November 23, 2012
Press releases, Scotland

CATS Press Release – Response to EEET Committee Report

Communities Against Turbines Scotland | November 23, 2012 | www.communitiesagainstturbinesscotland.com

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PRESS RELEASE
FROM: CATS / COMMUNITIES AGAINST TURBINES SCOTLAND
Contact: Andrew Shiells Shiellsshiells@hotmail.co.uk 01988860228 or Kim Terry 01465712594
CATS PRESS RELEASE
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The publication today of the EET Committee’s report, following its long inquiry, is a major disappointment, not only for those who have seen through the travesty of wind power, but also for the population of Scotland. Committees of the Scottish Parliament are supposed to question and interrogate the Parliament, not behave like the First Minister’s lapdogs. The lack of real investigation and the docile questioning of witnesses has been an utter embarrassment, as we saw at the time from the way the Committee treated its own invited guests.
However that may be, the Committee has endorsed the growth of renewables, and specifically wind power, across our country. Today we leave out the effect on tourism and on communities, and just focus on the technical aspects. There will be plenty of time to reflect once the adverse consequences become noticed and better understood by larger numbers of the population.
Consider just these few points
• The renewables programme is being forced on the Scottish people in defiance of the Åarhus Convention, which expressly requires the presentation of information in a way which allows public information and understanding
• It is not supported by a competent Environmental Assessment and therefore may not actually be lawful.
• It consistently and deliberately conceals the magnitude of the cost of implementation of the Scottish Government’s targets for generation by renewables through mistaken information and failure to reveal known and predictable outcomes.
• It assumes a market for surplus electricity which probably does not exist.
• It assumes that technologies which do not currently exist in deployable volumes will somehow become available in time to facilitate meeting the Government’s generation targets.
In a few days CATS will publish its measured response to the Committee’s report. Members of the Committee and of the Government had better be aware that it is now clear that our elected Government’s Energy Programme is completely unfit for purpose and sooner or later will impose substantial additional costs on every household, whilst trashing our countryside and bringing misery and division to hundreds of communities across the country.
The Committee system was one of the Jewels in the Crown of a devolved Parliament. It has become a sad apology for a Government which has not a clue what it is doing, under the iron hand of a man who has run amok.
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URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2012/11/23/cats-press-release-response-to-eeet-committee-report/