The "Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines" website is a good example of ... well, of a nimby website.
It's not difficult to figure out what happened, because the pattern is more-or-less the same wherever it happens. A clean energy company, having carried out the various preliminary wind-mapping and pre-scoping stages, announced that it was considering the Dorcas Lane site as a potential windfarm development. Between them, the developers and their consultants probably accounted for several decades of experience in wind energy matters.
Within days of the announcement, a small but wealthy group of local sociopaths decided that they were the real wind power experts, even though it's highly unlikely that any of them had even seen a windfarm before. To prove that they had become overnight experts in the science and technology of wind energy, they put out anti-windfarm propaganda which they had simply culled from numerous identikit anti-windfarm sites. In other words, the nimbies did absolutely no research whatsoever, but still posed as "experts" on the subject of windfarms.
The gibberish they had raided from the other nimby websites was basically the standard pile of nonsensical garbage promoted by anti-wind fanatics and the hoodlums who instantly and unthinkingly object to something, regardless of its merits. The oafish claims made by the fools of "Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines" have all been discredited, over and over again. Abundant evidence has been released which disproves every single one of those tiresomely repetitive claims (including such hoary old chestnuts as the government guidelines on windfarms and noise, ETSU-R-97, being "out of date" and "unfit for purpose" because wind turbines are larger today than they were back in 1997 - they're also, by the way, very much quieter, indicating that if only the nimbies had brains capable of processing information they'd realise that ETSU-R-97 actually works rather well!).
But, because they did NO RESEARCH WHATSOEVER and only ponced the idiotic and wildly inaccurate claims made by previous nimby groups, the Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines psychos didn't bother to find out the facts. Why should they? They were arrogant and conceited enough to pose as "experts" in something they knew nothing about and selfish and evil enough to spread cretinous scare stories about wind to alarm and frighten their neighbours.
Those who actually did some research into windfarms - real research, that is - discovered that they're really rather great. And so they had to be bullied and victimised. Because once a handful of pompous bores have decided that they know all there is to know about windfarms (having trawled obsessively and exclusively through misleading nimby websites), no one is allowed to question their judgement or voice an alternative opinion.
Typical, then, to find that the morons of Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines have run that fraudulent old myth about windfarms and house prices up the flagpole. Yep: they had the bad taste and breathtaking ignorance (or maybe just massive dishonesty) to claim that a study carried out by researchers based at Oxford Brookes University in 2006, and part-funded by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, found that house prices can fall by as much as "54%" in proximity to a windfarm.
Okay, so let's give the nimby nutters of Aylesbury Vale the benefit of the doubt and assume that they only made this claim because they didn't know any better (because they didn't actually do any research at all). The only alternative is that they knowing lied to their neighbours over something that was guaranteed to cause confusion and concern.
But let's assume that, because the Dorcas Lane nimbies didn't actually look into the issues, merely regurgitating the lies told by other nimby groups, they had no idea that no direct correlation has been found between windfarms and house prices. None. At all.
Fortunately, we have researched this subject in some depth. We have to, because the nimbies refuse to. They just repeat old, outdated, outworn lies. So we looked into it.
Luckily, so did Christopher Barclay, who drafted a briefing paper for the House of Commons Library (updated 11 February 2011) entitled "Do wind farms actually reduce house prices?" Christopher Barclay was forced to conclude that it would be difficult to agree compensation packages for residents living near windfarms because there is no actual evidence that windfarms have a negative impact on property prices.
Other studies have reached similar conclusions - apart from a couple of exceptions. These include the largest study yet carried out and point to something that even the nimbies, in the ghastly darkness of their black, black hearts, should find interesting:
Property values in relatively close proximity to windfarms tend to go up faster than in the case of comparable properties which are not so close to windfarms.
Yes. Fact. Windfarms are actually rather good news for the property-minded homeowners who would no doubt be delighted to know that a few turbines a fair distance away have increased the market value of their houses.
Overall, there is some evidence of a small dip in property values during the planning stage of a windfarm. But, of course, with no windfarm yet in the immediate vicinity, we have to question how a non-existent windfarm can have a minor impact on house prices. The answer, of course, is that the windfarm doesn't. Because it doesn't exist yet. What causes the slight fall in property prices is the nimbies themselves, who kick up such a fuss over nothing that they make their village an extremely undesirable place for a reasonable human being to want to live.
Then, when the windfarm becomes operational, the local house prices quickly catch up with what they were before the treacherous nimby idiots started their stupid campaign, and in many cases the house prices show a healthy increase over and above their normal rate. Because when people know what a windfarm is really like, they want to live near one. That's how it works.
The research we carried out into the matter of windfarms and property values (unlike the witless nimbies, who did no research at all) we freely shared with Yes 2 Wind. It now forms part of the "Expert" answer to the question of windfarms and house prices in the Windypedia section of their website. You can read up on our research by clicking here:
http://www.yes2wind.com/faqs/property-values/do-wind-farms-affect-property-values#
and selecting the "Expert" option.
You see, it takes work to become a real expert in wind energy and its associated issues. The self-serving idiots of Stop Dorcas Lane and all their clone-like nimby counterparts simply cannot be bothered to do that work. They reckon that just by looking up half-a-dozen nimby websites they can become instant experts entitled to fool, delude and mislead their communities and, indeed, their local councillors.
But they're actually being exceptionally stupid. Because what they say about windfarms is absolutely untrue. They're lying, and they either know that they're lying (in which case, they're liars) or they believe the nonsense they're talking (in which case, they're ignorant and very, very stupid). Either way, the last thing these people are is "expert" on the subject of windfarms.
Experts at spreading sickening lies, abusing their neighbours, bullying the smart people, telling more lies and generally being disgustingly aggressive and grossly irresponsible - yes. But experts on windfarms?
Don't make us laugh.
Sunday, 25 March 2012
Friday, 23 March 2012
NIGHTMARE ON DORCAS LANE
Once again, our British nimbies are proving that they are all cut from the same nasty cloth.
Proposals for a four-turbine windfarm a kilometre from the village of Stoke Hammond have been submitted to Aylesbury Vale District Council. The site is known as Dorcas Lane.
So, what have the local loons of the Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines nimby group done about it?
Well, same old, same old. The usual lies - about windfarm noise, for example, and the alleged - but now completely discredited - negative effects on health. They've even trotted out the old myths about windfarms and property prices, daring to quote the RICS-sponsored report which found no connection between windfarm proximity and house prices. But, oh no, the nasty nimby idiots fell into the old VVASP trap of quoting part of a sentence from that report which gives the misleading impression that the report concluded otherwise.
In fact, their website is a carbon copy job of old nimby myths from a few years ago - all the ridiculous, nonsensical claims which have been rubbished by the independent Advertising Standards Authority, amongst others, on the grounds that they are manifestly untrue. So, we come across tired old (i.e. lazy) references to the useless studies carried out by Dr Nina Pierpoint (married to an anti-wind power lobbyist) and Dr Christopher Hanning (who was fighting a windfarm proposal at the time), and no reference whatsoever to the wealth of properly scientific, peer-reviewed evidence which has since been published and which proves just how wildly unscientific and grossly misleading the "reports" of Pierpoint and Hanning are!
Equally brainless and predictable, they cite Jane and Julian Davis. Maybe it's time Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines updated their website to reflect the latest developments in that deeply suspect case.
Anyway. Okay, so their website is a pack of lies. What else?
