“Local concerns have to be respected and any form of legal and peaceful protest is legitimate activity. But there is the national interest as well and one of the difficult things for the Government is the balance of how strong the planning guidance should be to compel local communities to accept it….Trying to compel people. Trying to override legitimate concerns will make it more difficult rather than easier.”
Tim Yeo, BBC Radio 4’s Today programme 16/8/13
Categories: Politics
DRILL OR DROP? 
Framing the fracking issue at Balcombe as purely a ‘local concern’ completely ignores the wider issues of climate justice, groundwater pollution, damage to landscape and impacts on biodiversity, overuse of water at a time when it is expected to become scarcer and food production needs to be increased, risks to public health, and the stifling of renewable alternatives. Why are the minimal and questionable impacts on employment and energy prices the only issues deemed ‘national concerns’? And why weren’t the extremely private interests of a few government members who had a lot of power in pushing through fracking discussed as something that ‘needs to be balanced with national concern’?
Really good points. I am planning to investigate these issues over the next few days.