Conservative-run NKDC approves yet another solar farm
Burton Gorse Plantation is the tenth solar scheme with live permission to get through North Kesteven District Council on the Conservatives’ watch. They say they’re against solar. Their record says otherwise.
Conservative-run North Kesteven District Council has approved the Burton Gorse Plantation Solar Farm (24/1470/FUL). Around 188 acres of farmland north of Whitecross Lane and west of Burton Pedwardine will now be given over to solar panels, a substation compound and a 15-metre communications mast for the next 40 years.
We objected to this scheme. Residents objected. It has gone through anyway.
Say one thing, do another
Local Conservatives are quick to tell residents they’re against solar farms on our farmland. They’re happy to line up and criticise the giant schemes signed off by ministers in London. But when the decision is theirs to make — on their own council, under their own planning policies — the answer keeps coming back the same: yes.
You can’t claim to be standing up for the countryside on a leaflet and then let it be covered in panels at the planning office. Residents deserve better than that.
Ten and counting
Burton Gorse is the tenth solar scheme with live planning permission approved by North Kesteven District Council while the Conservatives have run it — two at Branston, Deepdale, Ermine Street, Gorse Lane, Grange Farm, Ferry Lane, Scopwick, White Cross Lane and now Burton Gorse. Together they cover about 1,430 acres of our countryside.
That isn’t a one-off or an unlucky exception. It’s a pattern.
Solar farm beside solar farm
This site sits right beside two existing solar farms, and just down the road from the Mareham Lane scheme that was allowed on appeal in February 2026. Field by field, the countryside south of Sleaford is disappearing under glass and steel — and every approval makes the next one easier to justify.
What a Reform UK council would do
Reform UK isn’t against energy. We’re against throwing away good farmland — land that feeds the country — for 40 years at a time. Under the new national planning rules, council officers decide most applications against the Local Plan, so that is where the fight has to be won. A Reform UK-led North Kesteven would write protection for our best farmland into that plan, open a published gateway so ward councillors and parish councils can ask for big schemes to go before councillors in public, and stand by that policy at appeal.
In May 2027, residents across North Kesteven get the chance to decide whether they want more of the same.