Well, they flew a blimp. Good golly gosh, where on earth did they get an idea like that???? Oh, yes - every mind-bogglingly unimaginative nimby group does the same thing in order to show people exactly what a windfarm doesn't look like. Many groups deliberately fly their stupid blimps in places where the turbines wll not be standing, in order to create a false impression. Besides which, these blimps are effectively the opposite of what a wind turbine looks like. Their boringly repetitive use by nimby groups is essential proof of how dishonest those groups are. Blimps and windfarms look nothing like each other. Nothing at all.
Fine. So Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines have spread the usual plethora of lies, false and selective information in order to whip up hysteria based an a total misunderstanding of what windfarms are, and they've flown their idiotic blimp. What next?
Well, the obvious, sadly. They're attacking anyone who expresses support for the windfarm. It's the usual nimby bullying - hectoring, harrassing, intimidating, shouting, browbeating and lying - all in order to maintain the falsehood that nobody is in favour of the windfarm.
Anyone who is in favour is instantly accused of working either for the developer, Force 9, or the pro-wind advocacy organisation Yes 2 Wind. Again, how tiresomely predictable. Every rat-faced, brain-dead nimby in the country likes to pretend that only those who work in or for the wind industry are supporters of wind energy. Presumably, the nasty nimby idiots don't believe in opinion polls (apart, that is, from those whose results they shamelessly manipulate in order to create the misleading impression that they are in the majority).
But the attacks have now got personal and predictably nasty. It's the same old story. No one is allowed to express an opinion unless it's the nimby opinion (which itself is based on ignorance, prejudice and a willingness to believe any old codswallop as long as it's anti-wind). We saw it in the Lenches, when VVASP bullied and intimidated anyone who had found out the truth about windfarms or just didn't agree with their "rabid" behaviour and imposition of "mob-rule". And now, the evil dunces of Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines are doing the same thing: bullying and harrassing anyone with a heart, a brain, a soul and a conscience.
This is what happens when you base your campaign entirely on lies.
Of course, like all nimbies, they try to pose as poor downtrodden church mice being "threatened" by some giant corporation. They claim to be all in favour of renewables (yeah, sure, where have we heard that one before?) but can't understand why the turbines have to be built "so close" to people's homes (i.e. a kilometre or so away from the nearest - so no likelihood of noise or even the dreaded "infrasound" that the nimbies want to believe in).
It's a bit like saying that you're all in favour of street lighting, but not within two kilometres of where anybody lives. It's an insane, unrealistic and thoroughly devious argument - a tactic favoured by the fundamentalist Christian Right in America: first pretend to be only being reasonable, and then propose something that is so blisteringly stupid it could never work.
As usual, Aylesbury Vale is quite simply more beautiful and "unspoilt" than anywhere else, and so its inhabitants shouldn't be required to do their bit to help combat climate change. No. Even though it will do them no harm and - as evidence from all around the UK has shown - benefit the community, the region, the nation and, of course, the planet. No. These people think they're special and are consequently absolved of all responsibilities, including those involving good neighbourliness, common decency and plain old-fashioned honesty.
The crazed frauds of Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines are, then, simply doing what every single nimby group in the country does. Telling lies, misleading themselves and others, stomping squarely on the face of local democracy, denying others their opinions and clamping down hard on anyone who believes in science, free speech and clean technology.
Once again, the nimbies themselves have given the lie to the vicious slur made against this blog on the Green Building Forum by a deluded anti-wind activist a short while ago.
If anyone can find and provide us with a proven example of pro-wind campaigners or windfarm developers spreading out-dated scare stories and bullying and threatening anyone who disagrees with them, we'd like to hear about it. Good luck, though, because it's unlikely that you'd find any genuine examples of disgraceful, immoral, undemocratic and mindlessly aggressive behaviour by the pro-wind lobby (and we would require evidence; just bleating about windfarm companies being "bullies" merely shows that you're unbalanced, not that you have a case).
As for the nimbies of Middle England - well, we're forever finding that they are all the same. They all tell the same lies, and they all resort to the same kneejerk persecution of anyone whose opinion differs from theirs - especially when it's an opinion based on evidence. That really drives them up the wall.
So, to "Joiner" of the Green Building Forum, and to the vicious thugs and liars of Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines, we say only this: we know your methods. You can delude yourselves, but you can't delude us. You are the problem. Your refusal to face facts, and your inability to see yourselves as you really are, will be your downfall. You are traitors to the nation.
And to Aylesbury Vale District Council we say this: we are watching. You know now what the dishonest nimby bullies are up to. We wait to see whether you will do the right thing and honour your obligations, or whether you will cave in to lies and threats from a dangerously unethical, self-centred and aggressive minority.
And so it goes on ...
Proposals for a four-turbine windfarm a kilometre from the village of Stoke Hammond have been submitted to Aylesbury Vale District Council. The site is known as Dorcas Lane.
So, what have the local loons of the Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines nimby group done about it?
Well, same old, same old. The usual lies - about windfarm noise, for example, and the alleged - but now completely discredited - negative effects on health. They've even trotted out the old myths about windfarms and property prices, daring to quote the RICS-sponsored report which found no connection between windfarm proximity and house prices. But, oh no, the nasty nimby idiots fell into the old VVASP trap of quoting part of a sentence from that report which gives the misleading impression that the report concluded otherwise.
In fact, their website is a carbon copy job of old nimby myths from a few years ago - all the ridiculous, nonsensical claims which have been rubbished by the independent Advertising Standards Authority, amongst others, on the grounds that they are manifestly untrue. So, we come across tired old (i.e. lazy) references to the useless studies carried out by Dr Nina Pierpoint (married to an anti-wind power lobbyist) and Dr Christopher Hanning (who was fighting a windfarm proposal at the time), and no reference whatsoever to the wealth of properly scientific, peer-reviewed evidence which has since been published and which proves just how wildly unscientific and grossly misleading the "reports" of Pierpoint and Hanning are!
Equally brainless and predictable, they cite Jane and Julian Davis. Maybe it's time Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines updated their website to reflect the latest developments in that deeply suspect case.
Anyway. Okay, so their website is a pack of lies. What else?
Well, they flew a blimp. Good golly gosh, where on earth did they get an idea like that???? Oh, yes - every mind-bogglingly unimaginative nimby group does the same thing in order to show people exactly what a windfarm doesn't look like. Many groups deliberately fly their stupid blimps in places where the turbines wll not be standing, in order to create a false impression. Besides which, these blimps are effectively the opposite of what a wind turbine looks like. Their boringly repetitive use by nimby groups is essential proof of how dishonest those groups are. Blimps and windfarms look nothing like each other. Nothing at all.
Fine. So Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines have spread the usual plethora of lies, false and selective information in order to whip up hysteria based an a total misunderstanding of what windfarms are, and they've flown their idiotic blimp. What next?
Well, the obvious, sadly. They're attacking anyone who expresses support for the windfarm. It's the usual nimby bullying - hectoring, harrassing, intimidating, shouting, browbeating and lying - all in order to maintain the falsehood that nobody is in favour of the windfarm.
Anyone who is in favour is instantly accused of working either for the developer, Force 9, or the pro-wind advocacy organisation Yes 2 Wind. Again, how tiresomely predictable. Every rat-faced, brain-dead nimby in the country likes to pretend that only those who work in or for the wind industry are supporters of wind energy. Presumably, the nasty nimby idiots don't believe in opinion polls (apart, that is, from those whose results they shamelessly manipulate in order to create the misleading impression that they are in the majority).
