“Its not your back yard, its ours” Rt Hon John Prescott told anti- wind farm campaigners in his keynote address to the British Wind Energy Association conference today.
The British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) opened its 31st annual conference and exhibition at Liverpool’s ACC this morning with the speech from the ex deputy PM.
Prescott launched into an attack on the UK planning system saying that it discourages the industry and communities from submitting planning applications.
“Three quarters of applications are refused and this is the highest it has ever been and it is getting worse” he said and went on to warn politicians that the system is threatening renewable energy targets.
The opening speech was followed this afternoon by an address by Rt Hon Ed Miliband MP, Secretary of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change. Miliband agreed that changes needed to be made if planning consent rates are to increase.
The recognition that urgent changes are required comes with the release of new planning consent figures released by the BWEA. On average BWEA say it takes 17 months to secure planning consent for a <50 MW onshore wind farm in the UK, compared with 16 weeks for other forms of development.
The wind energy conference continues tomorrow with a political keynote speech by Simon Hughes MP, Liberal Democrat Shadow Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change. It is the Conservatives' opportunity on Thursday with Charles Hendry MP speaking in the morning.
N. Lys
October 20th, 2009
This bullying windbag should be careful about ranting at “the squires and gentry”, they are the precisely the people who benefit most from wind farm developments (carefully sited out of sight of their ancestral piles).
In our area of Northumberland and the Borders, I might mention such typical Nu-Lab supporters as Lord Devonport (Ray Estate) and the Duke of Roxburghe (Fallago Rig) who are desperate to have turbines on their land.
In my experience, the huge number of people who have signed up to oppose these schemes are ordinary working people living in rows of farm cottages in rural settlements, not the fat-cat landowners and speculators who Prescott, Blair and Brown seem so to admire.
Vicky Portwain
October 21st, 2009
In my experience people who oppose wind farms are not the local people who have grown up in the area but incomers from the cities who have bought expensive houses and expect the countryside to stay stagnant – very much the opposite to your experience N. Lys. It is bonkers for example that the Isle of Wight Council would not consent one wind turbine in support of their most important manufacturing company (a wind turbine blade company) – I wonder who it was opposing that project…somehow I bet it was not those living in the rows of farm cottages needing jobs.