Are the people of Abernethy expendable to leaders of Perth and Kinross Council?

Dec 1 2009 Perthshire Advertiser Tuesday

Dear Editor, – I was delighted to see that the crescendo of opposition by the great, the good and the ordinary people of Perth against the proposed Shore Road waste incineration plant has finally met with action from Perth and Kinross Council in a belated attempt to properly reflect the overwhelming views and feelings of the people they represent.

The campaign against the Shore Road incinerator has clearly placed overwhelming evidence into the local understanding as to why industrialised waste incineration should not be permitted by any sane society.

Clearly there are better alternatives, as recycling rapidly gathers momentum in our community and alternative technologies show the way to a more sensible solution for our residual waste.

However, recent events locally beg a truly glaring comparison – if the clear consensus is that such a terrifying plant should not be built in Perth, why should an equally evil plant be acceptable just a few miles outside the so-called "Fair" City?

The grim spectre of the incinerator planned by SITA for Binn Farm – which has our tame Council's full blessing - currently hangs over the village of Abernethy like a prolonged death sentence. Being "out in the sticks", albeit only a handful of miles from the seat of our Council, a village of our size simply cannot muster the mighty tidal wave of opposition that Perth can (and has) in opposition to the Grundon proposal. Out here we just don't have the resident celebrities, the business lobbies, or the grim-faced MSPs and MPs on hand for photo opportunities and a mass protest campaign.

However, be in no doubt, for Abernethy the SITA Binn Farm development is every bit as much a frightening threat to our health, our environment, our amenity – in short, to our lives.

The overwhelming indifference of Perth and Kinross Council and our national representatives to Abernethy's plight against this horrific SITA plant only leads me to one conclusion – we must surely be the expendable people of this county. Are our votes somehow of less value to our urban compatriots ?

Come on Perth and Kinross Council, Roseanna Cunningham MSP and Gordon Banks MP – show some real care for the people of Abernethy who voted for you feeling we had the same value as every other voter. Please – do something right and make a real and powerful effort to stop this SITA monster before this community is poisoned and there's no way back in a generation.

If it's the right thing to reject the evils of incineration in Perth – then it simply must be the right thing to reject it for EVERY community in Perthshire.

Name and address supplied.