But the attacks have now got personal and predictably nasty. It's the same old story. No one is allowed to express an opinion unless it's the nimby opinion (which itself is based on ignorance, prejudice and a willingness to believe any old codswallop as long as it's anti-wind). We saw it in the Lenches, when VVASP bullied and intimidated anyone who had found out the truth about windfarms or just didn't agree with their "rabid" behaviour and imposition of "mob-rule". And now, the evil dunces of Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines are doing the same thing: bullying and harrassing anyone with a heart, a brain, a soul and a conscience.
This is what happens when you base your campaign entirely on lies.
Of course, like all nimbies, they try to pose as poor downtrodden church mice being "threatened" by some giant corporation. They claim to be all in favour of renewables (yeah, sure, where have we heard that one before?) but can't understand why the turbines have to be built "so close" to people's homes (i.e. a kilometre or so away from the nearest - so no likelihood of noise or even the dreaded "infrasound" that the nimbies want to believe in).
It's a bit like saying that you're all in favour of street lighting, but not within two kilometres of where anybody lives. It's an insane, unrealistic and thoroughly devious argument - a tactic favoured by the fundamentalist Christian Right in America: first pretend to be only being reasonable, and then propose something that is so blisteringly stupid it could never work.
As usual, Aylesbury Vale is quite simply more beautiful and "unspoilt" than anywhere else, and so its inhabitants shouldn't be required to do their bit to help combat climate change. No. Even though it will do them no harm and - as evidence from all around the UK has shown - benefit the community, the region, the nation and, of course, the planet. No. These people think they're special and are consequently absolved of all responsibilities, including those involving good neighbourliness, common decency and plain old-fashioned honesty.
The crazed frauds of Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines are, then, simply doing what every single nimby group in the country does. Telling lies, misleading themselves and others, stomping squarely on the face of local democracy, denying others their opinions and clamping down hard on anyone who believes in science, free speech and clean technology.
Once again, the nimbies themselves have given the lie to the vicious slur made against this blog on the Green Building Forum by a deluded anti-wind activist a short while ago.
If anyone can find and provide us with a proven example of pro-wind campaigners or windfarm developers spreading out-dated scare stories and bullying and threatening anyone who disagrees with them, we'd like to hear about it. Good luck, though, because it's unlikely that you'd find any genuine examples of disgraceful, immoral, undemocratic and mindlessly aggressive behaviour by the pro-wind lobby (and we would require evidence; just bleating about windfarm companies being "bullies" merely shows that you're unbalanced, not that you have a case).
As for the nimbies of Middle England - well, we're forever finding that they are all the same. They all tell the same lies, and they all resort to the same kneejerk persecution of anyone whose opinion differs from theirs - especially when it's an opinion based on evidence. That really drives them up the wall.
So, to "Joiner" of the Green Building Forum, and to the vicious thugs and liars of Stop Dorcas Lane Turbines, we say only this: we know your methods. You can delude yourselves, but you can't delude us. You are the problem. Your refusal to face facts, and your inability to see yourselves as you really are, will be your downfall. You are traitors to the nation.
And to Aylesbury Vale District Council we say this: we are watching. You know now what the dishonest nimby bullies are up to. We wait to see whether you will do the right thing and honour your obligations, or whether you will cave in to lies and threats from a dangerously unethical, self-centred and aggressive minority.
And so it goes on ...
Wednesday, 21 March 2012
FLYING THE FLAG FOR WIND
This image will appear in an advert this week in the right-leaning Spectator magazine. The advert seeks to set the record straight and to remind certain addled Tory politicians of their patriotic obligation to support wind energy.At last, the renewables industry is fighting back against the tsunami of grossly-distorted misinformation which has been peddled by lobbyists for nuclear and fossil fuels and greedily lapped up by deluded nimbies and the foolish politicians who act as their mouthpieces.
A major part of the misinformation campaign has concerned the so-called "subsidies" for renewables. Quite apart from the fact that few, if any, of the Tory backbenchers who called upon the Prime Minister to cut the subsidies would be able to explain what those subsidies are (there aren't any direct government subsidies for wind power - none at all), the real situation is actually rather flattering to wind.
Figures from the regulatory body Ofgem reveal that the cost to the average household of the Renewables Obligation last year (2010-11) was just £15.15. What that means is that £15.15 from the average domestic bill for energy helped to level the playing field for renewables. All renewables. Onshore wind accounted for just £4.68. In other words, the average household paid - wait for it - nine new pence per week towards wind energy.
Not quite the hundreds of pounds claimed by the anti-wind Nazis.
Imported gas, meanwhile, added £120 to the average annual bill. So the rising cost of gas accounted for a 10% increase, compared with a mere 0.05% increase caused by onshore wind.
The high wholesale price of gas caused the Big Six energy companies to mothball gas power stations (too expensive) and revert to coal (very dirty).
And yet, 101 Tory morons told the Prime Minister they wanted "subsidies" to windfarms slashed. When windfarms are NOT the cause of fuel poverty and rising fuel bills!! Lordy, how stupid can some people be??
What is more, even though the coalition government is pretending that its proposed new nuclear power stations will be built without any public money, that's not quite the full picture. The tax-payer will, for example, cover the costs of connecting those power stations (if they ever get built) to the National Grid. If the developers had to do it themselves, the costs of nuclear power would be "uneconomical". And yet, strangely, windfarm developers have to pay the cost of connecting their turbines to the National Grid. The tax-payer doesn't subsidise them one penny!!
So where are all the subsidies going? Well, it sure isn't wind. Gas, coal, oil, nuclear, yes. But not wind.
It's good, then, to see the normally shy and retiring proponents of wind energy and other renewables finally standing up for Britain's best interests and countering the insane lies of the lobbyists for Britain's worst interests (fossil fuels and nuclear - the latter being French-owned; Cameron was silly enough to let Sarkozy flog them to him, after France decided to start winding down its nuclear operations).
But it's not just academics, green activists and representatives of the renewables industry who are behind the fightback. A huge number of letters have been sent to the Chancellor, George "Oik" Osborne, recently. They have come from blue chip companies and major industrial corporations - Shell, BT, Aviva, Diageo, IKEA, M&S, Pepsi, Siemens, Philips and Microsoft, to name but a few. Sir Richard Branson and the TUC have also got in on the act, along with the RSPB, WWF and Friends of the Earth.
This wide-ranging plethora of companies, NGOs and individuals have all called on the Chancellor to think properly about green growth. Osborne had given succour to the anti-green loons of the Tory backbenches by making ugly noises about green issues. The business sector has told him, in no uncertain terms, that green is good. Green is growth. Stop pandering to the lunatics of the anti-environmentalist movement. Get real about the business opportunities in clean technology.
It is extremely rare for the corporate world to criticise a Conservative Chancellor like this. But the business community knows that the idiocy of putting blinkered anti-green prejudices ahead of the economic and ecological needs of the nation is - well, it's dumb. And unpatriotic. And it's not what the public wants. A recent YouGov poll reveals that only 2% of people think that Cameron and his cronies are living up to their promise of being "the greenest government ever". Part of the problem being that the Treasury is seeking to make it easier for energy firms to build new gas-fired power stations - even though gas has been the real cause of the dramatic hikes in domestic energy bills recently!!!
Maybe that's why we've been hearing so much nimby-friendly false information about the illusory "subsidies" to wind power - the government wants more gas, which is massively more expensive, and somehow or other has to persuade the public that this makes sense. So, as usual, renewables get the blame for everybody else's problems.
In the face of that sort of madness, the advertisement in this week's Spectator will hopefully clarify the situation somewhat:
"Gas prices have trebled in Europe over the last decade and there is no reason to think they will decrease in future years", it will say. "The cost of wind once built is locked in. This is a British resource that can create a substantial number of new jobs and can provide an increasing percentage of UK electricity.
