My hon. Friend raises an interesting point because speculative single turbine applications, especially for very large wind turbines of some 300 or 400 feet in height, are the ones that particularly need to be stopped. Some of the smaller wind turbines that generate for small businesses, farms or communities are acceptable. The other problem, and the Minister may be able to talk about this, is that such wind turbine applications are not linked to local communities. If a local community thinks it could benefit from a wind turbine, despite all my rhetoric this afternoon, people might find them a little more acceptable, but they are foisted upon communities that receive no benefit from them. All a community sees is a vast wind turbine restricting its view.
The flight paths of birds are also affected. One application in my constituency, for instance, is very close to a wood that has a lot of buzzards. Such applications can have a hugely detrimental effect. If I were a bird, I would not want to get caught in a wind turbine. We have to take all those things into consideration.
I thank my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon for securing this debate, and I look forward to what the Minister has to tell us.
3.13 pm