Nanny knows best?

Windfarm proponent Craig Johnson (Who’s bleating; SN 30/5/13) says “Carbon dioxide emissions per head of population in Shetland are among the highest in Britain and almost double the Scottish average…….” So what?

Apart from the fact that there is no evidence that carbon dioxide emissions are going to cause “dangerous climate change,” even if there were, it would not be a reason for Shetland to destroy its own unique environment and bankrupt itself in the process.

The only questions of interest to Shetlanders regarding the wind farm are whether the project will make an attractive investment return for Shetland and if so, is that financial return worth the loss of amenity and damage to other industries like tourism?

Once the financial and environmental gains and losses have been properly investigated and made clear, which would preferably have been done already by a local public inquiry, the question of whether this huge project should go ahead should be put to the Shetland people in a referendum.

Wind farm proponents confidently proclaim the majority of Shetlanders want it to go ahead and Sustainable Shetland, with whom I have no connection, have always said they would accept the outcome of a referendum. Yet no referendum has been held.

It seems therefore that protests from people ranging from Jonathan Wills to Craig Johnson that Sustainable Shetland are somehow “damaging the public interest” by their actions are well into the category of “bleating” since, if they are right about public opinion, the whole controversy could have been put to bed long ago by the simple act of holding a referendum.

Indeed had a referendum been held at the proper time we could have been spared all the shabby dealings and under-handed politics used to railroad the project through which resulted in acrimony and lead inexorably to the very court action which the “bleating ” fraternity so bewail.

So why didn’t they hold a referendum? Perhaps they feared the democratic process because their simple-minded constituents couldn’t possibly be expected to understand what is best for them.

After all, Nanny knows best?

John Tulloch
Lyndon
Arrochar