"Britain's inexhaustible wind energy supplies will be vital as we become increasingly dependent on foreign gas."
So, then - what's the patriotic thing to do? Buy in ever increasing, ever more expensive quantities of foreign gas? Or keep down our costs by relying more on our inexhaustible supply of British wind?
You'll have to ask the Tory politicians that question. To most of us, the answer's as clear as a bright blue sky.
Because there really is no doubt about it. If you want to fly the flag, you have to support renewables - wind power, especially.
Monday, 19 March 2012
101 HEROES
After 101 dimwits from the Conservative backbenches signed a very foolish letter to David Cameron a few weeks back, calling on the PM to wreck Britain's energy future, another letter to Cameron has now appeared. This one is signed by a much more diverse group of 101 public figures, with Sir Richard Branson high up on the list. Academics and scientists are represented, as are Lords and MPs. Not many Tories, though - although Rachel Johnson, whose Tory credentials are impeccable, is a signatory.
The letter calls upon David Cameron to do the decent, sensible, intelligent, forward-thinking and practical thing by supporting renewables properly:
http://www.blog.ewea.org/2012/03/richard-branson-and-100-other-public-figures-call-for-renewable-energy-support/#more-3049
That's more like it. It's a sad fact that the voice of the nimby minority, which is incapable of doing anything but opposing progress and telling lies about renewables - wind energy especially - is too frequently heard, because it is noisy, abrasive, aggressive and intolerant of other opinions. The Tory bigots who signed the letter to Cameron of a few weeks ago are symptomatic of the nimby insanity which has blighted this country of ours. Their arguments are fraudulent, their claims are ludicrous, and their interest in reality is minimal.
So let's be thankful to the 101 public figures from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines who have spoken up for renewables. These people have the facts at their fingertips and the interests of the nation and the planet at heart. Unlike their 101 doltish counterparts in the Conservative Party.
Oh, and another thing. We can't help but notice that one or two people have been finding this blog thanks to a wholly misleading comment on the www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk website. Evidently, there are some who use that site who don't believe in green building.
In the midst of a very silly discussion on there about a certain couple who claimed to have been driven from their home by a nearby windfarm (a complicated case, not made any easier by the fact that the couple insisted that they had "heard" the windfarm when it wasn't even operational, and when they were five miles away from it), one zealot posted a link to this blog. The zealot's accompanying remark indicated that he considered this blog "an unedifying example of the kind of brutish response anyone expressing concerns about a windfarm development is likely to encounter".
Well, let us set the record straight. The idiot who posted that link is without doubt a nimby - because only the nimbies are as out-of-touch with the real world as to imagine that brutish responses come from windfarm supporters. What such nimbies will never admit is that it is they who launch brutish responses to anyone who expresses support for a windfarm development.
If anyone doubts that, let them take a good hard look at their local nimby campaign. The people behind it, and those who get caught up in the fanaticism inspired by the false claims and moronic scare stories spread by the nimby leaders, will be the brutish ones.
Expressing concern about a windfarm development is not necessarily wrong, in our view. What is wrong is inventing concerns, forcing other people to invent false concerns, campaigning on a wholly unscrupulous platform of fake concerns, misquoting evidence to support those bogus concerns, intimidating anyone who has had the good taste and common sense to find out the truth about those silly concerns, and refusing point-blank to investigate legitimate concerns properly in order to put your mind at rest.
Those who have concerns about a proposed windfarm development are actively encouraged by us here at Wind of Change to find out more. Best of all, go visit a few windfarms. Don't take the word of your local nimbies for it, because they're self-serving liars. Do your own research, and don't restrict that research to other nimby groups' websites. There is a wealth of good, reliable information out there to help you get the measure of what a windfarm might mean for you (keeping it simple: you've got nothing to worry about). But most of all, go and get as close as you can to as many working windfarms as you can.
So, to the nimby fool who posted that link to our blog with his own bigoted comments, we say this: we are the ones who are exposing the fraudulent claims and the false statements, the intolerant behaviour and nimby madness of those who conjure up unnecessary concerns purely to force others into opposing harmless developments. They are the ones whose response tends to be brutish (as well as dishonest).
And if you were honest and clear-sighted, you'd know that. We've worked hard to supply the facts about windfarms - the real facts, that is, not the lunatic falsehoods peddled by the nimbies - and to address the legitimate concerns of the public. You, sir, are the sort who will happily whip up unnecessary fears for your own peculiar reasons. The "unedifying example" is your own. The "brutish response" is usually that of those you seem to agree with.
We will always deal as honestly and straightforwardly as possible with concerns about wind power. Unlike the sort of nimby crank who thinks that our approach is "unedifying".
Anyone, please now go and look at that letter (link above). It's pretty good.
The letter calls upon David Cameron to do the decent, sensible, intelligent, forward-thinking and practical thing by supporting renewables properly:
http://www.blog.ewea.org/2012/03/richard-branson-and-100-other-public-figures-call-for-renewable-energy-support/#more-3049
That's more like it. It's a sad fact that the voice of the nimby minority, which is incapable of doing anything but opposing progress and telling lies about renewables - wind energy especially - is too frequently heard, because it is noisy, abrasive, aggressive and intolerant of other opinions. The Tory bigots who signed the letter to Cameron of a few weeks ago are symptomatic of the nimby insanity which has blighted this country of ours. Their arguments are fraudulent, their claims are ludicrous, and their interest in reality is minimal.
So let's be thankful to the 101 public figures from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines who have spoken up for renewables. These people have the facts at their fingertips and the interests of the nation and the planet at heart. Unlike their 101 doltish counterparts in the Conservative Party.
Oh, and another thing. We can't help but notice that one or two people have been finding this blog thanks to a wholly misleading comment on the www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk website. Evidently, there are some who use that site who don't believe in green building.
In the midst of a very silly discussion on there about a certain couple who claimed to have been driven from their home by a nearby windfarm (a complicated case, not made any easier by the fact that the couple insisted that they had "heard" the windfarm when it wasn't even operational, and when they were five miles away from it), one zealot posted a link to this blog. The zealot's accompanying remark indicated that he considered this blog "an unedifying example of the kind of brutish response anyone expressing concerns about a windfarm development is likely to encounter".
Well, let us set the record straight. The idiot who posted that link is without doubt a nimby - because only the nimbies are as out-of-touch with the real world as to imagine that brutish responses come from windfarm supporters. What such nimbies will never admit is that it is they who launch brutish responses to anyone who expresses support for a windfarm development.
If anyone doubts that, let them take a good hard look at their local nimby campaign. The people behind it, and those who get caught up in the fanaticism inspired by the false claims and moronic scare stories spread by the nimby leaders, will be the brutish ones.
Expressing concern about a windfarm development is not necessarily wrong, in our view. What is wrong is inventing concerns, forcing other people to invent false concerns, campaigning on a wholly unscrupulous platform of fake concerns, misquoting evidence to support those bogus concerns, intimidating anyone who has had the good taste and common sense to find out the truth about those silly concerns, and refusing point-blank to investigate legitimate concerns properly in order to put your mind at rest.
Those who have concerns about a proposed windfarm development are actively encouraged by us here at Wind of Change to find out more. Best of all, go visit a few windfarms. Don't take the word of your local nimbies for it, because they're self-serving liars. Do your own research, and don't restrict that research to other nimby groups' websites. There is a wealth of good, reliable information out there to help you get the measure of what a windfarm might mean for you (keeping it simple: you've got nothing to worry about). But most of all, go and get as close as you can to as many working windfarms as you can.
