Power games and the battle for beauty

The Government’s plan to cover the countryside in ugly pylons with seemingly no regard for aesthetics must be vigorously challenged

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AT first sight, the prospect of 1,000 miles of giant pylons covering the length and breadth of Britain beggars belief. It would be the most intrusive invasion of the nation’s rural landscape since the Second World War. It should be subject to a searching audit and challenge.

The pylons, in their tens of thousands, are 400kV colossi the height of Nelson’s Column. They are to link the wind turbines of Scotland and the North Sea with London and the South-East. They will march south to the Lake District, cross Snowdonia as far as the Cambrian Mountains and spread from the Lincolnshire Wolds through East Anglia to the Thames. Occasionally, the cables will be buried, as in bits of the Peak District and Snowdonia, but the generality of Britain’s countryside is seen as being of no scenic value. It is up for grabs by a private company, the National Grid.

The Government's current war on planning Sir Keir Starmer's 'build baby build-treats those now defending rural Britain as fit for ridicule. Hardly a week passes but the Prime Minister flexes his muscles, smirks and derides them as blockers, nimbys and enemies of growth. His treatment of a concern for the environment as mere self-interest is the measure of this Government's philistinism.