This latest Community Benefits survey is yet another disappointment. Even Suffolk and Kent MPs have dismissed the proposed package as little more than a “rounding error.”
In a debate on Nationally Significant Energy Infrastructure Projects in Parliament on Thursday (June 30), Suffolk Coastal MP Jenny Riddell-Carpenter said the total £2.1m community fund amounts to just 0.1% of the total Sea Link budget.
East Thanet MP Polly Billington said that number “should be multiplied by 10 if we are really going to get the benefit for our communities in the long term.”
One resident’s comments on Michael Shanks’s reply during the debate were extremely apt.
“Alas, despite the welcome change of government two years ago, the message coming out of DESNZ has not changed. Michael Shanks’s reply could have been given, almost word for word, by any of his Conservative predecessors. No doubt this is because his reply was written by the same cohort of civil servants.
- His reply was the usual mix of obfuscation and misinformation combined with the dead hand of Whitehall.
- His description of Sealink as an underground/undersea cable was a particularly egregious example of this.
- His comments about community benefits and electricity costs were misleading.
- His comments about consultation and cumulative impact demonstrate a minister and department out of touch with reality”
Mr Shanks has yet to make a dedicated visit to Suffolk Coastal to hear directly from local communities about the cumulative impact of the full range of energy infrastructure projects, including Sizewell C, offshore wind developments, interconnectors, substations, and converter stations, plus solar and water projects. We hope that our MP, Jenny Riddell-Carpenter, will be able to arrange such a visit at the earliest opportunity.
Please do try to find time to respond to this consultation.