So, to the nimby fool who posted that link to our blog with his own bigoted comments, we say this: we are the ones who are exposing the fraudulent claims and the false statements, the intolerant behaviour and nimby madness of those who conjure up unnecessary concerns purely to force others into opposing harmless developments. They are the ones whose response tends to be brutish (as well as dishonest).
And if you were honest and clear-sighted, you'd know that. We've worked hard to supply the facts about windfarms - the real facts, that is, not the lunatic falsehoods peddled by the nimbies - and to address the legitimate concerns of the public. You, sir, are the sort who will happily whip up unnecessary fears for your own peculiar reasons. The "unedifying example" is your own. The "brutish response" is usually that of those you seem to agree with.
We will always deal as honestly and straightforwardly as possible with concerns about wind power. Unlike the sort of nimby crank who thinks that our approach is "unedifying".
Anyone, please now go and look at that letter (link above). It's pretty good.
Friday, 16 March 2012
Thursday, 15 March 2012
LIVING IN THE PAST
The National Trust has gone all nimby.
True, it's chair, Simon Jenkins, has sounded off about wind turbines at every available opportunity, even going so far as to make out that his own blinkered opposition to wind power is shared by the charity he chairs. This outrageous slur was countered by a statement from the National Trust explaining that Jenkins's backward views are his own and have nothing to do with the official stance of the Trust itself.
But now the National Trust has revealed itself as nimby to the core. It has shown that it makes the same fundamental mistake - following the same fallacious logic - as the nimbiest of nimbies.
After an appeal hearing, an inspector from Her Majesty's Planning Inspectorate has given the go-ahead for the four-turbine Barnwell Manor windfarm in Northamptonshire. The National Trust is up in arms about this, because the turbines will be visible from the Grade 1 listed Lyveden New Bield, a property belonging to the National Trust.
The seventeenth-century lodge and gardens were never finished, largely because Sir Thomas Tresham, who was building and landscaping the site, died in 1605. His son Francis inherited the estate but then got mixed up in the Gunpowder Plot and died in the Tower of London before the year's end.
Unsurprisingly, on the day of the planning inspector's unaccompanied visit to the site, the dimwitted nimbies of the Stop Barnwell Manor Wind Farm campaign group flew a blimp. This has become standard practice among nimbies - which just goes to show how little imagination these fruitcakes have, not least of all because you'd have to be pretty stupid to believe that the blimp demonstrates anything at all. Windfarms and blimps have very little in common, and it is far from unusual for the nimby idiots to fly their wretched blimps in places that are, shall we say, somewhat removed from the intended site of the windfarm, purely to create a false and misleading impression (as happened at Gartree). The routine flying of blimps is simply nimby agitation with no relevance whatsoever to the issues involved.
Neither the nimbies nor the National Trust seem to have worried about the airfield which is somewhat closer to Lyveden New Bield than the windfarm, and from which gliders and tow aircraft take off throughout the summer, when the vast majority of visitors to the National Trust property actually turn up. There were few enough aircraft and gliders around in Sir Thomas Tresham's day, and so you'd think that the nimby nutters would be honest enough to admit that the area is scarcely "untouched". But you'd be wrong.
The nimbies of Stop Barnwell Manor Wind Farm came out with all the usual nonsense to oppose the windfarm, pretending that the area was not windy enough (i.e., not windy enough for a windfarm, but windy enough for gliders) - the planning inspector saw through that one. There was also the usual fuss made about bats, but the council had withdrawn this as a basis for its original refusal of planning permission, almost certainly because it was a red herring. It usually is.
Overall, the planning inspector accepted that 10MW of installed wind capacity at Barnwell Manor takes the region a few steps closer to meeting its commitments, and any supposed or alleged "damage" done to local heritage had to be offset against that useful development.
The National Trust, though, is unhappy. Regardless of airplanes and gliders flying past Lyveden New Bield, the Trust believes that the gardens and lodge which were left unfinished four hundred years ago are so important to the fate of our nation that they should have had priority over an important clean-tech development.
This is the mistake they're making. It's the same mistake as that made by most nimbies.
Forget all the guff about windfarms not being "economically viable" - which is a joke - or them having an illusory "adverse effect" on health or property prices. Forget all the mendacious gibberish about windfarms doing nothing to reduce CO2 emissions or their supposed impact on bats - whether or not there are any bats in the area. What it all boils down to is the view.
It is a truism of planning and property ownership that you cannot own a view. And yet, when the nimbies bought or built their houses in the country, they really do seem to believe that the "view" came as part and parcel of the title deeds. It didn't, of course, and deep down in their black hearts, they know this. Which is why so few of them are honest about it, and why we routinely get such a torrent of dishonest rubbish peddled about wind power. Of course, we hear all sorts of nonsense about "visual amenity", but it tends to be buried underneath a pile of spurious objections concocted out of subsequently retracted stories published in the Telegraph - that most Delingpole of "newspapers" - and the sort of garbage that nimby groups raid from each other's nimby websites, even if the claims have previously been scorned by independent analysts at the Advertising Standards Authority.
Like the accursed nimby blimp (boring, boring!), these made-up stories just keep doing the rounds. They've been proven false time after time, but cretinous groups of self-centred nimbies rehash them endlessly. They have to, because otherwise they'd have to admit that their only real objection is that the proposed windfarm will "spoil their view". Which isn't really an objection at all, is it? Because the view isn't theirs to begin with.
The National Trust has walked into the same trap. They seem to think that "their" property - Lyveden New Bield - will be "damaged" by having a windfarm some distance away from it. There will be no noise impact (unlike with the airfield) and no nuisance. But the Trust, idiotically, imagines that because it runs the Grade 1 listed property, it must also own the view.
See? Same foolish mistake as the nimbies. The "view" does not belong to them, and it does not belong to Lyveden New Bield. So, realistically, they do not have the right to try and stop a vital, beneficial, harmless green energy development simply because they don't like the look of it. The Trust seems to imagine that anybody visiting the gardens (which were never finished) should be able to look out over a landscape which bears very little resemblance to the way it looked in the days of Sir Thomas Tresham. They're trying to flog a false view of history, and putting their preserved-in-aspic piece of it ahead of a development which is vital and necessary for the nation's future.
So, too, are a number of Tory and Lib Dem MPs - 44 of them, including most of the more fanatical anti-windfarm loonies on the government's backbanches (the self-serving Cash, the reckless Heaton-Harris, the odious Leadsom) - who leaked their "secret" letter to the PM to, where else, the Tory Telegraph. These "Protect My Privileges At All Costs" hypocrites have decided that economic recovery can wait. What really matters to them is "their" view.
No one, but no one, should be allowed to build anything where a complacent Tory backbencher, a raving nimby or a visitor looking around a National Trust property can see it, apparently. Which is about as insane as you can get.
This monstrous special pleading on behalf of vested interests must stop! It is holding Britain back, denying us a safe clean future, all because a few very selfish individuals think that they own something they don't. The National Trust does not own the view from a four-hundred year old garden that was never finished. The grasping frauds of the Tory backbenches do not own the views from their country piles. The average swivel-eyed nimby does not own the view from the house they bought four years ago. None of them owns the view. And none of them has the right to advance the preposterous argument that the "landscape" has remained unspoiled and will now be "adversely affected" by a windfarm on the horizon. It's a favourite argument of the nimby class, and it is utterly bogus.
