The following is the transcript of a guest blog post requested and published by the campaign group "Embrace My Planet" on their website, www.embracemyplanet.com.
IF YOU TOLERATE THIS ...
There's nothing quite like discovering that you're surrounded by Nimbies. Those who have seen either version of the movie "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" will have some idea of what it's like. It's terrifying. Suddenly, seemingly intelligent and rational people become the victims of some strange cult-like mind control. They attack, threaten and betray their neighbours. And they'll believe and say pretty well anything if they think it will advance their "cause".
Such things as facts, evidence, eyewitness testimony, common sense and the fundamental principles of science, democracy and civilised behaviour mean nothing to them. They will hijack any group, any occasion, any opportunity for their own devious ends.
Our very own Nimby nightmare began towards the end of 2008, with the announcement by ScottishPower Renewables that they were considering the area around my Worcestershire village as a potential site for a wind farm. Within hours, it seemed, a small number of local fanatics had got busy and were posting atrociously inaccurate anti-windfarm propaganda through people's doors.
By early 2010, supporters of the proposed Lenchwick Windfarm had successfully appealed to the independent Advertising Standards Authority about the outrageous claims the protest group VVASP ('Vale Villages Against Scottish Power') had been making since the start.
Sadly, too much damage had already been done. A form of mob-rule had been unleashed by a retired scientist who appointed himself Chief Nimby and proceeded to hoodwink, delude and terrify local villagers with his half-baked lies about wind turbines. The die was cast. We were living in Nimby hell.
Local democracy was quickly overturned. The parish councils nearby had carried out polls which revealed that, regardless of the crazy rumours spread about by VVASP the majority of residents either approved of the windfarm or couldn't be bothered to reply. VVASP got rid of one conscientious parish council by disrupting all its meetings; their head honcho refused to cooperate with the acting Chair of the parish council in preserving some sort of order, and the councillors resigned en masse. The Nimbies took over the parish council.
They then set up something they called a "Windfarm Working Party". They insisted that a councillor from each of the five adjoining parish councils be co-opted onto it and demanded an initial payment of £750 from each parish council towards its function of "information gathering and sharing". This money would be accounted for retrospectively every three months. That was last summer. As far as can be ascertained, no accounts have yet been presented to explain the expenditure of some £4,500 of tax-payers' money.
There is no evidence of the "Windfarm Working Party" visiting a working windfarm or contacting groups in favour of renewables. They did however sit down with VVASP as soon as they'd got their hands on our parish council money and agreed on how they were going to share it. Whether we like it or not, public money is seemingly going to a consultant advising the Nimby group on how to object to the planning application. Attempts by local residents to solicit information regarding the "Windfarm Working Party" - it's constitution, activities and use of our money - have been met by a stone wall.
It was this sort of lawless behaviour that prompted the "Wind of Change" blog, along with the constant barrage of lies. The anti-windfarm protest group insists that it's not a protest group and it's not anti-windfarms. Their website claims to be providing "comprehensive information" so that the community can make an "informed decision", and yet not one single article has ever appeared which presents data favourable to windfarms or renewables in general.
At public information sessions held by ScottishPower Renewables, the Nimbies were out in force, making sure that nobody got to hear the truth. Anyone who expressed even mild support for the turbines was accused of being in the pay of a wind power company. If you want to feel threatened, just tell a Nimby that windfarms aren't as noisy as they claim they are. Or just ask them a question. In fact, just say anything that doesn't conform to the brainwashed Nimby line and you'll soon find yourself in trouble.
The blog - www.lenchwind.blogspot.com - has been running since the beginning of May 2009. The British Library has now added it to its web archive, so that future generations can see how disgracefully certain newcomers to a rural community responded to a 21st century opportunity (by and large, it's the recent "immigrants" from the cities who oppose the plans and not our "native" residents or the farming community, who recognise that the countryside is a working environment).
Like those irresponsible right-wing newspapers, the Daily Mail and The Telegraph, our local Nimbies are simply refusing to accept that we are living in the 21st century. They demand the right to consume at 20th century levels on the grounds that they won't have to pay the bill. They have glimpsed the future in the form of elegant, inspirational, exhilarating wind turbines and have decided that they want to go backwards and let the UK fall behind the rest of the world.
Most of all, they care nothing for the environment, the planet, the needs of the many or of future generations. Their petty-minded and dishonest Nimbyism is a product of selfishness, pure and simple, combined with a kind of deliberate ignorance. Oh, and arrogance, too - the arrogance of people who are convinced that they alone have the right to an opinion. The arrogance of those who can afford to move into a "nice" country area and then seek to dictate what can and can't happen there. The arrogance of the bully who has found something they can use to whip up hysteria and hatred and thereby become leader of the gang.
We can and we must oppose them. The "Wind of Change" blog will show you how you can help to overcome such mindless, mendacious and anti-social opposition to a beneficial and necessary scheme. And please - support your local windfarm.
"AEOLUS"
To show your support for the eminently sensible, inspiring and totally harmless Lenchwick Windfarm development, just click here and fill in the form:
http://81.171.139.151/WAM/createComment.do?action=CreateApplicationComment&applicationType=PLANNING&appNumber=W%2F10%2F01074%2FPN
Thanks.
Tuesday, 29 June 2010
Monday, 28 June 2010
SETTING A FINE EXAMPLE
Is nothing sacred any more?
The Flower Festival. It's a major event in the summer calendar, locally. Gardens are thrown open (and not, as they were not so long ago, purely to raise money for the big nimby parade), the churches are done up, displays in the very pretty church at Rous Lench are themed ... It's all very villagey, very English.
Well, the buggers of VVASP ("Vale Villagers Against Sensible People") ruined it, didn't they?
And how did they ruin it, you ask.
They attached a huge banner, advertising one of their Nuremberg-style Rallies - sorry, 'public meetings' - to the school railings. So that anyone happily, peacefully attending the Flower Festival or just driving through Church Lench on a lovely summery weekend had little choice but to see their ghastly, tasteless, godawful banner promoting yet another mindless night of fanatical nimbyism and hatred.
Should they have done this? No, certainly not. The school railings are not village property - they belong to the school. So, in order to advertise their Psycho Evenings the frauds of VVASP had to cheekily hijack school premises.
Now, I don't know about you, but I thought that our schools were attempting to teach our children the importance of caring for the environment.
So what kind of message does it give out to the young and impressionable of the area when irresponsible adults come along and tie a banner to the school railings in the name of a vicious group of evil nimbies who can't stand the environment? Who lie about caring for the environment when the only things they care about are their bank balances and their egos. Who don't even like children very much, and certainly don't care for any of this teaching-them-about-the-environment stuff because WHERE'S THE RIGHT-WING IDIOCY IN THAT, EH??
And you know what? The sick nimbies KNEW that they weren't allowed to tie political banners to the school railings. How do we know this?
Because the banner mysteriously disappeared. It had been up long enough to annoy any decent passing stranger, anyone keen to see the flowers in a couple of villages, and was then hastily removed before the school authorities found out about the flagrant misuse of their property.
