This was the speech given by Stephanie Leadbetter

Hello everyone,

How did the STOP Action Group come into being? Why is it me that is standing here tonight in front of a packed Village Hall with my knees knocking and a very dry throat? Well I think it would probably be best to start at the beginning

On 10th May this year Malcolm, my husband, and I received a letter from Energia in Natura of Milan, Italy outlining a proposal to build 6 enormous turbines each 125 meters or 410ft in height to the blade tip to be built on Ellerside Ridge and Stribers just 525 meters from the back of our bungalow and 300 meters from the boundary of the Lake District National Park. It is difficult to imagine 410ft but it is just 10 meters short of the London Eye, the largest viewing wheel in the world and 4 times higher than our own Priory. It was devastating news.

But you know this isn’t really the beginning. The real beginning was in the mid 1950’s when my mother and father brought our caravan to the camping field alongside Wells House Farm in Cartmel which in those days was farmed by Len and his daughter Agnes Mason, incidentally that very same camp site in the centre of Cartmel will have a clear view of turbines on the ridge. Anyway back to Cartmel in the 1950’s. I was 9 years old then and I learnt to bring in the cows a Jersey and Guernsey called Charlotte and Maisie , I milked them by hand, I mucked out and helped look after the hens. I lived in wellies and shorts and played endlessly in the river running through the farm. I was never happier. Over the 9 years we had the caravan there something else happened to me I fell in love with Cartmel the grey Lakeland village with the beautiful Priory surrounded by some of the most beautiful countryside in the world.

On a Friday evening my family would leave Ormskirk and head for South Lakeland eventually turning left at Levens Hal no dual carriageway or speed cameras then. I would look out for Whitbarrow Scar and feel that I was on my way home, and that is the way it has always been for me - Cartmel is my home.

I was married at 20 and just a few years later I persuaded my lovely new husband to apply for a job in Ulverston and he got it. I knew that once again I was on my way back home to Cartmel.

Both our children were born here and went to the little school and then our son went on to the priory school.

Happy times don’t always last and with Malcolm’s promotion we left Cartmel and I cried all the way to Tavistock in Devon and for many months there were wet handkerchiefs down every chair. But 11 years ago we decided to take early retirement and attempt to come back to Cartmel.


We bought our little bungalow up at Speel Bank and just enjoyed every minute spent amongst the exquisite countryside of South Lakeland. As we all know Fairy Tales don’t always have a happy ending - -

Just 18 months later we were visited by – yes you’ve guessed – a wind turbine developer. Farm Energy of Devon had a proposal to put 3 turbines on Stribers. We put petitions up in the Spar and the Priory Shop and wrote our letters. They applied for planning permission for a wind monitoring mast twice - both applications were passed by SLDC. This was 1999/2000 We heard nothing more. We heaved sighs of relief.

But I knew they would be back so I joined a brand new organisation FELLS the Friends of Eden Lakeland and Lunesdale Scenery. An organisation dedicated to oppose Wind Turbine Developments sited in Inappropriate Areas. I attended their inaugural meeting and sat on their committee for about 4 years. At first hand I saw how communities could be devastated by these developments and some residents could suffer physically and mentally from the regular low level noise generated by the turbines. But all remained quiet up at Speel Bank and we continued to live very quietly as the OAPs that we now are

But we all know that Fairy tales don’t always have happy endings - Yes now we go back to the beginning

The 10th of May this year. When we received our letter from the developers I was so shocked that I could only think of our own losses. The peace and tranquillity would be exchanged for the whump, whump of revolving turbine blades, open skies would now be dominated by enormous industrial turbines just 525 meters from the rear of our bungalow.

Over the next couple of weeks we found out that only a tiny handful of our neighbours had received a letter and that others who lived just as close as us knew nothing of the proposed development. Now we realised that this was not just our problem but of course it was shared by our neighbours. Another couple of weeks went by and as we gained more and more information we realised that this was going to be Cartmel’s problem too. It was now obvious as we learned to pinpoint the ridge accurately that the turbines would be visible from the village itself. Clearly visible from every access road into the village, from the rear of properties in Priest Lane, from the properties along Aynsome Road, devastatingly from the properties in Haggs Lane both at the top and the bottom of the lane, from almost every footpath in the Valley. By this time we had broadened our minds and hearts and calmed down a bit and we could see that Field Broughton, Barber Green, High Newton and even parts of Allithwaite would have the turbines within their views. That was too much for me no-one was going to threaten the Cartmel Valley like this while I had breath in my body to defend it. So STOP was born. STOP stood for Stop Turbines Overlooking Priory.

You may be a little puzzled because it isn’t called that now, It is Stop Turbines On Peninsula – Peninsula being Cartmel Peninsula. Well you know it isn’t just Cartmel Valley’s problem. If you drive along the A590 past Greenod and look across the lovely Leven Estuary to the unbroken ridge beyond you are looking at Stribers and Ellerside Ridge. What about the residents of Greenodd, Arrad Foot, Ulverston and Aldingham. Did they know about the proposal and the answer was NO they didn’t and so we changed the name to include all those areas as well.

So that was how the STOP Action Group was started and our Group is now made up of friends, neighbours and new friends from the other side of the ridge. Our foremost aim is to bring accurate and informed influence to bear on decision makers in order to prove to them that the adverse effects of this development completely outweighs any benefits. Our second aim is to raise public awareness and inform the affected areas of the latest developments and we will do this swiftly and always accurately. Thirdly it is our aim to get as many people to write informed letters of objection relating only to planning issues if or when an application for the turbines is lodged with the District Council. We will never knowingly put out incorrect alarmist or divisive information. We hope to raise funds but would only use money as agreed by the Committee to benefit the campaign.

So we have a fledgling Action Group. Now we must encourage it to fly.

We have a Chairman in Malcolm, my husband, I have been press ganged into being Secretary, we have Martyn and Karen Farmer our neighbours who have been with us from the start and run their health business from their home in Beckside, Marie Hicks from Aynsome is our treasurer. Lyn Prescott, Barry Wilkinson, Jane Toffolo, Carol O’Neill and her daughter Karin and Tony and Margaret Varley are all regular attendees at Committee Meetings and without their help the Group would not have got off the ground.

I hope that as a result of tonight’s meeting you will think of becoming involved or just supporting our Action Group in opposing the sighting of this wholly inappropriate wind turbine development 6 turbines, 410ft high which will overlook the villages on the other side of the ridge and our lovely village of Cartmel on this side of the ridge.

Dr Mike Hall in his presentation will address the specific claims made by the developers on their website as to the output of the turbines, the savings on CO2 emissions and the number of houses served. He will also talk about the Planning Framework.

Thank you for being here, it makes us feel much less alone.