Communities living around Fife Council’s planned wind turbines should benefit financially.
In a surprise decision, the majority of councillors sitting on the City of Dunfermline area committee backed a motion by SNP Councillor Brian Goodall to ask the council’s executive to examine the possibility of redistributing back to Dunfermline some of the savings made by the scheme so the committee could distribute them for local community benefit.
Unusually, Mr Goodall found a seconder from the Labour benches in the form of Cara Hilton and support came from politicians of all hues, carried by seven votes to three.
He has asked the council’s executive to examine the possibility of redistributing some of the estimated savings made by the council from its wind turbines back to Dunfermline so the committee can distribute the cash to the community.
And in a second shock, a council official admitted if they were to carry out consultation again they would do it differently.
It is the latest piece of controversy stirred by the contentious plans to locate large-scale wind turbines on several sites, approved last week.
With the council facing a £77 million funding gap over the next two years, the project has been approved as a way of slashing its annual £13m energy bill.
The executive gave the green light to seven potential sites for 252ft wind turbines which could generate up to £11.75m, backing plans to invest in turbines at Lochhead and Lower Melville Wood landfills.
Planning permission is to be sought for another five four in west Fife and one in Kennoway. Mr Goodall said he wanted to see much more direct benefit to the people living in the community.
He was backed by Lib Dem Joe Rosiejak, who said everyone in the community had to be consulted.
SNP member Neale Hanvey queried why the community benefit would be spread to all of Fife and not to those people “who have to put up with known issues of turbines”.
Cara Hilton spoke of a flawed consultation where flyers asking for feedback had an inaccurate email address attached. And fellow Labour councillor Billy Pollock said he had also been inundated with concerns from residents “not knowing what is happening”.
“We, as a council, have to go further than we have ever gone before with consultation with the community.
“We have to physically go out and seek their views, instead of waiting for them to come to us.”
Chris Ewing, from asset and facilities management services, admitted: “On reflection we could probably do things better with more time and more resources with which to do it.
“That’s the reality of the situation. Doing it again, we might have handled it in a different way.”