Of course, we have seen time and time again that a) VVASP refuse to recognise that any property doesn't belong to them; they think it's all theirs, whatever it is - a mental illness that is becoming quite a problem in the area these days; and b) VVASP often throw up banners and placards, rather hurriedly, in places where they're not allowed to do so, just for a short period - i.e., when a politician is dropping by for a nimby natter - and then just as hastily get rid of them before any real people notice and kick up a fuss.
So, to their craven self-centredness, their brainwashed ignorance, they gallumphing sense of self-important, their total lack of perspective and their sheer effrontery in defrauding us of our money, we can add cowardice and a total lack of interest in the importance of the message being given out to our children to the ever-lengthening list of VVASP's crimes.
It really is about time that the whole of VVASP received an ASBO. They are collectively (as well as individually, in many cases) about as psychopathically antisocial as you can get!!
The Flower Festival. It's a major event in the summer calendar, locally. Gardens are thrown open (and not, as they were not so long ago, purely to raise money for the big nimby parade), the churches are done up, displays in the very pretty church at Rous Lench are themed ... It's all very villagey, very English.
Well, the buggers of VVASP ("Vale Villagers Against Sensible People") ruined it, didn't they?
And how did they ruin it, you ask.
They attached a huge banner, advertising one of their Nuremberg-style Rallies - sorry, 'public meetings' - to the school railings. So that anyone happily, peacefully attending the Flower Festival or just driving through Church Lench on a lovely summery weekend had little choice but to see their ghastly, tasteless, godawful banner promoting yet another mindless night of fanatical nimbyism and hatred.
Should they have done this? No, certainly not. The school railings are not village property - they belong to the school. So, in order to advertise their Psycho Evenings the frauds of VVASP had to cheekily hijack school premises.
Now, I don't know about you, but I thought that our schools were attempting to teach our children the importance of caring for the environment.
So what kind of message does it give out to the young and impressionable of the area when irresponsible adults come along and tie a banner to the school railings in the name of a vicious group of evil nimbies who can't stand the environment? Who lie about caring for the environment when the only things they care about are their bank balances and their egos. Who don't even like children very much, and certainly don't care for any of this teaching-them-about-the-environment stuff because WHERE'S THE RIGHT-WING IDIOCY IN THAT, EH??
And you know what? The sick nimbies KNEW that they weren't allowed to tie political banners to the school railings. How do we know this?
Because the banner mysteriously disappeared. It had been up long enough to annoy any decent passing stranger, anyone keen to see the flowers in a couple of villages, and was then hastily removed before the school authorities found out about the flagrant misuse of their property.
Of course, we have seen time and time again that a) VVASP refuse to recognise that any property doesn't belong to them; they think it's all theirs, whatever it is - a mental illness that is becoming quite a problem in the area these days; and b) VVASP often throw up banners and placards, rather hurriedly, in places where they're not allowed to do so, just for a short period - i.e., when a politician is dropping by for a nimby natter - and then just as hastily get rid of them before any real people notice and kick up a fuss.
So, to their craven self-centredness, their brainwashed ignorance, they gallumphing sense of self-important, their total lack of perspective and their sheer effrontery in defrauding us of our money, we can add cowardice and a total lack of interest in the importance of the message being given out to our children to the ever-lengthening list of VVASP's crimes.
It really is about time that the whole of VVASP received an ASBO. They are collectively (as well as individually, in many cases) about as psychopathically antisocial as you can get!!
Saturday, 26 June 2010
HOW NIMBYISM WORKS
Thanks to the British Library, this blog will be available, via their web archive, for future generations to study. Those who have yet to be born will be able to delve back into one horrifying chapter (a small, local one) in the transition from 20th century wastefulness to 21st century responsibility. They will be able to read what sort of idiotic things were said, and what devious and despicable things were done, by the selfish, foolish nookies of Lench in their lunatic fight against a Very Good Thing.
So, this is partly for those researchers of the future - those who will be studying, either the story of how we successfully got to grips with the problems caused by previous generations, or how we failed because the previous generation was just too bloody pig-headed and out-of-touch.
Nimbies are foul creatures. Vermin, really. They don't object to something because it's bad. They object to it because it is. There isn't any moral judgement involved. It's all down to the me-me-me thinking of the sort of person who has relocated to the Lenches in such numbers in recent years.
But what's odd is that most of the local nimby bunch aren't really nimbies at all. They're just along for the ride.
A careful analysis of that neo-fascist organisation calling itself 'VVASP' (a corrupt body which has proven, time and time again, that it is incapable of telling the truth about the simplest things) reveals that there is a hardcore of desperately irresponsible, neurotic and self-important individuals who have stirred this whole thing up.
Their reasons for doing so are not very impressive. One of them just doesn't want to see anything quote-industrial-unquote near his retirement home. To him, wind turbines are "industrial". And, like anything else that is "industrial", they "don't work", they're "inefficient" and they're really just a subsidy-sucking scam. A man of proven dishonesty, sad to say.
Another is just crazy. Totally hysterical. Ask two consecutive questions and she flies off the handle. An example was sent in by one of our correspondents. We'll call the nimby concerned "Mrs X":
Human Being ('HB'): "But what are you afraid of?"
Mrs X: "Are you kidding?"
HB: "No. And, honestly, I'm sorry to hear that you are so worried about this wind farm - but what is it exactly that worries you so much about it?"
Mrs X: "WE DON'T KNOW!!!!!"
Yes, folks. That person is leading the anti-windfarm protest. Which, according to nimby High Command, isn't a protest. And it isn't anti-windfarms. La, la, la-dee-dah, la, la ...
Around these two individuals, there are some very unpleasant lieutenants - Basil Fawlty lookalikes who stride about trying to pretend that they own EVERYTHING; Billy Bunter-types who inherited lots and have no social skills (and who think they own EVERYTHING) ... These people are the enforcers. They make sure that the daft pronouncements of the "intellectuals" running VVASP get spread about the place. They keep the pressure up, as it were.
There is then a layer of weirdos. People who complain about anything. Everything. Doesn't matter. Something to complain about? They're your chaps. Do they know anything at all about the subject? DOESN'T MATTER!! They just want to complain about it, whatever it is.
Fodder to the ideologues and arch-deceivers at the heart of VVASP.
But there are yet more layers, and these are the saddest of them all. These are made up of two types of people:
1) Those who just want to fit in. Is that a bandwagon going past? Better jump on it, then. Anything but appear to be remotely individual. Must, must, must look like part of the gang. Don't want to be left out.
2) Those who, for the sake of a quiet life, let the evil nimbies march all over them. Among this group we can include a number of parish councillors.
So, what happens is a tiny number of people with extraordinary chips on their shoulders start to organise an oppressive, fraudulent nimby campaign. They have their would-be-jackbooted henchmen to go round stirring up trouble and making sure that everybody, but everybody, gets the message.
