The debate and the issue are hugely important. I live in Montgomeryshire, which is a long way from the south-west, and I did not intend to speak when I came to the debate. I came because I have a great love for the south-west. I spend much of my holiday time there. St Ives and Padstow are beautiful, and I find the Isles of Scilly irresistible. We spend a great deal of time in the south-west, so I travel through it. Inevitably one notices the impact of the development of onshore wind turbines while driving through Somerset and Cornwall. They are quite dominant. I was hugely impressed by the power of the speech made by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr Cox). Because the issue is so important to me, I felt an irresistible urge to speak in the debate.
My aim is to speak about planning policy. I would not want to incur your wrath in any circumstances, Mr Pritchard, and particularly not when you are in the Chair. I have a special interest arising from my constituency, but I shall make a passing reference to what makes this such a big issue for me: it is scale. My constituency has more than 240 turbines already, and we have a proposal for probably 35 miles of 400 kW cable, a 20-acre substation and about 500 extra turbines—it is a dedicated line—and about 100 miles of cables criss-crossing the constituency from the centre. The proposal would completely change a beautiful part of Britain, which shares a standard of beauty with the south-west. Anyone representing such an area is bound to be involved in the debate. It is a question of scale.
We have a general Government policy, supported by the Opposition and all parties, of seeking an energy mix. I think that that is right, and have never argued that wind should not play a part in it. The question is about the scale. The Government do not have a target, other than having 15% of energy coming from renewable sources by 2020. As for onshore wind, there is, I think,
an expectation of what it would provide. That expectation is between 10 GW and 13 GW of power. Currently, we have 7 GW of power that is up and operating, 6.8 GW that has passed planning and another 6 GW that is in planning. We have achieved the target that the Government expected to achieve by 2020. Clearly, the level of support is so high that there would probably be an onshore wind farm on every hill in Britain if planning permission could be gained, but the case for a moratorium is strong. As manifestos are prepared, I hope that all parties seriously consider a moratorium to protect the most beautiful parts of Britain.
There is a real issue with local democracy and how people feel locally. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon referred to hopelessness, and that is exactly how people feel. A research project at Aberystwyth university looked at how wind farms impacted on mid-Wales. The research found a sense of hopelessness and helplessness throughout the area about being able to affect the implications of Government policy on where they lived. The council signed off on the development and gave up believing in local democracy. It is probably one of the poorest local authorities in Britain, yet it felt that it had to set aside £2 million to support its decisions and defend its policies at a public inquiry.