The Voice of Spalding and South Holland
Sutton Bridge Parish Council has been forced to back down on its bid to fight a second power station being built in the village – but a former parish councillor is taking up the mantle herself.
Shirley Giles has written an open letter to the government’s Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Amber Rudd, urging her to review the case and order a public inquiry.
The council was scared off by the £60,000 cost in legal fees to launch a High Court judicial review.
Chairman Coun John Grimwood says: “It would bankrupt the village. The parish hasn’t got that kind of money. It would be an unfair burden for a parish of only 2,000 homes.”
Energy firm EDF wants to build another gas-fired turbine power station, twice the size of the existing one.
But Mrs Giles is determined that Sutton Bridge will not be allowed to become a dumping ground for unwanted projects.
In the letter, she tells Ms Rudd: “This is big business with the help of the elected government bullying and trying to bamboozle a small rural community.
“I represent the views and concerns of many local people and ask that you demonstrate an understanding of our concerns. I urge you to set up a public enquiry so that all of the outstanding issues can be properly addressed.”
Her letter calls for answers to questions on health, the environment and human rights which she says have not been adequately addressed.
She also claims approval ignores the fact the power station would be built on a flood plain which came to within inches of being breached during the tidal surge of December 2013.
Mrs Giles (75), of Wharf Street, has already used £3,500 of her own savings to help overturn local planning consent.
She successfully mounted a legal challenge to South Holland District Council allowing a renewable energy park to proceed without proper consideration for its sustainability.
A big fuss was made last week when National Grid had to impose emergency measures in order to keep the lights on. The media told us that this was down to a lack of generation capacity.
I can therefore only assume that Mrs Giles is not a user of electricity (unlike the rest of us) and would not mind one little bit if she had no electricity to power her home.
This is a classic case of Not In My Back Yard thinking.
Instead of building this much needed power station next to an existing power station where the infrastructure is already in place to support it, why not build it on somebody elses doorstep instead and not only have to deal with the impact on the landscape of the power station itself but also the building of new pylons to carry the electricity away and new roads and of course the extra jobs such an investment will bring.
Even if we take the selfish view of looking at this from a South Holland only perspective, we need the electricity and we need the jobs it will bring.
The cost?
The existing “blot” will become a slightly bigger “blot”(and of course the existing blot will not go away if this planning application is defeated)
Selfish!