.