They are eagerly joined by the seasoned complainers against this and that and the other and oh God everything's all gone to pot hasn't it I blame the EU, myself ...
And then a few noses twitch, and the nervous types think "Oh, I'd better join this group of nimbies or they'll think I'm an outsider. Please, let me join! Please!! And can I be milk monitor, please? Pleeeeeassse??" (This type like making friends with the bullies - probably some kind of childhood trauma involved here).
And then those who should know better look the other way, thinking "Oh dear, a maddened angry mob, pumped up on crazy propaganda and stupid slogans by the ringleaders and whipped into an aggressive mood by the agitators and happy now that they've got something to moan about and anxious to prove that they're part of the majority - oh yes, a majority they are, regardless of numbers and things - and, heck, better give them what they want and then they might go away!"
And that, dear friends, is a nimby protest. It's the weak frightened by the timid led by the awkward and the confused led by the aggressive and the selfish led by the deranged and the dishonest.
The Daily Mail's perfect world, you could say.
So, this is partly for those researchers of the future - those who will be studying, either the story of how we successfully got to grips with the problems caused by previous generations, or how we failed because the previous generation was just too bloody pig-headed and out-of-touch.
Nimbies are foul creatures. Vermin, really. They don't object to something because it's bad. They object to it because it is. There isn't any moral judgement involved. It's all down to the me-me-me thinking of the sort of person who has relocated to the Lenches in such numbers in recent years.
But what's odd is that most of the local nimby bunch aren't really nimbies at all. They're just along for the ride.
A careful analysis of that neo-fascist organisation calling itself 'VVASP' (a corrupt body which has proven, time and time again, that it is incapable of telling the truth about the simplest things) reveals that there is a hardcore of desperately irresponsible, neurotic and self-important individuals who have stirred this whole thing up.
Their reasons for doing so are not very impressive. One of them just doesn't want to see anything quote-industrial-unquote near his retirement home. To him, wind turbines are "industrial". And, like anything else that is "industrial", they "don't work", they're "inefficient" and they're really just a subsidy-sucking scam. A man of proven dishonesty, sad to say.
Another is just crazy. Totally hysterical. Ask two consecutive questions and she flies off the handle. An example was sent in by one of our correspondents. We'll call the nimby concerned "Mrs X":
Human Being ('HB'): "But what are you afraid of?"
Mrs X: "Are you kidding?"
HB: "No. And, honestly, I'm sorry to hear that you are so worried about this wind farm - but what is it exactly that worries you so much about it?"
Mrs X: "WE DON'T KNOW!!!!!"
Yes, folks. That person is leading the anti-windfarm protest. Which, according to nimby High Command, isn't a protest. And it isn't anti-windfarms. La, la, la-dee-dah, la, la ...
Around these two individuals, there are some very unpleasant lieutenants - Basil Fawlty lookalikes who stride about trying to pretend that they own EVERYTHING; Billy Bunter-types who inherited lots and have no social skills (and who think they own EVERYTHING) ... These people are the enforcers. They make sure that the daft pronouncements of the "intellectuals" running VVASP get spread about the place. They keep the pressure up, as it were.
There is then a layer of weirdos. People who complain about anything. Everything. Doesn't matter. Something to complain about? They're your chaps. Do they know anything at all about the subject? DOESN'T MATTER!! They just want to complain about it, whatever it is.
Fodder to the ideologues and arch-deceivers at the heart of VVASP.
But there are yet more layers, and these are the saddest of them all. These are made up of two types of people:
1) Those who just want to fit in. Is that a bandwagon going past? Better jump on it, then. Anything but appear to be remotely individual. Must, must, must look like part of the gang. Don't want to be left out.
2) Those who, for the sake of a quiet life, let the evil nimbies march all over them. Among this group we can include a number of parish councillors.
So, what happens is a tiny number of people with extraordinary chips on their shoulders start to organise an oppressive, fraudulent nimby campaign. They have their would-be-jackbooted henchmen to go round stirring up trouble and making sure that everybody, but everybody, gets the message.
They are eagerly joined by the seasoned complainers against this and that and the other and oh God everything's all gone to pot hasn't it I blame the EU, myself ...
And then a few noses twitch, and the nervous types think "Oh, I'd better join this group of nimbies or they'll think I'm an outsider. Please, let me join! Please!! And can I be milk monitor, please? Pleeeeeassse??" (This type like making friends with the bullies - probably some kind of childhood trauma involved here).
And then those who should know better look the other way, thinking "Oh dear, a maddened angry mob, pumped up on crazy propaganda and stupid slogans by the ringleaders and whipped into an aggressive mood by the agitators and happy now that they've got something to moan about and anxious to prove that they're part of the majority - oh yes, a majority they are, regardless of numbers and things - and, heck, better give them what they want and then they might go away!"
And that, dear friends, is a nimby protest. It's the weak frightened by the timid led by the awkward and the confused led by the aggressive and the selfish led by the deranged and the dishonest.
The Daily Mail's perfect world, you could say.
Monday, 21 June 2010
WHAT ARE THEY OBJECTING TO?
They don't know. They haven't been told yet.
Members of VVASP (motto - 'We Make the Nazis Look Subtle') have been contacted and told to hold their horses (in some cases, literally).
They have received instructions not to object to the Lenchwick Windfarm planning application just yet. This is on the grounds that frothing and foaming at the mouth isn't really a convincing argument, and just going "Turbines? Monsters!! Grrrr!" means nothing.
As the VVASP's Chief Dalek put it, "It is very important that those of us who want to object use the right reasons." Which kind of suggests that, left to their own devices, most of the VVASP drones would use the wrong reasons - which probably includes repeating all the lies, myths, falsehoods and inaccuracies that the VVASP's Politburo has used to brainwash and mislead them all along.
VVASP have realised that they stand no chance whatsoever of being taken seriously if their membership bark and baa and blether and talk nonsense as usual.
That's why they have "hired a specialist on the best way to object".
Actually, what that means is YOU have hired a specialist in duping the planning committee. WE have ALL hired a specialist in misleading our elected representatives because VVASP are almost certainly using our parish council funds to pay for this dodgy advice.
Now - we've all seen the scene, haven't we? Evil criminal mastermind gets off on a technicality thanks to his expensive lawyer. Everyone screams "Foul!" and maybe some right-thinking cop takes justice into his own hands. We're familiar with that sort of scenario, aren't we?
And that's just what VVASP are wasting your money on - hiring an "expert" they hope will get them off the hook on a technicality, so that we can all go to hell in a handcart thanks to them.
Till then, though, the sheep of VVASP are under orders not to contact the council and spout meaningless gibberish. No, wait till you've been told exactly what technicality you can object to. And then all object at once.
Fortunately, the experienced members of Wychavon District Council's planning committee weren't born yesterday. They'll be able to tell that all these VVASP objections were coordinated by the group of egotistical arch-liars at their core.
And we'll probably find that all that public money wasted by VVASP and its phoney "Windfarm Working Party" on experts was - well, yeah - wasted.