We can do better than this. We can preserve our heritage without trying to live in a false past which never existed, and without insisting that the National Trust, hard-right Tory extremists or tin-pot little nimbies are the Lords of All They Survey. We can start being reasonable, rational and honest. We can admit that, a) windfarms are not a "blot" on the landscape - they are elegant, efficient and essentially noiseless technological marvels, and b) they are the future.
So, for God's sake, Britons - stop living in the past (especially one that never existed in the first place)! Stop putting your own narrow-minded and misplaced self-interest ahead of the national good! Stop pretending that you own something you don't!
Get real or shut up, basically, before you do any more harm to this country of ours. And let's allow the 21st century solution to our problems, rather than sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that we still live in feudal times.
True, it's chair, Simon Jenkins, has sounded off about wind turbines at every available opportunity, even going so far as to make out that his own blinkered opposition to wind power is shared by the charity he chairs. This outrageous slur was countered by a statement from the National Trust explaining that Jenkins's backward views are his own and have nothing to do with the official stance of the Trust itself.
But now the National Trust has revealed itself as nimby to the core. It has shown that it makes the same fundamental mistake - following the same fallacious logic - as the nimbiest of nimbies.
After an appeal hearing, an inspector from Her Majesty's Planning Inspectorate has given the go-ahead for the four-turbine Barnwell Manor windfarm in Northamptonshire. The National Trust is up in arms about this, because the turbines will be visible from the Grade 1 listed Lyveden New Bield, a property belonging to the National Trust.
The seventeenth-century lodge and gardens were never finished, largely because Sir Thomas Tresham, who was building and landscaping the site, died in 1605. His son Francis inherited the estate but then got mixed up in the Gunpowder Plot and died in the Tower of London before the year's end.
Unsurprisingly, on the day of the planning inspector's unaccompanied visit to the site, the dimwitted nimbies of the Stop Barnwell Manor Wind Farm campaign group flew a blimp. This has become standard practice among nimbies - which just goes to show how little imagination these fruitcakes have, not least of all because you'd have to be pretty stupid to believe that the blimp demonstrates anything at all. Windfarms and blimps have very little in common, and it is far from unusual for the nimby idiots to fly their wretched blimps in places that are, shall we say, somewhat removed from the intended site of the windfarm, purely to create a false and misleading impression (as happened at Gartree). The routine flying of blimps is simply nimby agitation with no relevance whatsoever to the issues involved.
Neither the nimbies nor the National Trust seem to have worried about the airfield which is somewhat closer to Lyveden New Bield than the windfarm, and from which gliders and tow aircraft take off throughout the summer, when the vast majority of visitors to the National Trust property actually turn up. There were few enough aircraft and gliders around in Sir Thomas Tresham's day, and so you'd think that the nimby nutters would be honest enough to admit that the area is scarcely "untouched". But you'd be wrong.
The nimbies of Stop Barnwell Manor Wind Farm came out with all the usual nonsense to oppose the windfarm, pretending that the area was not windy enough (i.e., not windy enough for a windfarm, but windy enough for gliders) - the planning inspector saw through that one. There was also the usual fuss made about bats, but the council had withdrawn this as a basis for its original refusal of planning permission, almost certainly because it was a red herring. It usually is.
Overall, the planning inspector accepted that 10MW of installed wind capacity at Barnwell Manor takes the region a few steps closer to meeting its commitments, and any supposed or alleged "damage" done to local heritage had to be offset against that useful development.
The National Trust, though, is unhappy. Regardless of airplanes and gliders flying past Lyveden New Bield, the Trust believes that the gardens and lodge which were left unfinished four hundred years ago are so important to the fate of our nation that they should have had priority over an important clean-tech development.
This is the mistake they're making. It's the same mistake as that made by most nimbies.
Forget all the guff about windfarms not being "economically viable" - which is a joke - or them having an illusory "adverse effect" on health or property prices. Forget all the mendacious gibberish about windfarms doing nothing to reduce CO2 emissions or their supposed impact on bats - whether or not there are any bats in the area. What it all boils down to is the view.
It is a truism of planning and property ownership that you cannot own a view. And yet, when the nimbies bought or built their houses in the country, they really do seem to believe that the "view" came as part and parcel of the title deeds. It didn't, of course, and deep down in their black hearts, they know this. Which is why so few of them are honest about it, and why we routinely get such a torrent of dishonest rubbish peddled about wind power. Of course, we hear all sorts of nonsense about "visual amenity", but it tends to be buried underneath a pile of spurious objections concocted out of subsequently retracted stories published in the Telegraph - that most Delingpole of "newspapers" - and the sort of garbage that nimby groups raid from each other's nimby websites, even if the claims have previously been scorned by independent analysts at the Advertising Standards Authority.
Like the accursed nimby blimp (boring, boring!), these made-up stories just keep doing the rounds. They've been proven false time after time, but cretinous groups of self-centred nimbies rehash them endlessly. They have to, because otherwise they'd have to admit that their only real objection is that the proposed windfarm will "spoil their view". Which isn't really an objection at all, is it? Because the view isn't theirs to begin with.
The National Trust has walked into the same trap. They seem to think that "their" property - Lyveden New Bield - will be "damaged" by having a windfarm some distance away from it. There will be no noise impact (unlike with the airfield) and no nuisance. But the Trust, idiotically, imagines that because it runs the Grade 1 listed property, it must also own the view.
See? Same foolish mistake as the nimbies. The "view" does not belong to them, and it does not belong to Lyveden New Bield. So, realistically, they do not have the right to try and stop a vital, beneficial, harmless green energy development simply because they don't like the look of it. The Trust seems to imagine that anybody visiting the gardens (which were never finished) should be able to look out over a landscape which bears very little resemblance to the way it looked in the days of Sir Thomas Tresham. They're trying to flog a false view of history, and putting their preserved-in-aspic piece of it ahead of a development which is vital and necessary for the nation's future.
So, too, are a number of Tory and Lib Dem MPs - 44 of them, including most of the more fanatical anti-windfarm loonies on the government's backbanches (the self-serving Cash, the reckless Heaton-Harris, the odious Leadsom) - who leaked their "secret" letter to the PM to, where else, the Tory Telegraph. These "Protect My Privileges At All Costs" hypocrites have decided that economic recovery can wait. What really matters to them is "their" view.
No one, but no one, should be allowed to build anything where a complacent Tory backbencher, a raving nimby or a visitor looking around a National Trust property can see it, apparently. Which is about as insane as you can get.
This monstrous special pleading on behalf of vested interests must stop! It is holding Britain back, denying us a safe clean future, all because a few very selfish individuals think that they own something they don't. The National Trust does not own the view from a four-hundred year old garden that was never finished. The grasping frauds of the Tory backbenches do not own the views from their country piles. The average swivel-eyed nimby does not own the view from the house they bought four years ago. None of them owns the view. And none of them has the right to advance the preposterous argument that the "landscape" has remained unspoiled and will now be "adversely affected" by a windfarm on the horizon. It's a favourite argument of the nimby class, and it is utterly bogus.
We can do better than this. We can preserve our heritage without trying to live in a false past which never existed, and without insisting that the National Trust, hard-right Tory extremists or tin-pot little nimbies are the Lords of All They Survey. We can start being reasonable, rational and honest. We can admit that, a) windfarms are not a "blot" on the landscape - they are elegant, efficient and essentially noiseless technological marvels, and b) they are the future.
So, for God's sake, Britons - stop living in the past (especially one that never existed in the first place)! Stop putting your own narrow-minded and misplaced self-interest ahead of the national good! Stop pretending that you own something you don't!
