TWO conflicting motions over energy policy and climate change are to be debated at Dorset Council this week.

One, from opposition councillors, calls for national legislation to be beefed up to allow councils to reject fossil fuel applications while the other, from the controlling Conservative group asks the government to back legislation ensuring UK energy self-sufficiency.

Both will be debated at the end of this Thursday’s evening council meeting at County Hall in Dorchester.

The first motion has been proposed by Weymouth Green councillor Clare Sutton and is backed by Liberal Democrats, other Green councillors, independent councillors and the only Labour councillor, Portland’s Paul Kimber.

Read more: Archaeological dig to take place at Weymouth MFA Bowl site

Quoting claims that even if all climate pledges made at last year’s Glasgow climate summit were honoured, global temperatures would still rise by 2.7C, the motion asks Dorset Council to “lobby national government urgently, strongly, at every opportunity and at all levels to revise the Minerals section of the National Planning Policy Framework to enable Dorset (and other) Planning Authorities to decline planning permissions on the grounds of climate impact alone if they so wish and that Dorset Council will lobby the Local Government Association to do the same.”

The other motion, proposed by council leader Spencer Flower, seconded by Weymouth councillor Louie O’Leary calls for the council to “urge the Government to introduce an energy policy with the principal objective of securing permanent UK energy self-sufficiency from as early a date as possible, utilising whatever forms of energy generation sourced from within the UK are necessary to this end.”

Read more: Weymouth Fish and Chip shops fear for industry as war drives up prices

The motion also calls on the Government to “still meet its declared 2050 net zero carbon target, through a continuous reduction in the reliance on fossil fuels and by strategies designed to alter present patterns of energy demand and consumption,” and says that in the short term the Government should “introduce flexibilities when considering the need for national energy self-sufficiency. This will recognise the serious, long lasting national security implications of the instability that accompanies the present but unavoidable need to import energy, and which is also a principal driver in the cost of living crisis now facing this country.”

The motion also asks for a review of the minerals section of the National Planning Policy Framework, “in order that Planning Authorities may have due and proper regard to the implications of climate change” and for Local Planning Authorities to have greater influence in the determination of planning applications relating to the extraction of minerals in their areas.