Meanwhile, real people who know the truth about wind power and aren't frightened off it are free to support the Lenchwick Windfarm planning application whenever they like, up till 31 July. We will not be hiring expensive "professionals" to tell us how to express our support, and we will not be telling you how or when to go about it. We believe that adults (i.e. those likely to approve of the development) can sort themselves out.
Here's where you can register your support today: http://81.171.139.151/WAM/createComment.do?action=CreateApplicationComment&applicationType=PLANNING&appNumber=W%2F10%2F01074%2FPN
Do us all - the Vale, the nation, the planet - a favour and vote 'YES' to Lenchwick Windfarm.
Members of VVASP (motto - 'We Make the Nazis Look Subtle') have been contacted and told to hold their horses (in some cases, literally).
They have received instructions not to object to the Lenchwick Windfarm planning application just yet. This is on the grounds that frothing and foaming at the mouth isn't really a convincing argument, and just going "Turbines? Monsters!! Grrrr!" means nothing.
As the VVASP's Chief Dalek put it, "It is very important that those of us who want to object use the right reasons." Which kind of suggests that, left to their own devices, most of the VVASP drones would use the wrong reasons - which probably includes repeating all the lies, myths, falsehoods and inaccuracies that the VVASP's Politburo has used to brainwash and mislead them all along.
VVASP have realised that they stand no chance whatsoever of being taken seriously if their membership bark and baa and blether and talk nonsense as usual.
That's why they have "hired a specialist on the best way to object".
Actually, what that means is YOU have hired a specialist in duping the planning committee. WE have ALL hired a specialist in misleading our elected representatives because VVASP are almost certainly using our parish council funds to pay for this dodgy advice.
Now - we've all seen the scene, haven't we? Evil criminal mastermind gets off on a technicality thanks to his expensive lawyer. Everyone screams "Foul!" and maybe some right-thinking cop takes justice into his own hands. We're familiar with that sort of scenario, aren't we?
And that's just what VVASP are wasting your money on - hiring an "expert" they hope will get them off the hook on a technicality, so that we can all go to hell in a handcart thanks to them.
Till then, though, the sheep of VVASP are under orders not to contact the council and spout meaningless gibberish. No, wait till you've been told exactly what technicality you can object to. And then all object at once.
Fortunately, the experienced members of Wychavon District Council's planning committee weren't born yesterday. They'll be able to tell that all these VVASP objections were coordinated by the group of egotistical arch-liars at their core.
And we'll probably find that all that public money wasted by VVASP and its phoney "Windfarm Working Party" on experts was - well, yeah - wasted.
Meanwhile, real people who know the truth about wind power and aren't frightened off it are free to support the Lenchwick Windfarm planning application whenever they like, up till 31 July. We will not be hiring expensive "professionals" to tell us how to express our support, and we will not be telling you how or when to go about it. We believe that adults (i.e. those likely to approve of the development) can sort themselves out.
Here's where you can register your support today: http://81.171.139.151/WAM/createComment.do?action=CreateApplicationComment&applicationType=PLANNING&appNumber=W%2F10%2F01074%2FPN
Do us all - the Vale, the nation, the planet - a favour and vote 'YES' to Lenchwick Windfarm.
Saturday, 19 June 2010
HOW MUCH WILL VVASP COST US?
Money is about the only thing the nimbies understand. So it's pretty amazing to discover that their selfish and stupid opposition to a perfectly sane development will end up costing us all thousands, if not millions of pounds.
So far, the anti-windfarm protesters have helped themselves to £4,500 of public money. This came out of the precepts of six parish councils and is being misused by a "Windfarm Working Party" set up by the rabid nimbies of Church Lench Parish Council in order to ease the VVASP work load (VVASP members would rather YOU paid for their shady dealings than THEY had to).
So we're already £4,500 down.
Now, let's assume that Wychavon DC do the sensible, progressive, intelligent and proper thing and approve ScottishPower Renewables' plans for the Lenchwick Windfarm. VVASP will, as a kneejerk reaction, call for a judicial review. With any luck, they won't get one. But if they did, that would set the tax-payer back at the very least some £100,000.
You'll be paying that, my friends, just so that the mad members of VVASP can waste a bit more time (and a lot more of your money).
Now, worst comes to the worst, and VVASP somehow manage to get the windfarm stopped altogether. What will that cost us?
First of all, there are those annual payments from the developer to a community trust. These are based on the number of megawatts of electricity produced by the windfarm and tend to be upwards of £2,000 per megawatt. For twenty-five years. So if we take the lowest offer, and assume it will stay at that rate for the full twenty-five years, the local area will lose out on £575,000 - all thanks to the looney brigade of VVASP.
Oh, by the way - that money is for the community. Not VVASP's idea of the community (just themselves) but the full six parishes of the immediate area. So they will effectively be stealing from their neighbours, just as they basically stole your tax money via the parish councils.
AND that amount doesn't take into account the government's promise to "allow communities that host renewable energy projects to keep the additional business rates they generate." That's from the coaltion government's policy document. Anyone want to calculate 25 years worth of business rates generated by the Lenchwick turbines - and then add that to the huge and rising total of what VVASP want to deprive us all of?
Perhaps worst, though, is the fact that if the selfish, petty-minded nimbies get their way, they will have set back the necessary progress of wind power and renewable energy generation in the UK. Power cuts will follow within a very few years, matched by massive rising in energy bills. The government will lurch back towards unsustainable ways of generating energy.
And you and your children will end up paying God knows what. And the planet will end up paying even more.
So, that's what VVASP really are. Greedy grasping money-hogging fools who will happily cost those around them thousands and thousands of pounds - and all for no good reason.
So far, the anti-windfarm protesters have helped themselves to £4,500 of public money. This came out of the precepts of six parish councils and is being misused by a "Windfarm Working Party" set up by the rabid nimbies of Church Lench Parish Council in order to ease the VVASP work load (VVASP members would rather YOU paid for their shady dealings than THEY had to).
So we're already £4,500 down.
Now, let's assume that Wychavon DC do the sensible, progressive, intelligent and proper thing and approve ScottishPower Renewables' plans for the Lenchwick Windfarm. VVASP will, as a kneejerk reaction, call for a judicial review. With any luck, they won't get one. But if they did, that would set the tax-payer back at the very least some £100,000.
You'll be paying that, my friends, just so that the mad members of VVASP can waste a bit more time (and a lot more of your money).
Now, worst comes to the worst, and VVASP somehow manage to get the windfarm stopped altogether. What will that cost us?
First of all, there are those annual payments from the developer to a community trust. These are based on the number of megawatts of electricity produced by the windfarm and tend to be upwards of £2,000 per megawatt. For twenty-five years. So if we take the lowest offer, and assume it will stay at that rate for the full twenty-five years, the local area will lose out on £575,000 - all thanks to the looney brigade of VVASP.
