Suffolk County Council is in talks with three other local authorities to explore how they can join forces to oppose plans to build overhead power lines and hundreds of pylons through their counties.

Representatives from Suffolk County Council, Norfolk County Council, Lincolnshire County Council and Essex County Council met for talks last week, it has emerged.

Richard Rout, Deputy Cabinet Member for the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project, confirmed "early talks" had taken place last week.

Mr Rout, who is a cabinet member for finance and environment, said the four authorities wanted to come together to share their expertise and experience to see how they could best fight National Grid's proposals.

"We met up to have very early talks to see how we can share the problems all of us have with the plans for the pylons," the councillor said. 

"In plans like these, we have to come together because we have to discuss how we can oppose these unacceptable pylons that will stretch across all of our counties." 

Cllr Rout said that four council's met last week to discuss pylons.Cllr Rout said that four councils met last week to discuss pylons. (Image: Richard Rout)

He said residents across all four counties were opposed to the pylons and it was incumbent on the local authorities to find a way to prevent National Grid's plans from coming to fruition.

All four local authorities, which are Conservative run, have voiced their opposition to National Grid's plans to improve its transmission network, known as The Great Grid Upgrade.

It wants to build about 100 miles of new overhead power lines with more than 500 pylons between Norwich and Tilbury cutting through open countryside in Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex.

It also wants to build a high transmission power line and five substations from Grimsby in northeast Lincolnshire to Walpole in Norfolk.

News of the talks comes after the government signalled it was determined to press ahead with new power infrastructure as quickly as possible by cancelling a scheme looking at co-ordinating offshore power lines.

In a letter to South Suffolk MP James Cartlidge, Energy minister Michael Shanks said that the Offshore Co-ordination Support Scheme (OCSS) would no longer be funded.

Mr Shanks said that the scheme could delay the construction of power grids to link into new North Sea windfarms by up to five years.

He said it was vital that the government should encourage the creation of a new power grid as soon as possible to reach its 2030 target,

Mr Cartlidge said he was "tremendously frustrated" by the letter.

MP for South Suffolk James Cartilidge was dissapointed to learn tha plans for the offshore power grids were being cancelled. MP for South Suffolk James Cartilidge was disappointed to learn that plans for the offshore power grids were being cancelled. (Image: chpv.co.uk)

Mr Rout has also been frustrated at the collapse of a legal challenge to the compensation for the Sunnica Solar farm, near Mildenhall.

Suffolk County Council, West Suffolk Council, Cambridgeshire County Council and East Cambridgeshire District Council had joined forces to start proceedings to launch a legal challenge.

But the bid collapsed after West Suffolk Council and Cambridgeshire County Council pulled out.

Mr Rout believes the authorities may have backed out because the new Labour government had put local Labour councillors under pressure to do so.