PUT THEM WHERE POOR PEOPLE LIVE!

Residents of villages in the area affected by the proposed ScottishPower Renewables Lenchwick Windfarm project are terrified that the values of their properties will collapse when the turbines are erected.

They're so concerned, they've plastered their charming villages with crude yellow posters designed to welcome prospective buyers.

"Anyone thinking of buying a property in this area," said a spokesperson from VVASP (Vale Villagers Are Spouting Piffle), "will see these glaring 'NO' placards everywhere and realise that we are a caring community. We meet up regularly to rant and rave, to abuse parish councillors and to tell each other scary stories about progress. We care passionately about wildlife, including the stuff we blast out of the skies with our shotguns, and our concern for the environment is such that, when all this is over, we will dispose of hundreds of these plywood anti-wind farm placards by burning them on a huge bonfire ... er, I mean ... putting them in landfill."

Said another, "We welcome any newcomers to these villages - especially those who build big new houses which blight the landscape, and we're not too worried about planning permission if you want to build a huge new extension and then sell your property on. All that we ask is that you agree unthinkingly with everything we say, or we'll send the boys round, know what I mean?"

As for the proposed wind farm, VVASP are adamant that no one anywhere in the world likes them. "We are not a protest group," said one swivel-eyed protester. "We believe passionately in renewable energy. We just don't want to see any of it near us. We have as much right to electricity as anybody, but really, I mean, we shouldn't have to see it being produced, all quietly and without pollution and all that! I mean, the Lenches are a special area! We have special needs! Someone else can provide our electricity - it's not our problem!"

Another pointed out that the Lenches are not a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty - "Cripes, you have to be really loaded to live in one of them!" - but insisted that it was rather pretty all the same. "Buying a house in the Lenches is like buying a yacht: it's a status thing. We moved here for the peace and quiet, for the quaintly rural sound of angry mobs, and we've already complained about the noise made by inconsiderate farmers with their industrial tractors and their bleating sheep. Now they want to put up some turbines somewhere nearby. Well over my dead body," he said, as the vein in his temple throbbed.

Even though the area is ideally suited for the siting of a commercial wind farm, the protesters - who aren't protesting about anything, of course they're not - argue that they should be erected somewhere else, preferably well out of sight. "Why can't they put them in the middle of cities, or in the ghetto, or somewhere? Why not build them where we used to live, before we made a bit of money? This is a middle class area - they've no right to produce clean energy harmlessly in a middle class area! It's just wrong!"

"They'll blow all the blossom off the trees!" said an old man with a poor grasp of science.

"I had no problem at all with wind turbines, I even thought they were quite nice, until they started talking about putting some nearby, and then I went to a VVASP meeting and discovered that they're something to do with al-Qaeda or something and paedophiles hide inside them," said an attractive but rather dim woman. "Now I've already got a drink problem just thinking about them."

"These turbines will knock ten per cent off the value of our house overnight," said a man with a big red face. "That's a fact. There's no actual evidence for it, but it is a fact. Just like what the VVASP have told us, that these turbines climb into your bedroom at night and murder your firstborn."

The protesters raised their fears about the possible impact on mental health with a representative from Scottish Power. "I said to him, these things turn people into raving loonies, don't they? And all he could say was, 'I doubt you'll notice any difference.' Pathetic!"

"Nuclear power - that's the answer!" said another protester - correction: thoughtful individual. "They should build a nuclear power station here instead," he added, before being beaten to death by villagers wielding angry yellow placards.

"Vale Villagers are the most tolerant people anywhere, and I'll twat anyone who says otherwise!" said one of the survivors. "We want plenty of wealthy people to move here, to buy our houses from us, even though we have no intention whatsoever of leaving, because it's such a great community. Inclusive, that's the word. We just don't want any Guardian readers. They make me sick."

Anyone thinking of moving to the Lenches should lie down in a dark room for a while.