Oh, by the way - that money is for the community. Not VVASP's idea of the community (just themselves) but the full six parishes of the immediate area. So they will effectively be stealing from their neighbours, just as they basically stole your tax money via the parish councils.
AND that amount doesn't take into account the government's promise to "allow communities that host renewable energy projects to keep the additional business rates they generate." That's from the coaltion government's policy document. Anyone want to calculate 25 years worth of business rates generated by the Lenchwick turbines - and then add that to the huge and rising total of what VVASP want to deprive us all of?
Perhaps worst, though, is the fact that if the selfish, petty-minded nimbies get their way, they will have set back the necessary progress of wind power and renewable energy generation in the UK. Power cuts will follow within a very few years, matched by massive rising in energy bills. The government will lurch back towards unsustainable ways of generating energy.
And you and your children will end up paying God knows what. And the planet will end up paying even more.
So, that's what VVASP really are. Greedy grasping money-hogging fools who will happily cost those around them thousands and thousands of pounds - and all for no good reason.
Friday, 18 June 2010
KILLING THE COUNTRYSIDE
One of the most terrifying aspects of the vicious nimby campaign being carried out by VVASP (Vale Villains Against Sane Practices) is what it reveals about the newcomers' attitudes to the countryside.
Back in 1962, Rachel Carson published a massively influential book entitled "Silent Spring". It's credited with helping to launch the environmental movement.
Carson had noticed how unnaturally quiet rural areas were becoming as a result of the widespread use of agricultural chemicals like DDT. Basically, human beings were killing off the world's wildlife in droves.
Horrifying, I'm sure you'll agree.
Ah, no - not to the nasty nimbies. They LOVE the idea of a completely silent countryside. It's what they moved here for, goddammit!
They grew up with some daft idea of what the countryside is. Real country dwellers recognise it as a working landscape, a kind of vast green factory, whose job it is to feed us.
But the weeny-brains who insisted on invading our villages and planting their hideous new-build homes in our midst don't realise this.
They hate farmers (ugly yokels). They hate farm machinery (ugly, dirty). They hate farm animals (dirty, noisy). They hate rural activities (coarse, noisy, populist) - unless of course we're counting those middle-class exclusive things that incomers want to do. They don't much care for church bells (noisy). Or children (noisy). Or anything, really (noisy, ugly, dirty).
Which means that they yearn for the Silent Spring that the rest of us - the sane, the caring - so deplore. They want a dead landscape, swept clean of life: a picture postcard that never changes, in which no work is ever carried out, and from which no one - but no one - benefits other than themselves.
Theirs is a crazy, deluded, utterly selfish, false image of country life - and that's what they're trying to impose on the rest of us.
So when the chief dingbat of the VVASP (Vain Victims of Anti-Scientific Propaganda) declares that the proposed windfarm will "kill the Vale countryside", you'd think that the nimbies would cheer their dark little hearts out. Killing the countryside is what they're all about. Privatising it, shooshing it, making it an exclusive playground for the middle-classes, but NO NOISE WHATSOEVER. NO SOUND, NO LIFE, NO ACTIVITY AT ANY COST!!!
It is they who are killing the countryside with their ignorance, their stuffiness, their paranoid foolishness, their unreasonable arrogance, their hatred and their lies.
The windfarm will bring life to the area.
That's what the nookies really can't stand.
Back in 1962, Rachel Carson published a massively influential book entitled "Silent Spring". It's credited with helping to launch the environmental movement.
Carson had noticed how unnaturally quiet rural areas were becoming as a result of the widespread use of agricultural chemicals like DDT. Basically, human beings were killing off the world's wildlife in droves.
Horrifying, I'm sure you'll agree.
Ah, no - not to the nasty nimbies. They LOVE the idea of a completely silent countryside. It's what they moved here for, goddammit!
They grew up with some daft idea of what the countryside is. Real country dwellers recognise it as a working landscape, a kind of vast green factory, whose job it is to feed us.
But the weeny-brains who insisted on invading our villages and planting their hideous new-build homes in our midst don't realise this.
They hate farmers (ugly yokels). They hate farm machinery (ugly, dirty). They hate farm animals (dirty, noisy). They hate rural activities (coarse, noisy, populist) - unless of course we're counting those middle-class exclusive things that incomers want to do. They don't much care for church bells (noisy). Or children (noisy). Or anything, really (noisy, ugly, dirty).
Which means that they yearn for the Silent Spring that the rest of us - the sane, the caring - so deplore. They want a dead landscape, swept clean of life: a picture postcard that never changes, in which no work is ever carried out, and from which no one - but no one - benefits other than themselves.
Theirs is a crazy, deluded, utterly selfish, false image of country life - and that's what they're trying to impose on the rest of us.
So when the chief dingbat of the VVASP (Vain Victims of Anti-Scientific Propaganda) declares that the proposed windfarm will "kill the Vale countryside", you'd think that the nimbies would cheer their dark little hearts out. Killing the countryside is what they're all about. Privatising it, shooshing it, making it an exclusive playground for the middle-classes, but NO NOISE WHATSOEVER. NO SOUND, NO LIFE, NO ACTIVITY AT ANY COST!!!
It is they who are killing the countryside with their ignorance, their stuffiness, their paranoid foolishness, their unreasonable arrogance, their hatred and their lies.
The windfarm will bring life to the area.
That's what the nookies really can't stand.
Thursday, 17 June 2010
NIMBY DOUBLE STANDARDS
Okay, guys - the public consultation period for the Lenchwick Windfarm planning application ends on 31 July 2010.
That means we have six weeks in which to get as many people as possible to support the plans.
The nimby "Windfarm Working Party" asked Wychavon District Council to extend the consultation period, but Wychavon said no. 31 July it is, then.
Hang on ... Did you hear that right? The "Windfarm Working Party" - which, as some of you will recall, is the VVASP pretending to be parish councillors and spending YOUR tax-payers' money on their shabby little campaign - wanted more time. To do what?
When the newly-constituted, totally anti-windfarm Church Lench Parish Council set up its bogus "Windfarm Working Party" it said it was to gather and share information between the six local parish councils.
What that really meant was it was an exercise in taking parish council money (your money) under what could be considered false pretences and using it to bolster VVASP's disingenuous efforts while spreading propaganda around the parishes.
Now, when the windfarm plans are available for public consultation, the "Windfarm Working Party" reveals what it really is. They are channelling YOUR money into the pockets of professional consultants in the hope of finding a reason or two to object to the plans. Now they're saying that they and their consultants won't have time to spend all your money or to find an adequate reason to object.
This isn't information gathering and sharing, of course. It's a dishonest use of your money for biased political purposes and a complete dereliction of the duty of parish councils to approach planning applications impartially. A FAIL on all democratic levels, then.
Funny, though - at a time when nimby groups left, right and centre are cock-a-hoop because a Telegraph journalist published a very misleading article about windfarms being little more than a subsidy scam, our local nimbies are misusing public money in their own interests.
