UK misses out as foreign firms and workers do bulk of windfarm work | Environment | The Guardian

Britain is leading the world in the building of windfarms off its coastline but the "green revolution" appears to be largely working in favour of foreign firms.

The Danish operator of the world's biggest offshore windfarm, off Cumbria is the latest to come under fire for favouring foreign suppliers and allegedly providing "negligible" work or services to local UK companies.

Dong Energy opened the Walney scheme on 9 February boasting it had erected more than 100 turbines in double quick time and had broken other records by bringing in foreign investors.

But John Woodcock, Labour MP for Barrow-in-Furness where the formal opening of Walney took place, blamed ministers as well as companies, saying they had taken their eye off the ball.

"The impact here has been fairly negligible. The Danish company has been using its own trusted suppliers on shipping contracts and other supply deals. This is not how Ed Miliband [as Labour energy secretary] envisaged it. We need a level playing field so that British companies can win a share of the action."

France is coming late to the party, but is avoiding this Anglo-Saxon blunder.

_{It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue - Queen Elizabeth II}