Solar, Flooding and Facts: What These Stories Say About Our Politics
Solar, Flooding and Facts: What These Stories Say About Our Politics
Two very different stories appeared in the news feed last week. Taken together, they reveal something important about the state of politics, public priorities and the climate that is reshaping the country faster than our debates can keep up.
Folkestone and Hythe is a stretch of coastline that means a great deal to me. It is relatively unloved in the national imagination yet rich in British history. Derek Jarman adored it. Martello towers sit along the sea walls, the old railway lines still carry the weight of past worlds and the shingle beaches at Lydd remain some of the most atmospheric in the country. I have spent days there, both as a child and as a man, wandering through the gorse and stone.
This week, that coastline is the setting for a political stand-off. The Leader of Folkestone and Hythe District Council, Councillor Jim Martin, has formally appealed to the Minister for Energy, Michael Shanks MP, over what he calls the “growing concerns” of residents about multiple large solar farms and Battery Energy Storage System proposals on Romney Marsh. KentLive reports that thousands of residents have lodged objections. At the same time the district is spending millions on flood defences to protect homes and land from rising sea levels.
Catherine Langston
Another story played out in Abergavenny. This is another place I know well, surrounded by rolling hills that are beautiful in summer and brutal during winter flooding. According to the Abergavenny Chronicle, a Conservative Member of the Senedd criticised the local health board for what she called “woke” spending on transgender training and “expensive” solar panels at the local hospital. In her view, these were misplaced priorities.
Tomos Oakley
These two stories come from very different places but they have a common thread. Both reveal the tendency of political leaders to treat climate solutions as cultural symbols rather than essential infrastructure. In one town solar farms are framed as an intrusion on the landscape. In another solar retrofits are dismissed as a distraction from more important concerns. In both cases the same truth is being ignored. The climate is no longer waiting for us to decide what we think about it.
Storm Claudia has just left Wales waterlogged again. The Guardian reports of rivers overtopping, the River Monnow hitting dangerous levels and communities already exhausted by a string of storms now facing another round of emergency clean-ups. This is the new normal, not a once in a generation event. Our environment is shifting under our feet and it is doing so with increasing force.
John Harris
This is what makes the political framing in Folkestone and Abergavenny so strange. These are not abstract ideas. They are not lifestyle choices or culture war ornaments. They are the tools of basic resilience. Solar farms and rooftop solar reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Storage systems provide stability. Flood defences buy time. Retrofit is simply the work of making our buildings safe and affordable to heat. These are direct responses to the realities we are living through.
Residents are right to demand clarity about land use on Romney Marsh. People in Abergavenny are right to want good services in their local hospital. But the way these debates are being shaped by political figures does not help anyone. They distract from the central fact of our era. If we do not invest in clean energy and climate resilience, the climate will keep demonstrating the cost of delay.
The British public, when asked without political filters, consistently supports clean air, clean water and clean energy. They want security. They want bills that can be controlled. They want homes that do not flood every winter. The idea that the public is hostile to climate action is a myth. What people are hostile to is confusion, spin and decisions that do not match the reality they can see outside their windows.
These stories from Folkestone and Hythe, from Abergavenny and from flood-hit Wales are asking the same question. What are the priorities of our political leaders. Are they prepared to move beyond culture wars and confront the simple truth that the climate does not negotiate. Or will they continue to tell stories that pretend we still have a choice about whether or not to adapt.
Solar farms are part of the solution. Retrofit solar is part of the solution. Storage is part of the solution. Better planning is part of the solution. None of these are optional. The only option is whether we face this now or pay for it later.
The climate is already choosing for us. The real question is when our politics will do the same.