CLLR Beesley’s letter of August 12 goes to the heart of the whole dispute on the matter of the impact, if any, of Navitus wind farm on visitors and tourism.

The key fact is that it does NOT say “incontrovertibly” in the surveys that visitors will “stop” coming during construction. The word “stop” does not appear anywhere in the surveys.

What the surveys do say is that 20 per cent of visitors “may possibly” be put off visiting but that is, all critically, dependent on whether or not there would be “construction on the beaches”, significant noise levels on the beaches or pollution on the beaches.

As a matter fact there will be no construction on beaches; all research and modelling make clear no noise will reach beaches, and no “pollution” is expected or forecast. As all know in the industry Offshore Health & Safety standards in UK waters are the highest in the world.

And that is why in the overall assessments the 20 per cent “possibly” put off visiting in “theory” is discounted in “practice” in the balance of all the experience of the industry in other coastal areas over two decades. At nine plus miles the farm is too far out to sea for concerns to be realised.

And that is overwhelmingly the view of visitors in surveys where the majority view by far was one of indifference : Survey Results 21.182 “80 per cent of summer visitors and 96 per cent in the spring said the presence of a wind farm had no bearing on their decision to visit an area”.

But Cllr Beesley refuses to accept the assessments and we continue to get the hugely-misleading claims that as a “matter of fact” tourism is going to be decimated.

With that doom-laden prophesy it's a tragedy so many are being so shockingly misled.

Jeff Williams

Jubilee Road Parkstone