Get real or shut up, basically, before you do any more harm to this country of ours. And let's allow the 21st century solution to our problems, rather than sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that we still live in feudal times.
Tuesday, 13 March 2012
NEWS FROM LIE-CESTERSHIRE
Parish Councils are supposed to be a cornerstone of English democracy. But when a bunch of nimbies go berserk, parish councils are too easily hijacked and subverted.
We saw it during the Great Lenchwick Scandal. A deranged nimby mob obstructed parish councils, preventing them from going about their lawful democratic business (the self-important leader of the nimby group refused to rein in their excesses - but then, he was largely responsible for the lies that had got them going in the first place). The parish councillors resigned en masse. Then, with the collusion of a District Councillor, a new parish council was created and packed with signed-up members of the nimby mob.
Other parish councils were attacked. Some stood their ground. Others, like Harvington, in which less than a third of the inhabitants were bothered about the proposed windfarm, decided to suck up to the devious traitors of Church Lench anyway.
Local democracy had been overturned (as a lifelong resident of Church Lench reported). The nimbies threw out the rule book for parish councils, diverting public money into their insane and fraudulent anti-windfarm campaign. Even the supposedly neutral councils - like Norton & Lenchwick - were quietly hijacked by nimby liars. Regardless of what the local people actually felt, their representatives objected. All the councils submitted the same objection, a poor-quality hatchet job done by a local solicitor and paid for by parish money.
But we were not alone. In the East Midlands, Lubenam Parish Council also decided that it was not a legally constituted democratic body but the political wing of the Stop Gartree Wind Farm group. The parish council duly published the usual insane misinformation and collected signatures on pro forma letters at various public events. Thirteen months later, these letters were retrospectively dated and the planning application case number added on.
That was illegal. Worse, many of those letters came from residents who had no intention whatsoever of objecting to the Gartree Wind Farm. The parish council was engaging in fraud!
Harborough District Council accepted all those letters. The chief executive of Harborough DC has since stated that "In principle Harborough District Council would not accept forged letters of representation." Whatever "in principle" means. The fact remains, thanks to the unlawful and undemocratic behaviour of the maniacs on Lubenham Parish Council, the District Council was sucked into the fraud.
Something very similar happened in Lenchwick, where Wychavon District Council signally failed to put its foot down. The nimby liars and frauds were allowed to run amok, taking our parish council money and diverting it into their cretinous, treacherous, vicious campaign. Wychavon, though alerted to the outrage, did nothing.
A very detailed account of the misbehaviour of Lubenham Parish Council and Harborough District Council in this matter of the utmost national importance can be read here:
http://docs.google.com/file/d/0B1M8O6n2n4Q5NTkxOWFiMjAtYzNjMS00NzI3LWI3ZDYtZWY0Y2M1ZjA1YzI4/edit?pli=1
Sadly, it appears that the nimby maniacs are back in force in Leicestershire. We mentioned in our last post a planning application which has been submitted for a single 20-metre turbine in Horninghold. Not a windfarm, a moderately-sized individual turbine. But, buoyed by the success of Lubenham's law-breaking antics, the nimby nutters of Harborough have swung into action, determined to stop one man's efforts to combat climate change and create cheap, clean energy.
Bilston Parish Council turn out to be the villains on this occasion. We can comfortably assume that - in defiance of the proper behaviour of parish councils - the loons of Bilston had made up their minds long before this application was submitted (indeed, the proposed site of the turbine was moved 60 metres to accommodate local concerns).
The parish clerk of Bilston is quite possibly as dishonest and slippery as some of the clerks we got to know and loathe during the Lenchwick Scandal. A letter has been submitted to Harborough District Council from this "person", who can barely avoid spuming their frothy-mouthed rage all over the letter.
The letter starts with a bit of creative language: "Comments have been received from the majority of householders within the Village [shades of The Prisoner, for those who remember it] and with the exception of one household all other comments received objected to the proposal."
This is tricky writing. It's designed to give the (false) impression that the entire village is opposed - apart from that one accursed household. But evidently there are villagers - the parish clerk was extremely careful not to indicate how many - who either hold no form opinion or are actually in favour of the windfarm but are too scared to speak out (it happens: it happened in Lenchwick).
Neither did the huffing and puffing parish clerk have the grace to admit that the "one household" which expressed support for the wind turbine happens to be the home of one of the UK's pioneers of wind energy, a man who probably knows more about wind power than anyone else in Britain. He is also the professor who so thoroughly debunked the insane bilge published in the nimby Bible - a useless piece of phoney research entitled The Wind Farm Scam. Copies of this cheap publication were bought in bulk and distributed by our local fanatics as part of their drive to "educate" the District Council, in that oh-so Stalinist sense of the word.
Having tried to give a false impression of the strength of local opposition - without admitting that Bilston Parish Council has completely ignored the advice of a genuine wind power expert who lives on their doorstep - the clerk goes on to make some claims which would be bold if they weren't so stupid.
Naturally, the countryside around the Village is the most beautiful anywhere on God's green earth, and that would be ruined forever and a day if a single 20-metre turbine was allowed. People using the footpaths would be "adversely affected" (what does that mean? They'd be mugged? Mildly inconvenienced? Prone to cricked necks because of their inability to look at anything other than a medium-sized turbine?).
The gibberish continues, as Mr Pompous-Arse assures his District Council that the one turbine would play havoc with the ecology of the area and frighten the horses. Did he check with the British Horse Society, who know a thing or two about horses and wind turbines? Probably not. Just the usual rampant prejudice inspired by stupid nimby rumours.
But what really gets this idiot's goat is that people who don't live in the Village have commented on the proposal, expressing support for this sensible, necessary and harmless development.
It doesn't concern the parish councillors that objections have been solicited from absentee nimbies as far afield as London and - yes - Main Street, Church Lench. No, they're just spectacularly unhappy that democracy is being seen to be done.
Of course, when you happen to live in an area which already has a reputation for fixing up letters of objection under false pretences and submitting forged letters of representation, you really should expect that those in this land who still have a heart and a soul will stand up for Britain and support this worthy wind turbine. But - like every nimby everywhere - their countryside is theirs, it's "particularly attractive", and only the people who happen to agree with their blinkered and foolish stance should be allowed to express an opinion. No wind turbine experts, no supporters of green energy, no one who actually wants the turbine to be given the go-ahead should be heard from. End of.
That's how the nimby Nazis think. They, and they alone, are allowed an opinion - even if their opinion is based on lies, misinformation, prejudice, ignorance and overwhelming intolerance.
Don't these morons realise what is happening? We are facing a crisis - a crisis made of several crises all bundled into one to make the perfect storm. Climate change (a hosepipe ban in March - nice work, mortals!), energy shortages, resource shortages, ever-increasing domestic bills thanks to the coalition government's love-in with the lobbyists for gas and nuclear ...
AND THESE MENTALISTS OF BILSTON DON'T WANT ONE MAN TO PUT UP A TURBINE BECAUSE IT MIGHT "ADVERSELY AFFECT" SOMEBODY WALKING ALONG A FOOTPATH???
How insane, how blisteringly out-of-touch, how disgustingly self-important must you be to be that divorced from reality?
So, Harborough District Council now has to decide what democracy means. Typically, the nimby fools of Bilston Parish Council are invoking the "terms" of the Localism Bill. They should be threatened with a nuclear power station on their doorstep and forced to decide between that and a 20-metre wind turbine!
Can Harborough DC redeem itself, after its blatant collusion in fraud over the Gartree Wind Farm? We'll know soon enough.
