Onshore Wind Energy

Tony Cunningham Excerpts

Thursday 10th February 2011 Westminster Hall

[Andrea Leadsom]

My hon. Friend makes a good point, and I would add to it. The rush to build wind farms under Labour’s top-down planning now makes it difficult for Opposition Members to stand on a localism ticket.

[Tony Cunningham (Workington) (Lab)]

I hope that the hon. Lady will wait and listen carefully to what I shall say.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I look forward to that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tony Cunningham (Workington) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom) on choosing such a very important topic for debate today.

I do not want to be party political at all, but I gently point out to the hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray) that at the last election my constituency covered about a third of the Lake district, including six lakes, some of the highest mountains and some of the most beautiful countryside anywhere in the United Kingdom, and it is represented by a Labour MP. Therefore, the idea that all Labour MPs represent “dark satanic mills “ and so on is not quite the truth.

[Mr Gray]

I accept the hon. Gentleman’s point. I absolutely apologise for my disgraceful slur. I just ask him what has happened to his colleagues who are not here today?

[Tony Cunningham]

There is no way that I can account for my colleagues. I can account only for myself.

As I said, I will not be party political. I want to speak on behalf of the people of west Cumbria, the area that I represent. The hon. Member for South Northamptonshire said very clearly, and I agree wholeheartedly with her, that we have to accept that there are two major problems: energy security and climate change. If we are to deal with both those problems, wind turbines must play their part.

However, let us take west Cumbria as an example. Recently, we have had a wind farm constructed offshore. On a good day, it produces probably enough electricity for about half the entire population of Cumbria. On a very good day, it produces even more electricity than that. I think that the people of west Cumbria would say, “It’s large, it produces a huge amount of electricity, we’ll put up with it because of the amount of electricity that it produces”. Sellafield is about 15 miles from where I live. There will be a brand new nuclear power station constructed there, which will generate huge amounts of electricity. There is a plan—one that is only in its infancy—to build a barrage across the Solway firth, which would produce a large amount of electricity. To echo the point that the hon. Member for South Northamptonshire made, the wind blows some times and not at others, but the tide tends—most days—to come in twice a day, so tidal power is a very reliable form of energy.

The people of west Cumbria would say, “We’ve got huge offshore wind turbines, there are plans for a nuclear power station and plans for a barrage across the Solway. We are doing our bit, not just for Cumbria but for the entire United Kingdom. And yet they will still come to west Cumbria and say, ‘We want to put three turbines in a field, generating enough electricity to boil a kettle on a good day.’” That is what people get annoyed about.

[Stephen Barclay]

The issue for many colleagues is not what is going on with turbines in their own constituency, but the lack of action on turbines in many metropolitan areas. Does the hon. Gentleman share the surprise that I experienced when I looked at the figures for this sector and discovered that the last Government set a 10-year target on renewable electricity, beginning in 2000 at 2.7% but only reaching just over 6% by 2010? Moreover, in 2009 they set an even more ambitious target, of 31% by 2020. Do those figures not surprise the hon. Gentleman?

[Tony Cunningham]

I strongly concur with the hon. Gentleman on one point. When I speak to groups in my constituency who talk to me about the visual impact, the noise and everything else associated with turbines that are proposed for their area, they remind me on many occasions that there are not a lot of turbines in Green park, Regent’s park or any of the parks in London, or indeed any of the other areas where there are no wind turbines at all. Why is it that people come back time and again to a small area such as west Cumbria?

The point that I want to move on to is a cogent one. The question that those people in my constituency keep asking is, “Isn’t there a balance? Isn’t it tipped too far the other way in favour of wind turbines when it comes to the disadvantages that we’re up against?” We are trying to protect the environment in a beautiful part of the world. We are trying to develop tourism not only in the centre of the Lake district, but across in west Cumbria. The balance in favour of wind turbines is being overtaken by the need to protect our environment and develop our tourist industry—that is the problem.

The Minister might be interested to hear that I wrote to the inspector to ask whether he or she would take into consideration the cumulative effect of having so many wind turbines in one area, shifting the balance against wind turbines. I got a letter back saying, “Yes, we will take into consideration the cumulative effect of so many wind turbines in one area.” We have dozens and dozens of wind turbines in west Cumbria, and the local authorities turned the last two planning applications down. Those applications resulted in huge campaigns by local residents, and I spoke vehemently against both at the public inquiries. None the less, the inspector turned around and said, “Well, on balance, we’ll allow them to go ahead.”

What was slightly scary was when I got a phone call from someone who asked, “What can we do?” These are honest, decent people, who have reached the end of their tether. They are wondering, “What can we do? We’ve been to a public inquiry. We’ve done everything we legitimately can, but they still want to put three turbines in a field. These turbines won’t generate a great deal of electricity, but they’re going to blight the area.” That is worrying.

[Andrew Percy]

I want to reinforce the hon. Gentleman’s point. A planning application was turned down twice in my area and it recently went to appeal. Precisely because there would be a wind farm with 34 turbines opposite the proposed site and another wind farm with 18 turbines a little further up the road, and precisely because there was already a wind farm opposite with eight turbines, the inspector, rather than taking into account the cumulative impact, turned around and said, “Actually, this is a wind turbine vista. As such, people will not be impacted significantly by another eight turbines.”

[Tony Cunningham]

I can only agree with the hon. Gentleman. These things sadden me. I do not want to get into the issues raised by the Localism Bill, but we are, rightly, concerned about generating enough electricity and dealing with climate change, and the community is saying, “We’ll help you. We’ll agree to a barrage. We’ll agree to offshore wind. We’ll agree to nuclear. But in return, can you please prevent any more onshore wind farms from being built?”

[The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change (Charles Hendry)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one reason why these cases have often gone through on appeal is the regional spatial strategies and the regional renewable energy targets? Does he agree that it is absolutely right to remove those because inspectors have often used them to override a strong body of public opinion?

[Tony Cunningham]

Anything that helps to support people locally—anything that gives greater power to local people—must be welcomed, although if we imagine a different scenario, in which local people say that they do not want a nuclear power station, we would not say that, therefore, we were not going to have any more nuclear power stations. We cannot do that; there must be a balance. The point I am trying to make, however, is that the balance has gone too far.

[Andrew George]

The hon. Gentleman uses the word “balance”. In a sense, he is advancing the argument that we need a balanced energy supply, and his part of the world is demonstrating that it has a balanced energy supply. However, is he saying that wind energy should never be used in the UK or that it should be used on occasion to contribute to the balance of energy supply sources?

[Tony Cunningham]

I am saying that. However, what people in west Cumbria are saying very clearly is that they have already achieved that. We already have offshore wind, plans for nuclear, plans for a barrage and lots of onshore wind. We have done our bit. The balance is therefore shifting too far against the environment and the development of tourism and in favour of onshore wind in small clusters, which—I say this with the greatest sincerity—do not make a huge difference.

To conclude, the people of west Cumbria have plans for other forms of energy. They are simply saying that enough is enough.