Kelly’s Eye

I MADE the mistake of forgetting to switch over after an episode of I’m A Celebrity... last week, and so had to sit through a report about wind power on that night’s ITV News At Ten which perfectly illustrated why any shred of impartiality from our mainstream broadcasters on the subject blew away years ago.

It began with the news that Keir Starmer backs building more onshore wind turbines.

With the help of some statistics purporting to show how much cheaper it was than power generated by other means, you could draw no other conclusion from the item than that this was a matter for unequivocal approval.

The brief note of dissent, from a member of the public complaining the turbines would blight her surroundings, was tacked on at the end like it was a tiresome chore.

No other nuance or qualification was allowed. Such as how we’ve yet to devise ways of storing wind and solar-generated power.

Or that when the wind doesn’t blow, we have to go back to fossil fuels to provide our power. Or do a deal with the US to import fracked gas to cover our shortfall, while banning fracking ourselves – or by importing liquefied natural gas from the likes of Qatar, despite having spent the past few years curtailing further gas field exploration in the North Sea.

Or that, when there’s no wind or sunshine, the supply of such renewable energy collapses to five per cent of what is generated in more favourable conditions.

When such an event happened last September, our energy suppliers had to pay wholesale prices 50 times the then average for gas supplies to plug the gap.

What we get on our screens instead are only tales of impending apocalypse.Which is how you end up with last week’s footage (well worth finding online) of a wideeyed eco-hysteric – a picture of petulance and privilege called Indigo Rumbelow (of course!) – screaming at Sky News host Mark Austin.

Someone should tell Indigo that if the wind changes, her face will stay like that forever.