This article appears as part of the Winds of Change newsletter.
The dramatic decision, yesterday, to reject the Lomond Banks development, frequently referred to as Flamingo Land Loch Lomond, could be seen as a statement not just on the proposal itself, but on the purpose of National Parks.
Though, in the run-up, and hearing itself, multiple issues were debated, much of the discussion and commentary from board members on the day fixed on what a National Park is for. Is it economic development, or conservation? Of course, National Park policy says they are there for both, and has an answer to the question of what happens when the two are in conflict, and that can’t be resolved, known as the Sandford Principle - and it’s that conservation wins.
MSP Jackie Baillie, and other local representatives, talked of jobs and traffic problems, as these were frequently the key issues in the Balloch and surrounding community. But the threads running through the board member comments, and the report produced by the National Park authority, which recommended refusal, was one of climate impact and biodiversity.
As board member Ronnie Erskine said: “Who is going to lead in nature restoration and biodiversity enhancement if it’s not a National Park?”
Climate resilience featured too, and the question of whether there was significant risk of flood in areas of the development was picked apart - as well as discussion on the evolving nature of flood risk in a changing climate.
Flood risk, in other words, is no longer what it used to be.
The vibrant campaign against the resort led by groups that included Save Loch Lomond, the Scottish Greens and Balloch and Haldane Community Council, tapped into an intensity of feeling about what Loch Lomond means not just to the people who live on its banks, but the population of Scotland and afar.
That is what drove up the objections, as well as highlighting the size of the resort, and its more commercial-seeming features, its monorail and its waterpark.
READ HERE:
- Flamingo Land Lomond Banks - Herald investigative series
- Flamingo Land's Lomond Banks failed to move with the times
But the decision itself, even if influenced by the campaign, revolved around elements of planning policy, including the National Planning Framework 4 and Local Development Plan. What was clear was that Lomond Banks had failed to engage with a shift in mood and policy.
MSP Ross Greer, perhaps, expressed it best, when he said, in the five-minutes given him to speak against the proposal, “The developer,” he said, “had a chance to scale down after their failed application in 2018 and they didn’t. That’s why we’re here today. That’s why opposition to the proposal has grown.”
The points raised by many of the board members were reminders of why we have National Parks. With a 12-week consultation on the proposed new park in Galloway set to start in November, this debate will surely form part of its backdrop and raise questions for those who may be set to be within its boundaries.
Meanwhile, of course, the battle over Balloch is no doubt far from over - but we now know that biodiversity, alongside jobs and economic regeneration, has to be at its heart.
Grangemouth Groundhog
The announcement last week felt like a Groundhog Day. We were hearing the same news as was reported in November last year, but more certain, a confirmation of gloom. Grangemouth will close in the third quarter of 2025, with 400 jobs to go.
Ten months have passed and yet there was no sense of having moved forward in that time for the workers. Yes, there was talk of a buyer, with MSP Michelle Thomson raising such hopes. But Scottish ministers appeared to know nothing about it and Acting Net Zero Secretary Gillian Martin on the BBC The Sunday Show seemed sceptical of its existence, given that Petroineos announced the closure last November.
"I would have imagined," she said," that if anyone was interested in taking over the refinery, that would have been the key point to get in touch, but obviously, I don't know the background of these people."
The Scottish Government announced a £100 million investment package - but that too seemed too little, too late, too vague. Does such a fund have any chance of accelerating green projects in Grangemouth before the site’s skilled workers are forced to look elsewhere for employment?
GMB Scotland Secretary Louise Gilmour, in a letter to UK Energy Secretary Ed Miliband and Gillian Martin, summed it up. "The green jobs our members have been promised are nowhere to be seen and our traditional sectors like oil and gas are in a terminal decline. This will continue unless a new approach to oil and gas is not taken, backed up public investment.”
READ HERE:
- Grangemouth: Oil and gas ban will devastate jobs, union says
- Ministers 'unaware of potential Grangemouth refinery buyer'
The Grangemouth closure is the result of a complex situation, involving global markets and competition, the whims of a multinational, and the politics of energy transition.
It's tempting perhaps to blame the UK Government ban on new oil and gas licenses, and justify our need to maximise every last drop from the North Sea, framing this as fair and reasonable and justified.
But is it really? Let’s not forget that the UK is among those so-called climate leaders that is leading fossil fuel expansion.
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One recent report from the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) found that in the past decade, new licences issued by high-capacity, low-dependency countries including the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and Norway contributed five times more greenhouse gas emissions than all other oil- and gas-producing countries combined.
Is that what we call fair and just? And in that context, shouldn't our frustration be directed not at the ban on new oil and gas licenses, but the slowness of creation of green jobs?
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