Anti-fracking 'scaremongering' is equivalent to that of anti-vaxxers, a Tory lord has said. Lord Lilley, a former cabinet minister, spoke as the Government was tackled at Westminster over the lifting of the ban on the process.
A moratorium had been in place since 2019 because of a series of earth tremors, and some Conservative MPs representing seats in northern England have been angered at the move to end it. The potential return of the controversial gas extraction technique, which breaks a Tory manifesto promise, comes as the Government attempts to tackle soaring energy costs.
Speaking in the House of Lords, Lord Lilley said: “Over a million shale wells have been drilled in North America and elsewhere and there’s no record of a single building being shaken down by the occasional micro-tremor, nor a single person being poisoned by allegedly contaminated aquifers. Isn’t the scaremongering of the anti-frackers as bad as that of the anti-vaxxers and should they be treated similarly?”
Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, is a method of extracting gas from shale formations using high-pressure liquid. Its return is being considered because of concerns over the security of energy supply following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Responding to Lord Lilley, energy minister Lord Callanan said: “There are indeed a number of scare stories that have been circulated. Although I would gently point out that many parts of America are much less densely populated than many parts of the UK.”
The Tory frontbencher also rejected claims the Government would overrule local opposition to fracking in their areas. He said: "The Prime Minister has said and my secretary of state has said that local support for fracking projects is very important and is one of the factors we will take into account.”
Labour peer Lord Watts said the suggestion local people would have a say was “meaningless because the Government will overrule them”.
