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The Purbeck Gazette


Democracy? Now You See It - Now You Don’t David Hollister writes...


N


ow you see them, now you don’t. The great Wind Turbine debate continues. Despite having indicated last year that it was likely to grant planning consent for the proposed wind farm at Masters


Quarry, East Stoke, the Purbeck District Council Planning Committee has refused permission for the four 125-metre turbines.


Planning Officers had recommended acceptance, which would suggest that the application was ok on ‘planning criteria’. In the light of recent cases where substantial outpourings of public opinion have failed to sway the Planning Committee who has itself stated that “plans are considered on the merits of the ‘planning criteria’ rather than the views of the general public”, do we now have a u-turn in the attitudes of the Committee suggesting that it is (at last) prepared to consider public opinion? Or do we have a Planning Committee which has ‘passed the buck’ to the Planning Inspectorate in Bristol where one man – who lives outside the area – will take the final decision? Neat ploy. If the Inspector passes the application the Purbeck Planning Committee can deny responsibility for it. If he refuses the application, then it can claim credit for a decision well made.


Local opinion is firmly divided on this one. The wind turbines are only 125 metres high and there are only four of them. It’s not like they are covering a whole hillside with them like they have in Lanzarote. They’re only twice the height of Nelson’s column and probably don’t make enough noise to have a lasting effect upon people living in the vicinity. And apparently people living on the Heathrow flight path eventually get used to the planes. Migrating birds will probably eventually work out that it’s best to keep away from them.


So if it’s ‘not in my back yard’ – and I don’t want them in mine either, thank you - then where? Are we to build 250 of them – at huge expense – out in the channel where the sailors and tourists can marvel at the way in which progress has added to the Area of Outstanding Natural beauty and provided 250 turnstiles at the doorway to the Jurassic Coast? The horizon is 17 miles away. The proposed channel wind farm is 10.


In all honesty, there’s no ‘right place’ for a wind farm. Just like there’s no ‘right place’ for a rubbish dump or – without wishing to be controversial – for a gypsy encampment. NIMBY.


So whilst the environmentalists hail the victory, I wonder what is their alternative. Just when our Lords and Masters had announced the construction of several new nuclear power stations in the UK, an earthquake has caused the Fukushima nuclear facility to turn into another “Three Mile Island” and has once again brought to the fore the dangers of nuclear power. And which of us can ever forget Chernobyl? And which government will now dare to bring them in?


The same anti-nuclear and anti-wind-turbine environmentalists are also hot on the ‘man-made global warming’ myth. And whilst not subscribing to the theory myself, I can fully understand that we don’t want another tranche of coal- or oil-burning power stations pumping their noxious fumes into the atmosphere. Well, not round here anyway. I expect that secretly they don’t mind conventional power stations in someone else’s back yard. But coal and oil are not sustainable. But my message to you is – if not wind-farms, nuclear, or coal/oil, then what? Just saying ‘no’ isn’t


good enough. You have to come up with an alternative. Unless you want to go back to the dark ages, to do without electricity, grow beards, wear anoraks and freeze to death, in which case go on being an ‘anti-everything’.


We have everything we need to generate electricity until the next millennium. Right here. In our own back yard. It’s free, it’s sustainable, it’s non-polluting, and it’s been here all the time. The power stations don’t have to be ugly concrete monsters, and no birds will be hurt in the generation of your electricity.


What a sad letter that was in last month’s Gazette from Frances Prescott on the subject of public footpaths. Sad inasmuch as it is highly unlikely that anyone – be they Councillor, MP, or anyone else – will take much notice of her very valid case. In case you missed it (page 10, and the magazine’s still on the website) she said “the Rights of Way Committee is not fit for purpose. The Chairman and Committee did not appear to be in command of the evidence…..or to understand the law that had to be applied to the decision-making process…..the Committee was not fit for purpose…..a travesty of justice ….. an insult to the people of Dorset”.


But as there is patently no shame in local government the same as there’s no shame in national government, these useless incompetents will no doubt go on with deliberating matters beyond their comprehension. I call upon them all – the whole Rights of Way Committee – to resign en masse until they have sufficient training to enable them to at least understand what they’re doing.


But this is Dorset County Council, led by a clique (sorry, I meant ‘cabinet’) and controlled by overpaid officials apparently answerable to no-one, so I guess it’s a case of same waste matter, different day.


And finally what IS happening at Worth Matravers? Is there any truth in the suggestion that the Parish Council is in favour of a ‘bypass’ taking traffic/ caravans round the village rather than through it? Through it to where, for heavens sake? Are there yet sufficient businesses on the other side of the village to merit the despoliation of the fields in an AONB or will the establishment of a bypass be the thin end of a wedge to significant development to justify the road’s existence? Who stands to gain from it? Seems strange to me. I thought that Worth Matravers was a tourist destination rather than a route to somewhere else. Watch this space; I will unashamedly campaign through this column in an attempt to prevent further commercialisation of Worth Matravers, one of the last unspoiled parts of Purbeck.


The Parish Council of Worth Matravers is supposed to represent both Worth Matravers and Harmans Cross. There are no Harmans Cross representatives on it. How many of these councillors are actually elected through the democratic process and how many are co-opted? How many come up for re-election on May 5th?


Answers on a polling card please. Co-option should be a stop-gap measure to fill casual vacancies and every co-opted member should come off at election time so that the Council should be a properly elected body not – as it has been described to me this morning – a ‘personal fiefdom’.


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