IT IS impossible not to praise the spectacular demonstration in Cardiff against turbines - a demonstration of the strength of feeling against the project.
With so many people involved, it’s obvious what local folk think and how worried they are about the implications for the area.
It also ups the political ante. Such is the importance of the issue, that there will be winners and losers. The winners will be either the government, if the turbines are constructed, or local people, if they’re prevented.
As I said in my previous article, it also means that the local political representatives must make this their absolute priority. They must surely be aware that they will share in the glory if the turbines are stopped – but by the same token, they will inevitably shoulder the lion’s share of the blame if they are built.
I am of the view that the Assembly will be eager to hide behind the authority of the Conservative led Westminster Government. Whitehall claims that eco-power is essential, and that Wales must play its part – and will ignore arguments about the inefficiency and cost of wind turbines. The Assembly Members will therefore use the usual defence: ‘we’re only following orders.’ They will say they can only do that with the construction of wind farms in rural areas like Powys.
As such, there’s no point pretending that success can be achieved solely by pressure on Cardiff. However, the demo outside the Assembly was a testimony to what people up here can do when we put our minds to it. Now, logically, the struggle must move on to Westminster. I cannot emphasise enough the vital urgency of doing so. Without this action, it will be hard to win the battle.
Also, there’s every reason to require anyone even vaguely connected to the Government to use that influence to prove that all the talk about localism - and about respecting the views of local people, as Tory Ministers like Eric Pickles have repeatedly promised – will now be put into action.
Unless they do, it would suggest that their pledge to local democracy is not worth the paper these speeches are written on.
Time is short. I appeal to everyone to be willing to travel to the Houses of Parliament. An excellent suggestion made to me in the Abermule Hotel on Tuesday evening was to arrange to drive a turbine lorry through Parliament Square – with legal permission of course! Let’s see what that would do to traffic flow in the capital. It could well be that creative initiatives like this are the best way to highlight the country to a crisis that most aren’t even aware is blowing in the wind.