The Telegraph article plays to the right-wing of the Tory party - people who simply refuse to understand the case for renewables on ideological grounds. Of course, the nookies of VVASP and their gormless clones elsewhere love this pointless article (and, naturally, the Telegraph completely fails to explain why other countries, like China and the oil state of Texas, are investing so heavily in wind power).
But what the nookies are saying is - it's all right for them to ponce public funds for their crazy purposes, but it's not all right for the UK's vital move towards sustainability to receive a bit of government support.
Typical nimbies, eh? One rule for them ...
(Anyway, details next time on sending in your comments in support of Lenchwick Windfarm to Wychavon District Council. Keep tuned in!)
That means we have six weeks in which to get as many people as possible to support the plans.
The nimby "Windfarm Working Party" asked Wychavon District Council to extend the consultation period, but Wychavon said no. 31 July it is, then.
Hang on ... Did you hear that right? The "Windfarm Working Party" - which, as some of you will recall, is the VVASP pretending to be parish councillors and spending YOUR tax-payers' money on their shabby little campaign - wanted more time. To do what?
When the newly-constituted, totally anti-windfarm Church Lench Parish Council set up its bogus "Windfarm Working Party" it said it was to gather and share information between the six local parish councils.
What that really meant was it was an exercise in taking parish council money (your money) under what could be considered false pretences and using it to bolster VVASP's disingenuous efforts while spreading propaganda around the parishes.
Now, when the windfarm plans are available for public consultation, the "Windfarm Working Party" reveals what it really is. They are channelling YOUR money into the pockets of professional consultants in the hope of finding a reason or two to object to the plans. Now they're saying that they and their consultants won't have time to spend all your money or to find an adequate reason to object.
This isn't information gathering and sharing, of course. It's a dishonest use of your money for biased political purposes and a complete dereliction of the duty of parish councils to approach planning applications impartially. A FAIL on all democratic levels, then.
Funny, though - at a time when nimby groups left, right and centre are cock-a-hoop because a Telegraph journalist published a very misleading article about windfarms being little more than a subsidy scam, our local nimbies are misusing public money in their own interests.
The Telegraph article plays to the right-wing of the Tory party - people who simply refuse to understand the case for renewables on ideological grounds. Of course, the nookies of VVASP and their gormless clones elsewhere love this pointless article (and, naturally, the Telegraph completely fails to explain why other countries, like China and the oil state of Texas, are investing so heavily in wind power).
But what the nookies are saying is - it's all right for them to ponce public funds for their crazy purposes, but it's not all right for the UK's vital move towards sustainability to receive a bit of government support.
Typical nimbies, eh? One rule for them ...
(Anyway, details next time on sending in your comments in support of Lenchwick Windfarm to Wychavon District Council. Keep tuned in!)
Tuesday, 15 June 2010
FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN
When the Empire Windrushbrought immigrants from the West Indies to Britain in the late '40s, those new arrivals weren't dispersed equally across the UK. Many areas didn't get to see a black face for a good long while.
Naturally, perhaps, people were concerned. They had no experience of black people. But they'd heard some terrible things.
They'd open a newspaper, and what would they find - some horrifying scare story about immigrants.
They'd go down the pub and the local bore would tell them some ridiculous tale about the ghastly way the immigrants lived.
Their racist friends would pass on no end of rumours aimed solely at frightening and worrying them about the consequences of having black people in the neighbourhood.
Such are the problems of ignorance. You get newspapers selling ridiculous stories just to upset and infuriate the readers (the Daily Mail and the Telegraph in particular do this).
You get tap room bores and misinformed neighbours rabbiting the latest daft gossip about the issue.
And you end up with people believing no end of nonsense.
Which is where we are at with wind farms. There aren't enough of them in the country yet, and they're spread out a little too much, so that most people in the UK aren't really familiar with them at all. And that's sadly a gift to the irresponsible troublemakers in our midst. The VVASP types, who have no care for honesty or decency, but would rather spin lies, tell tall tales and try to terrify their neighbours FOR NO GOOD REASON.
They're just like the ignorant racists of old, reading their right-wing rubbish and spreading their stupid stories.
One day, we'll recognise those types for what they really are.
Very, very stupid, bigoted, arrogant, dangerously misinformed purveyors of filthy lies.
Naturally, perhaps, people were concerned. They had no experience of black people. But they'd heard some terrible things.
They'd open a newspaper, and what would they find - some horrifying scare story about immigrants.
They'd go down the pub and the local bore would tell them some ridiculous tale about the ghastly way the immigrants lived.
Their racist friends would pass on no end of rumours aimed solely at frightening and worrying them about the consequences of having black people in the neighbourhood.
Such are the problems of ignorance. You get newspapers selling ridiculous stories just to upset and infuriate the readers (the Daily Mail and the Telegraph in particular do this).
You get tap room bores and misinformed neighbours rabbiting the latest daft gossip about the issue.
And you end up with people believing no end of nonsense.
Which is where we are at with wind farms. There aren't enough of them in the country yet, and they're spread out a little too much, so that most people in the UK aren't really familiar with them at all. And that's sadly a gift to the irresponsible troublemakers in our midst. The VVASP types, who have no care for honesty or decency, but would rather spin lies, tell tall tales and try to terrify their neighbours FOR NO GOOD REASON.
They're just like the ignorant racists of old, reading their right-wing rubbish and spreading their stupid stories.
One day, we'll recognise those types for what they really are.
Very, very stupid, bigoted, arrogant, dangerously misinformed purveyors of filthy lies.
Monday, 14 June 2010
AND WE'RE OFF - !!!
Yes, folks - it's true. ScottishPower Renewables' planning application for a five-turbine windfarm near Bishampton Bank in Worcestershire is in! It's there on the Wychavon District Council website.
Okay, now we'll wait a little while to see how the nimbies react. They've been a bit quieter ever since they were ruled against by the Advertising Standards Authority on the grounds that they had been telling porky pies about the windfarm. We can, however, expect some spectacular dishonesty from them in the weeks to come.
The real race will be to get comments to the planning committee - both for (those who give a damn about renewables, the environment, the planet, the future) and against (those who think about themselves and ... well, that's it, really). They will be getting friends and relatives from far and wide to write in to Wychavon with some irrelevant, inaccurate or just totally misinformed point to make.
We must get as many people as we can to write in or show their support for this eminently sensible and thoroughly harmless development online.
Details on how to do this will appear shortly. We're still examing the plans, and would suggest that anyone supporting the windfarm has a quick look at what the plans actually say. This is because the majority of the objectors won't have the foggiest what it is they're actually objecting to (meanwhile, of course, VVASP High Command will have gathered its consultants and solicitors together to try to find loopholes in the plans, but then they're weird).
Till then, anyone who has a Facebook account might care to visit this page:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Support-Lenchwick-Windfarm/134616516555756?ref=ts
And don't forget the BLoW website:
http://www.backlocalwindfarms.co.uk
It is time for good people to stand by their beliefs in the face of rampant selfishness, arrogance and lunacy. "Wind of Change" will keep you updated. Morally, though, we have already won. Now let's defeat the madcap opposition and look forward to the arrival of our very own turbines.
