CAMPAIGNERS won the backing of Ribble Valley Council again in another battle over wind farms in local beauty spots.

Hot on the heels of victory over a recent application for a wind measuring mast on Longridge Fell, protesters urged the plannning and development committee to throw out similar plans for Easington Fell at Newton.

And last night, councillors went against planning officers' recommendations for approval of the scheme and backed the campaigners.

The Easington Fell project, although being operated by a different company from the Longridge scheme.

But it bears many similarities including the fact that a mast to measure wind speed and direction has already been erected without permission.

Coun James Rogerson pointed out that if their decision goes to appeal, it is likely that the wind farm company would get their necessary 12 months of monitoring anyway while the appeal is held and decided .

But Coun Howel Jones said it would be totally inconsistent of the committee to let this latest application go ahead when just a few weeks ago a similar project was thrown out.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.