The Nimbys have not won

I WAS delighted to see Suffolk coastal councillors displaying a fair degree of good sense by giving planning permission for a new wind farm on Parham airfield - and I'm looking forward to the day when there are scores of turbines erected off the Suffolk coast.

Britain has to do more to harness its natural renewable resources - like the wind, tides and waves - if we are to help stop the polluting of our atmosphere.

And for the life of me I cannot understand the objections to these green alternatives - especially when they come from people who claim to care about the environment.

Frankly it sounds like nimbyism of the first degree!

I suppose each to his own taste, but I cannot see anything ugly about wind turbines - they can add interest to a bleak landscape and have a beauty of their own.

A few years ago I drove past a wind farm just outside Aberystwyth in Wales and that certainly added interest to an already attractive landscape.

Frankly Parham airfield is a pretty desolate place after the Americans ripped out all the trees and hedges during the second world war - it's difficult to imagine how a few turbines will ruin the look of the place!

And apparently they're noisy.

I'm sorry, but in the league table of noisy environmental hazards, wind farms really aren't up there next to airports, main roads, factories, or even farms.

The last argument I've heard against the turbines is that they won't generate much electricity - that they won't be able to make a real difference.

If that argument is followed through, then we'll never do anything to address the environmental problems caused by our desire for energy.

We'll just build more coal-fired power stations which produce lots of electricity but belch lots of carbon dioxide into the air.

Or we'll build more nuclear stations - starting with another one at Sizewell.

If that's what the objectors to wind farms want, fine. But don't insult our intelligence by claiming to be friends of the environment as well.

IT took an awful long time for Keith Myers-Hewitt to leave the Conservative group at Suffolk County Council - and frankly his former colleagues did not handle the situation well.

Mr Myers-Hewitt finally resigned from the group this week after it became clear that comments he made more than a year ago would continue to be a source of embarrassment to his party colleagues.

He has always denied making racist comments, but the Adjudication Panel which heard the case in June believed he did say: “Have the aliens landed, or is it an invasion of darkies?” during a visit to Stowmarket library in July last year.

He was cleared of bringing Stowmarket Town Council into disrepute, but his Tory colleagues on that authority had no hesitation about withdrawing the whip from him.

Meanwhile at Endeavour House, where he was elected to the county council in May, his colleagues there seemed to accept his apology and allow him to continue in his new role.

Now he has resigned from the group - if not the council as the opposition would like to see.

But the Tory group doesn't come out of this too well - if they had really wanted to press home the point that they were not prepared to tolerate racist language they should have followed Stowmarket's lead and withdrawn the whip from him straight away.

Having spoken to leading councillors, I wouldn't think they would tolerate racist language - but that is the impression they have given to many people over the last few weeks.

Now that Mr Myers-Hewitt is no longer a member of their group, they have the chance to make a new start. They have a big job on their hands.