Exciting times, yes?
Okay, now we'll wait a little while to see how the nimbies react. They've been a bit quieter ever since they were ruled against by the Advertising Standards Authority on the grounds that they had been telling porky pies about the windfarm. We can, however, expect some spectacular dishonesty from them in the weeks to come.
The real race will be to get comments to the planning committee - both for (those who give a damn about renewables, the environment, the planet, the future) and against (those who think about themselves and ... well, that's it, really). They will be getting friends and relatives from far and wide to write in to Wychavon with some irrelevant, inaccurate or just totally misinformed point to make.
We must get as many people as we can to write in or show their support for this eminently sensible and thoroughly harmless development online.
Details on how to do this will appear shortly. We're still examing the plans, and would suggest that anyone supporting the windfarm has a quick look at what the plans actually say. This is because the majority of the objectors won't have the foggiest what it is they're actually objecting to (meanwhile, of course, VVASP High Command will have gathered its consultants and solicitors together to try to find loopholes in the plans, but then they're weird).
Till then, anyone who has a Facebook account might care to visit this page:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Support-Lenchwick-Windfarm/134616516555756?ref=ts
And don't forget the BLoW website:
http://www.backlocalwindfarms.co.uk
It is time for good people to stand by their beliefs in the face of rampant selfishness, arrogance and lunacy. "Wind of Change" will keep you updated. Morally, though, we have already won. Now let's defeat the madcap opposition and look forward to the arrival of our very own turbines.
Exciting times, yes?
Friday, 11 June 2010
A MIND A-BOGGLE
To the joy, no doubt, of her constituents in built-up Redditch, newly-elected Tory MP Karen Lumley is wasting her time with the nimby nutters of VVASP.
Of course, this is what the red-faced nookies had been waiting for - they were praying for a Tory government months ago, on the grounds that Tory politicians would take pity on them and say, "Oh, no, of course they can't go putting nasty big wind turbines within a mile or so of your nice middle-class homes! Let me have a word in a few ears and they can plomp them down somewhere nearer the plebs - how's that, old boy?"
But then, there's the real world.
Kazza Lumley, novice parliamentarian for a largely urban seat, prefers to hang out with evil-minded city-dwellers who've decamped to the countryside and now think they know what's best for the country than to spend too much time worrying about the energy needs of a place like Redditch.
Even weirder, she thinks the VVASP knuckleheads have got a "strong case" for opposing the proposed Lenchwick Windfarm on the grounds that one or two houses will be, well, more than half a kilometre away from these silent structures.
Of course, it's evident that she has swallowed the VVASP BS whole. Has she done any research whatsoever into the issue?
Ha! What do you think?
Has she let Mr Misleader of the VVASP and his ghastly cronies fill her head with nonsense about turbines?
Damn right she has!
What could constitute a "strong case" for turbines being "too close" when they're more than half a kilometre away from the nearest buildings? Only the usual demented claims of the nimbies - those things they've been saying for months, which have turned out, again and again, to be utterly and totally inaccurate and untruthful. The claims which were rejected by the independent Advertising Standards Authority. And so on ...
In other words, only if you believe the lies peddled by VVASP could you possibly imagine that they have a "strong case". If you've spent any time looking into what wind turbines are, and what wind farms do, then you'll know for a fact that VVASP are a bunch of dishonest nimby cretins with no interest in anything at all but their own petty-minded outlooks.
The natural friends of the Tories, in other words. But with energy posing such a pressing and increasingly urgent problem, can the new government - and their noobie backbenchers, drunk on power already - afford to ignore the pertinent facts?
This isn't about a tiny handful of weirdos who moved into a country village a few months back.
This is about the future of the UK's energy supply and the planet.
So, for God's sake, Lumley - GET A GRIP!! Do your homework!! The rest of us have figured out what a bunch of lying toads VVASP are - why haven't you? You've only been an MP for five minutes - don't blow it this early on, for all our sakes!
(BLoW - 'Back Local Windfarms' - have meanwhile pointed out how shortsighted of Karen Lumley it is to jump on this particular nimby bandwagon, especially when it's patently obvious that you have no idea what you're talking about. So, good for BLoW! At last there's a voice of reason in this debate, and the mad, bad nookies of Lench aren't spilling their awful bilge all over the place without a sensible response from the caring element in the community. Karen Lumley MP - take note!)
Of course, this is what the red-faced nookies had been waiting for - they were praying for a Tory government months ago, on the grounds that Tory politicians would take pity on them and say, "Oh, no, of course they can't go putting nasty big wind turbines within a mile or so of your nice middle-class homes! Let me have a word in a few ears and they can plomp them down somewhere nearer the plebs - how's that, old boy?"
But then, there's the real world.
Kazza Lumley, novice parliamentarian for a largely urban seat, prefers to hang out with evil-minded city-dwellers who've decamped to the countryside and now think they know what's best for the country than to spend too much time worrying about the energy needs of a place like Redditch.
Even weirder, she thinks the VVASP knuckleheads have got a "strong case" for opposing the proposed Lenchwick Windfarm on the grounds that one or two houses will be, well, more than half a kilometre away from these silent structures.
Of course, it's evident that she has swallowed the VVASP BS whole. Has she done any research whatsoever into the issue?
Ha! What do you think?
Has she let Mr Misleader of the VVASP and his ghastly cronies fill her head with nonsense about turbines?
Damn right she has!
What could constitute a "strong case" for turbines being "too close" when they're more than half a kilometre away from the nearest buildings? Only the usual demented claims of the nimbies - those things they've been saying for months, which have turned out, again and again, to be utterly and totally inaccurate and untruthful. The claims which were rejected by the independent Advertising Standards Authority. And so on ...
In other words, only if you believe the lies peddled by VVASP could you possibly imagine that they have a "strong case". If you've spent any time looking into what wind turbines are, and what wind farms do, then you'll know for a fact that VVASP are a bunch of dishonest nimby cretins with no interest in anything at all but their own petty-minded outlooks.
The natural friends of the Tories, in other words. But with energy posing such a pressing and increasingly urgent problem, can the new government - and their noobie backbenchers, drunk on power already - afford to ignore the pertinent facts?
This isn't about a tiny handful of weirdos who moved into a country village a few months back.
This is about the future of the UK's energy supply and the planet.
So, for God's sake, Lumley - GET A GRIP!! Do your homework!! The rest of us have figured out what a bunch of lying toads VVASP are - why haven't you? You've only been an MP for five minutes - don't blow it this early on, for all our sakes!
(BLoW - 'Back Local Windfarms' - have meanwhile pointed out how shortsighted of Karen Lumley it is to jump on this particular nimby bandwagon, especially when it's patently obvious that you have no idea what you're talking about. So, good for BLoW! At last there's a voice of reason in this debate, and the mad, bad nookies of Lench aren't spilling their awful bilge all over the place without a sensible response from the caring element in the community. Karen Lumley MP - take note!)