(If you want to leave a supportive comment for the 20-metre wind turbine, please email us here at wind-in-the-orchard@hotmail.com before Tuesday 20 March and we'll send you the link)
We saw it during the Great Lenchwick Scandal. A deranged nimby mob obstructed parish councils, preventing them from going about their lawful democratic business (the self-important leader of the nimby group refused to rein in their excesses - but then, he was largely responsible for the lies that had got them going in the first place). The parish councillors resigned en masse. Then, with the collusion of a District Councillor, a new parish council was created and packed with signed-up members of the nimby mob.
Other parish councils were attacked. Some stood their ground. Others, like Harvington, in which less than a third of the inhabitants were bothered about the proposed windfarm, decided to suck up to the devious traitors of Church Lench anyway.
Local democracy had been overturned (as a lifelong resident of Church Lench reported). The nimbies threw out the rule book for parish councils, diverting public money into their insane and fraudulent anti-windfarm campaign. Even the supposedly neutral councils - like Norton & Lenchwick - were quietly hijacked by nimby liars. Regardless of what the local people actually felt, their representatives objected. All the councils submitted the same objection, a poor-quality hatchet job done by a local solicitor and paid for by parish money.
But we were not alone. In the East Midlands, Lubenam Parish Council also decided that it was not a legally constituted democratic body but the political wing of the Stop Gartree Wind Farm group. The parish council duly published the usual insane misinformation and collected signatures on pro forma letters at various public events. Thirteen months later, these letters were retrospectively dated and the planning application case number added on.
That was illegal. Worse, many of those letters came from residents who had no intention whatsoever of objecting to the Gartree Wind Farm. The parish council was engaging in fraud!
Harborough District Council accepted all those letters. The chief executive of Harborough DC has since stated that "In principle Harborough District Council would not accept forged letters of representation." Whatever "in principle" means. The fact remains, thanks to the unlawful and undemocratic behaviour of the maniacs on Lubenham Parish Council, the District Council was sucked into the fraud.
Something very similar happened in Lenchwick, where Wychavon District Council signally failed to put its foot down. The nimby liars and frauds were allowed to run amok, taking our parish council money and diverting it into their cretinous, treacherous, vicious campaign. Wychavon, though alerted to the outrage, did nothing.
A very detailed account of the misbehaviour of Lubenham Parish Council and Harborough District Council in this matter of the utmost national importance can be read here:
http://docs.google.com/file/d/0B1M8O6n2n4Q5NTkxOWFiMjAtYzNjMS00NzI3LWI3ZDYtZWY0Y2M1ZjA1YzI4/edit?pli=1
Sadly, it appears that the nimby maniacs are back in force in Leicestershire. We mentioned in our last post a planning application which has been submitted for a single 20-metre turbine in Horninghold. Not a windfarm, a moderately-sized individual turbine. But, buoyed by the success of Lubenham's law-breaking antics, the nimby nutters of Harborough have swung into action, determined to stop one man's efforts to combat climate change and create cheap, clean energy.
Bilston Parish Council turn out to be the villains on this occasion. We can comfortably assume that - in defiance of the proper behaviour of parish councils - the loons of Bilston had made up their minds long before this application was submitted (indeed, the proposed site of the turbine was moved 60 metres to accommodate local concerns).
The parish clerk of Bilston is quite possibly as dishonest and slippery as some of the clerks we got to know and loathe during the Lenchwick Scandal. A letter has been submitted to Harborough District Council from this "person", who can barely avoid spuming their frothy-mouthed rage all over the letter.
The letter starts with a bit of creative language: "Comments have been received from the majority of householders within the Village [shades of The Prisoner, for those who remember it] and with the exception of one household all other comments received objected to the proposal."
This is tricky writing. It's designed to give the (false) impression that the entire village is opposed - apart from that one accursed household. But evidently there are villagers - the parish clerk was extremely careful not to indicate how many - who either hold no form opinion or are actually in favour of the windfarm but are too scared to speak out (it happens: it happened in Lenchwick).
Neither did the huffing and puffing parish clerk have the grace to admit that the "one household" which expressed support for the wind turbine happens to be the home of one of the UK's pioneers of wind energy, a man who probably knows more about wind power than anyone else in Britain. He is also the professor who so thoroughly debunked the insane bilge published in the nimby Bible - a useless piece of phoney research entitled The Wind Farm Scam. Copies of this cheap publication were bought in bulk and distributed by our local fanatics as part of their drive to "educate" the District Council, in that oh-so Stalinist sense of the word.
Having tried to give a false impression of the strength of local opposition - without admitting that Bilston Parish Council has completely ignored the advice of a genuine wind power expert who lives on their doorstep - the clerk goes on to make some claims which would be bold if they weren't so stupid.
Naturally, the countryside around the Village is the most beautiful anywhere on God's green earth, and that would be ruined forever and a day if a single 20-metre turbine was allowed. People using the footpaths would be "adversely affected" (what does that mean? They'd be mugged? Mildly inconvenienced? Prone to cricked necks because of their inability to look at anything other than a medium-sized turbine?).
The gibberish continues, as Mr Pompous-Arse assures his District Council that the one turbine would play havoc with the ecology of the area and frighten the horses. Did he check with the British Horse Society, who know a thing or two about horses and wind turbines? Probably not. Just the usual rampant prejudice inspired by stupid nimby rumours.
But what really gets this idiot's goat is that people who don't live in the Village have commented on the proposal, expressing support for this sensible, necessary and harmless development.
It doesn't concern the parish councillors that objections have been solicited from absentee nimbies as far afield as London and - yes - Main Street, Church Lench. No, they're just spectacularly unhappy that democracy is being seen to be done.
Of course, when you happen to live in an area which already has a reputation for fixing up letters of objection under false pretences and submitting forged letters of representation, you really should expect that those in this land who still have a heart and a soul will stand up for Britain and support this worthy wind turbine. But - like every nimby everywhere - their countryside is theirs, it's "particularly attractive", and only the people who happen to agree with their blinkered and foolish stance should be allowed to express an opinion. No wind turbine experts, no supporters of green energy, no one who actually wants the turbine to be given the go-ahead should be heard from. End of.
That's how the nimby Nazis think. They, and they alone, are allowed an opinion - even if their opinion is based on lies, misinformation, prejudice, ignorance and overwhelming intolerance.
Don't these morons realise what is happening? We are facing a crisis - a crisis made of several crises all bundled into one to make the perfect storm. Climate change (a hosepipe ban in March - nice work, mortals!), energy shortages, resource shortages, ever-increasing domestic bills thanks to the coalition government's love-in with the lobbyists for gas and nuclear ...
AND THESE MENTALISTS OF BILSTON DON'T WANT ONE MAN TO PUT UP A TURBINE BECAUSE IT MIGHT "ADVERSELY AFFECT" SOMEBODY WALKING ALONG A FOOTPATH???
How insane, how blisteringly out-of-touch, how disgustingly self-important must you be to be that divorced from reality?
So, Harborough District Council now has to decide what democracy means. Typically, the nimby fools of Bilston Parish Council are invoking the "terms" of the Localism Bill. They should be threatened with a nuclear power station on their doorstep and forced to decide between that and a 20-metre wind turbine!
Can Harborough DC redeem itself, after its blatant collusion in fraud over the Gartree Wind Farm? We'll know soon enough.
(If you want to leave a supportive comment for the 20-metre wind turbine, please email us here at wind-in-the-orchard@hotmail.com before Tuesday 20 March and we'll send you the link)
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