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Navitus Bay Wind Farm

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Mr Syms) on securing the debate to highlight this very important issue. He has been very active on this subject. After I raised it with the previous Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, the gentleman who is no longer a Member of the House, my hon. Friend and I went to see him to put on the record our concerns about the process of this development.

Let me pick up a couple of points that colleagues have made. I say to the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke) that the critical difference between her constituents and those of other hon. Members present is that her constituents will not have to look at this wind farm. All of ours will, so the impact, by definition, will be greater on the constituencies represented by other hon. Members here.

My hon. Friend and constituency neighbour the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood) intervened twice on the point about the distance from shore and the definition that the Government lay down. I ask my right hon. Friend the Minister to give us some clarity on that point. I put it to the company before the closure of phase 4 of its consultation; I raised the issue that my hon. Friend raised about the 12 nautical mile limit. In the reply to my letter of objection, Mike Unsworth, the project director at Navitus Bay, said:

“Regarding the wind farm’s distance from the shore, I would emphasise that the Government has not issued guidance that stipulates a 12 nautical mile limit. Indeed on 10 October 2013, the Climate Change Minister Greg Barker was clear that DECC ‘has not issued guidance on the distance that offshore wind farms should be placed from the coast’”.

He was quoting from column 342W of Hansard for 10 October 2013. I ask the Minister to give us some clarity on what the Government’s position is on distance.