PATRICK Harvie’s Friday column in The National featured a photograph of Mr Harvie, Energy Secretary Neil Gray and a representative of Muirhall Energy Ltd at the opening of the Greengairs East Wind Farm. They all had broad smiles on their faces.
Sadly I can see little to smile about in the overall financial arrangements from the point of view of either the Scottish taxpayer or electricity bill payer.
Mr Harvie is quoted as saying: “With more than £2 billion for renewable energy, the Programme for Government has green policies right at its heart. That’s real action and real money that is making a real difference.”
READ MORE: Warning over Scottish renewable future after UK offshore wind failure
I do not know where the figure of “more than £2 billion” comes from but I fear it is partly from our hard-earned taxes being used to eventually line the pockets of electricity suppliers.
The operators of these wind farms, many based outwith Scotland, are filling our landscapes with wind turbines that have been manufactured overseas and are controlled remotely. Once assembled they are vast money-making machines harnessing, virtually for free, wind to generate electricity – much of it to be sent southwards. They are among the very best examples of a licence to print money.
In the case of the smaller wind turbine companies, minor “community benefits” – mainly donations to local charities – are being used to convince local communities not to raise objections to planning applications.
For some reason known only to the wind turbine farmers, the electricity generated on their farms has recently greatly increased in price while the wind involved remains free.
READ MORE: Scottish Renewables stresses urgent need for more pylons and power lines
The Scottish Government is sadly complicit in this financial scandal which, due to the fact that electricity bills are not means-tested, is a major cause of poverty in Scotland. I wonder how much of our greatly heralded £25 Scottish Child Payments eventually end up in the pockets of wind farmers via the electricity bills paid by the children’s parents.
Whatever happened to the promises by the former First Minister of a Scottish national energy company?
Iain Wilson
Stirling
JOANNA Cherry writes that she is unconvinced by proposals to criminalise misogyny, but would like to see a hate crime-style statutory aggravation to protect women (There’s plenty to welcome in the FM’s Programme for Government, Sep 8). The detailed consultation paper for the misogyny bill makes clear that such an aggravation is one of the measures proposed. While the full details remain to be seen, the Equality Network strongly supports the intent of the bill.
It would be disappointing if Joanna Cherry did not support the bill, but it is more disappointing that, to judge by her comment piece, she seems to believe that the most significant cause of misogyny is the issue of equality for trans people.
READ MORE: Calls for ‘equality of outcome’ will take us into dangerous territory
Helena Kennedy KC’s review of misogyny in Scotland, which led to the bill, quoted a UK study which found that 97% of young women had experienced sexual harassment. 95% of respondents to the review’s consultation in Scotland had experienced misogynistic behaviours.
LGBT equality groups have long worked with gender equality, race equality and disability equality groups and others to counter prejudice and discrimination. Standing together is the way to succeed. Joanna Cherry’s views on trans equality are widely known, but to suggest that trans people are in any sense the cause of the misogyny and sexism still prevalent in Scotland is clearly and unhelpfully wrong.
Tim Hopkins
Director, Equality Network
I MUST say Ruth Wishart’s article in last weekend’s Sunday National was “spot on” in urging the SNP to up the ante and take on what I certainly regard as a futile attempt by the Labour Party to gain some kind of political foothold in Scotland, its significance only being created by the Unionist press/media pressing home their regular anti-SNP/Scottish Government aspersions (The SNP must marshal their forces and end this Labour resurgence, Sep 10).
As for Starmer adopting the use of what I regard as a hijacked political flag, a Union Jack, placed alongside him during interviews? This copycat ploy has Brexit written all over it! What a turn-off for most Scottish voters who are totally opposed to Brexit and are well aware of the unequal partnership in this broken Union when compared to the sham of Northern Ireland and its trade benefits!
READ MORE: SNP focus on cost of living at Rutherglen by-election campaign launch
I hope the majority of voters in Rutherglen and Hamilton West are observing this faux pas (and other Starmer manifesto U-turns!) and will act accordingly against any favour given to the Labour branch office called the Scottish Labour Party. Lastly, the photo caption alongside Ruth’s article was uncanny in the fact one could mistakenly view Ash Regan walking alongside Keir Starmer instead of Angela Rayner– what a spooky resemblance!
Bernie Japs
Edinburgh
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