Donald Trump Renews Legal Challenge Of North East Offshore Wind Farm

Billionaire Donald Trump has renewed his legal challenge to an offshore wind farm which he claims is ruining his plans for an exclusive golf resort in the north east of Scotland.

The US tycoon has raised a court action against the Scottish Ministers who are backing the wind power scheme in Aberdeen Bay.

He wants judges at the Court of Session in Edinburgh to judicially review a decision made by the Scottish Ministers in March 2013.

The government at that time decided not to hold a public inquiry into the proposed energy generation scheme.

Mr Trump reckons the wind farm could spoil the view from his golf course at Balmedie, Aberdeenshire, and he threatened to stop investing there.

The businessman doesn't want the wind farm scheme to go ahead. But for the time being he wants civil appeal judges to consider whether the Scottish Ministers acted legally.

A previous attempt to have the Scottish Ministers decision judicially reviewed failed after judge Lord Doherty ruled last year that the Holyrood administration hadn't acted illegally.

On Wednesday, Mr Trump's legal team began a further action before judges Lord Gill, Lord Malcolm and Lord Menzies.

Trump's advocate John Campbell QC wants the court to allow a judicial review into whether the Scottish Ministers acted legally.

At the last bid for a judicial review, Mr Trump's lawyers criticised the Scottish Ministers for their decision not to hold a public inquiry into the 100 MW wind farm which is also intended to be a test bed for wind turbines.

The Trump side argued that because the wind farm was receiving public money through Aberdeen City Council and the European Union there was an appearance of bias.

The SNP administration at Holyrood have been committed to green energy for some time. They want to increase the percentage of Scotland's electricity produced from sustainable sources.

They claimed that funds already committed to the project be wasted if it did not go ahead.

Mr Trump's legal team claimed that remarks that former first minister Alex Salmond made about the certainty of the wind farm project going ahead could be interpreted as showing bias.

On Wednesday, it emerged that one of the key arguments in the legal challenge is over the interpretation of the 1989 electricity act.

Mr Trump's lawyers argue that Lord Doherty interpreted the legislation wrongly and came to the incorrect decision in not allowing the judicial review to go ahead.

Mr Campbell the appeal judges that Lord Doherty's approach seemed to him to produce "an anomalous result".

He added: "To adopt his approach you have two lots of rules for different people - those with a licence, those without a licence, those who are exempt and those who are not exempt."

The judges will give their decision on whether a judicial review will be granted at a later date.