Wednesday, 9 June 2010
WIND TURBINE SOUND AND HEALTH EFFECTS
For those of you who are too intelligent and grown-up to fall for the nimby lies about windfarms being noisy or causing ill-health, this link might be useful:
http://www.awea.org/newsroom/releases/AWEA_CanWEA_SoundWhitePaper_12-11-09.pdf
This scientific report examines the evidence regarding wind turbine noise and health and takes a proper look at the so-called research done by anti-windfarm campaigners like the VVASP's favourite, Dr Nina Pierpoint.
It's the sort of thing that the VVASP fuhrer really ought to have read because then he might have thought twice before spreading his moronic stories around the Lenches.
Maybe we should try and get Karen Lumley MP to read it. What are the chances, eh?
http://www.awea.org/newsroom/releases/AWEA_CanWEA_SoundWhitePaper_12-11-09.pdf
This scientific report examines the evidence regarding wind turbine noise and health and takes a proper look at the so-called research done by anti-windfarm campaigners like the VVASP's favourite, Dr Nina Pierpoint.
It's the sort of thing that the VVASP fuhrer really ought to have read because then he might have thought twice before spreading his moronic stories around the Lenches.
Maybe we should try and get Karen Lumley MP to read it. What are the chances, eh?
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
AT LAST ...
Here's some good news.
Members of the local (Evesham) Transition Town initiative are off to see a windfarm.
Brilliant!
So, quickly: the Transition Towns Initiative started in the South-West and has running for a wee while now. It aims to prepare local communities for the low carbon economy and the consequences of peak oil by promoting sustainability, local produce, sensible transport ... you know the sort of thing. Basically, it's good and long overdue.
A windfarm is a quiet and harmless development designed to tap a massive renewables resource in order to provide cheap, clean, green electricity for thousands of consumers.
The one the Evesham group is off to see is Westmill Windfarm near Swindon (check out the website here: http://www.westmill.coop/westmill_home.asp)
One of the things that makes Westmill interesting is that it is owned by a co-operative. Not that this would make the slightest bit of difference to our local nasty nimbies in the Lenches because they don't really understand the principle of co-operation. It's also interesting because, go back just a few blogposts and you'll see what someone living very close to Westmill Windfarm has to say about it, noise-wise. There isn't any.
We should be glad - relieved, even - that the Transition Town people are finally taking this windfarm business seriously. They've so far given the impression of steering well clear of the whole issue. Why? Well, low carbon economy, peak oil, sustainability and all that, but - you don't want to upset the raving nutters of VVASP because they are spectacularly irresponsible and cannot be trusted one bit.
It's probable that the Transition Town people feared that, if they got involved in the discussion about Lenchwick Windfarm (presumably, if they're true to their beliefs, on the right side - i.e. all in favour of this perfectly sane development) they would incur the senseless wrath of some very twisted people whose sputum has been known to eat through glass and whose terrorist tactics are sadly only too well-known in the vicinity.
VVASP started out down the wrong road by lying their heads off from the very start. That's meant that (apart from going a bit quiet at times) they've just had to keep on lying. So the intervention of some intelligent, educated Transition Town people is only going to lead to yet more back-biting, mindless raving and utter dishonesty from the dimbies.
But how good will it be to have more people who have taken the trouble to visit a windfarm and come back excited by the prospect of having one nearby? Another group who know for a fact that VVASP lies about windfarms being noisy and harmful are total rubbish? A pressure group that actually knows what it's talking about (unlike the VVASP goons) and can (in it's all too quiet way) dispute the idiotic, misleading and disingenuous claims of the nookies?
Little by little, friends, we inch our way towards sanity (as long as we don't count that idiot new MP for Redditch, of course).
Members of the local (Evesham) Transition Town initiative are off to see a windfarm.
Brilliant!
So, quickly: the Transition Towns Initiative started in the South-West and has running for a wee while now. It aims to prepare local communities for the low carbon economy and the consequences of peak oil by promoting sustainability, local produce, sensible transport ... you know the sort of thing. Basically, it's good and long overdue.
A windfarm is a quiet and harmless development designed to tap a massive renewables resource in order to provide cheap, clean, green electricity for thousands of consumers.
The one the Evesham group is off to see is Westmill Windfarm near Swindon (check out the website here: http://www.westmill.coop/westmill_home.asp)
One of the things that makes Westmill interesting is that it is owned by a co-operative. Not that this would make the slightest bit of difference to our local nasty nimbies in the Lenches because they don't really understand the principle of co-operation. It's also interesting because, go back just a few blogposts and you'll see what someone living very close to Westmill Windfarm has to say about it, noise-wise. There isn't any.
We should be glad - relieved, even - that the Transition Town people are finally taking this windfarm business seriously. They've so far given the impression of steering well clear of the whole issue. Why? Well, low carbon economy, peak oil, sustainability and all that, but - you don't want to upset the raving nutters of VVASP because they are spectacularly irresponsible and cannot be trusted one bit.
It's probable that the Transition Town people feared that, if they got involved in the discussion about Lenchwick Windfarm (presumably, if they're true to their beliefs, on the right side - i.e. all in favour of this perfectly sane development) they would incur the senseless wrath of some very twisted people whose sputum has been known to eat through glass and whose terrorist tactics are sadly only too well-known in the vicinity.
VVASP started out down the wrong road by lying their heads off from the very start. That's meant that (apart from going a bit quiet at times) they've just had to keep on lying. So the intervention of some intelligent, educated Transition Town people is only going to lead to yet more back-biting, mindless raving and utter dishonesty from the dimbies.
But how good will it be to have more people who have taken the trouble to visit a windfarm and come back excited by the prospect of having one nearby? Another group who know for a fact that VVASP lies about windfarms being noisy and harmful are total rubbish? A pressure group that actually knows what it's talking about (unlike the VVASP goons) and can (in it's all too quiet way) dispute the idiotic, misleading and disingenuous claims of the nookies?
Little by little, friends, we inch our way towards sanity (as long as we don't count that idiot new MP for Redditch, of course).
Wednesday, 2 June 2010
STRIKE A BLoW!!
Just a quickie:
The good people at BLoW (Back Local Windfarms) have got a website up and running. Unlike the Vile Villagers And Stupid People (VVASP) website, the BLoW one has some facts on it. And quite a lot of great photos of wind turbines for those who (like the ovine followers of Mr VVASP and his PseudoScience Roadshow) don't really know what one is.
Do go take a look:
www.backlocalwindfarms.co.uk
The good people at BLoW (Back Local Windfarms) have got a website up and running. Unlike the Vile Villagers And Stupid People (VVASP) website, the BLoW one has some facts on it. And quite a lot of great photos of wind turbines for those who (like the ovine followers of Mr VVASP and his PseudoScience Roadshow) don't really know what one is.
Do go take a look:
www.backlocalwindfarms.co.uk
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
