The economic blame really lies with Wilson – not Thatcher

CAROLINE Flint’s ebullient oration (Yorkshire Post, March 7) on how to transform British industry and turn green policies into veritable emeralds is a masterpiece of glib Utopian make believe.

She makes a sustained attack on the Cameron government for failing to implement all the green measures that Labour, now conveniently out of office, would by now have introduced, and, in particular, accuses the present administration of lacking an integrated industrial strategy and even hits rarefied air when she talks of her own government’s achievements, or lack of them, we see the familiar truth of repeated failure.

Their much vaunted integrated transport policy, for instance, ended up as integrated as a bomb dropped on a land fill site. Indeed, her facile ideas are far less challenging than the practical difficulties created by their possible implementation.

The MP’s espousal of wind power as some kind of faultless energy producer is also lacking in reality; in fact, it seems in the eyes of a growing body of discerning opinion, that wind farms are about as useful at producing electricity as turkey farms at furthering the longevity of turkeys. Because of their inconsistent output, conventional stations are essential as back-up and their mammoth operational costs are an enervating burden on the economy and all energy users.

But if we are, mistakenly, going to go ahead with these economically debilitating monstrosities, and Ms Flint is right here, why don’t we manufacture our own?

However, in order to exempt her own government’s lack of initiative on this, and they had 13 years to do it, she places blame on the Left’s classical scapegoat – the Thatcher government of the 1980s – for not supporting British firms in the early development of wind power. But I ask her, why didn’t the Wilson government support even earlier initiatives? And as for the competence of Labour in assisting industry, does she remember the Harold Wilson government in its support of British Leyland?

That great conglomerate’s fortunes, under the direction of Labour, went downhill faster than a toboggan on the Cresta run. George Brown’s grandiose National Plan, another Labour brainchild, was an even greater failure and petered out in abject humiliation.

I accept that government intervention is vital in creating the conditions for enterprise and for innovation to flourish. Transport infrastructure, an efficient and inexpensive energy supply and an effective educational system are all part of this but governments must also act to liberate enterprise from paralysing over-regulation and the crippling political correctness that the likes of Harriet Harman and other Labour figures inflicted on British business.

However, Caroline Flint, with her head in the clouds, ignores in her arguments these elements that are utterly essential in pursuing a successful industrial strategy.

From: JP Beaumont, Paddock Hill, Norwood, Otley.

I DO not know if your readers are aware of the plans submitted by Kelda (Yorkshire Water) for a massive wind farm to the south of Penny Pot Lane. This current application is opposite the existing wind farm which lies to the north of Penny Pot Lane (near Harrogate) but is only a prelude to a much bigger one on the other side of Oak Beck and which will be contained within the old Haverah Park.

It is quite disgraceful that such a sensitively historical and archaeological area should be proposed for the erection of such huge industrial structures. It should be remembered that in order to facilitate maintenance of the turbines the area will be criss-crossed by miles of disfiguring access roads.

The company in its submissions states that the power generated will help to protect and cushion from possible future price fluctuations. It does not, however, mention the obscene subsidies it receives from the Government which directly feed into higher taxes and increases in electricity costs.

It is often not appreciated just how much money the developers and the land-owners receive from the Government and to what extent these subsidies represent a clear transfer of money from the less well off in higher electricity prices to the wealthy, or in this case, a large company.