I COMMEND Alan Simpson for his recent article on the failure of not only the quango that is Naturescot but also every SNP politician at Holyrood who supported John Swinney in his endorsement of the Minister for Climate Action, Dr Alasdair Allan, to override the decision of a public inquiry to refuse planning approval for the wind farm at Strath Oykel (“Nature body should think again on the threat to rare mussels”, The Herald, March 17).
This demonstrates that Holyrood is unfit for purpose when our MSPS appear unaware of the fact that, if the wind does not blow, then there will be no output from a wind turbine and the proposed 25GW of hydrogenfuelled gas turbines project will surely follow that of the Heat in Buildings bill into the dustbin of history.
This is time for a major review of the actions of an Edinburghbased parliament that appears is only there to represent Central Belt voters. It would appear that, for those living in Central
Scotland, then the rural hinterland is composed of regions that are far away and a habitat of which they know little.
It is surely time for the leaders of the Scottish Liberal Democrats, Labour and Conservatives to band together and insist that Holyrood introduces the draft Wightman Bill to transfer additional powers to local councils as pledged by all politicians prior to the May 2021 election before Holyrood desecrates every glen and ben in Scotland.
Ian Moir, Castle Douglas.
The damage done by Sitka
ROB Mackenna professes to be obsessed with the timber yields generated by the Lockerbie sawmill he manages on behalf of James Jones & Sons (“Inside the sawmill splitting the wood from the trees to be put to good use”, The Herald, March 21). However
I suspect he means he is fixated by his revenues and I very much doubt he has properly accounted for the carbon cost of the Sitka crops he oversees. Scottish Woodlands, the developer appointed by James Jones & Sons to expedite their 1,050 hectare Warblaw development, spoke of “extensive ecological surveys” underpinning their analysis (“Locals across
Scotland fighting Sitka”, The Herald, March 20) but this claim is as spurious as Mr Mackenna’s yield calculations.
Species diversity and carbon emission are twin reinforcing climate crises, yet Westminster and Holyrood provide Sitka spruce with investment subsidies when the invasive seeds are sown and complete relief from tax when timber is felled. It’s little wonder that returnsfocused commercial foresters and private funds have huge appetite for these schemes.
However public policy lags the science and is ineffective: the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Naturescot and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature have all highlighted the environmental damage caused by Sitka plantations on peatlands. A peat layer of 30cm comprises three centuries of natural selection and contains carbon equivalent to equatorial rainforests.
Yet UK forestry policy relies on archaic and arbitrary definitions of 40cm in England and 50cm in Scotland when measuring land suitable for forestry development.
The Warblaw slopes are heavily peated and their fragile ecology is representative of many hills across the South of Scotland. Much of Scotland’s peatlands are degraded and their carbon emissions comprise 15% of Scotland’s total, largely due to ineffective government policy on commercial forestry. The Warblaw proposals shine a very bright light on this and must be resisted.
As a first step, the regulator Scottish Forestry must compel James Jones & Sons to properly survey, measure and evaluate the substantial peat deposits on Warblaw and their related hydrology adopting the practices established by UK Forestry Standards. Otherwise “right tree, right place” means nothing. Iain Bannatyne, Langholm.
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