Residents in North Yorkshire are being urged to stand together to fight plans for lower-volume fracking.

Europa Oil & Gas is seeking to use proppant squeeze – a form of lower-volume fracking – at Burniston near Scarborough.

The local Labour MP, Alison Hume, told a meeting attended by about 100 people in the village on Saturday:

“By standing together, by working together … we will see off Europa Oil & Gas so we’ll get proppant squeeze and every other small-scale fracking included in the national ban on fracking.”

There is a moratorium in England on fracking that uses more than a legally-defined volume of fluid. But operations below the limit, like proppant squeeze, are still allowed. The government has promised a ban on fracking but has not confirmed which processes will be included.

Ms Hume said:

“We need to make sure that all loopholes are closed.”

She added:

“all the parties [at Westminster] are working together on this. This is a lot of people, a lot of campaigners. This is cross-party.”

She said:

“there is a huge feeling in government and from the back benches that the ban on fracking is urgent and will happen very soon.”

She said work in the Burniston area by a local opposition group, Frack Free Coastal Communities, and three parish councils, who all objected unanimously, had been effective:

“This is a big campaign. It’s being noticed nationally. And we are literally at the front line. We are the way forward and we have to show that Europa Oil and Gas have got no place in Burniston and no place in the UK.”

Ms Hume was joined at the meeting by Conservative, Lib Dem and Independent county councillors and Burniston’s parish council chairman.

Derek Bastiman, a member of the leading Conservative group on North Yorkshire Council, said he would speak against Europa’s plans at the decision meeting, on behalf of the three parish councils. He said he had lived all his life in the area:

“I want it to be a decent area for my grandkids and your grandkids and thereafter to grow up.

On the application, he said:

“I am opposed to it. I’ve always been opposed to it.”

He added:

“I am badgering my Conservative colleagues. At the end of the day, commonsense should prevail.”

Steve Mason, a Lib Dem member of North Yorkshire Council, said:

“We need to step up and object and support each other. Because otherwise, the oil and gas industry will come back with something else and something else and something else.

“If we let the industry in now, we are going to lose this battle. This is why it is so vitally important that we object right now because the industry is not going to go away.”

Burniston Parish Council chair, Richard Parsons, said:

“The three parish councils that are working together haven’t done with this planning application. Yes, we’re still working on it. We have submitted a fairly lengthy response, which Europa then responded to. And we need to respond to that and we’re doing that.

“This whole thing will only go away if everybody works together. If you know people that have been interested in this that appear to be less interested now, remind them they need to stay on the ball. The only time this is going to go away is when Europa decides that they’re giving up.

“We’ve got to stay focussed. We’ve got to remember it’s still there. And we’ve got to stay active.”

Burniston residents were urged to object to plans for gas exploration at Foxholes, also in North Yorkshire. The public consultation on that application closes on 31 October 2025.

Democratic voice

One resident asked whether the planning committee that decides the application would consider the public response.

There are about 1,500 objections, mainly from Burniston and nearby villages. There were also unanimous objections by town and parish councils at Burniston, Cloughton, Newby and Scalby and Scarborough.

The resident asked:

“Will individual county councillors with this huge responsibility devote the necessary time to read all those objections, rather than merely following the recommendation of the planning officers?”

Cllr Parsons said:

“We call upon them [planning committee members] to read everything. Look at it. Carefully make a decision, which is based on the feelings of those who live in this community. There can be no doubt about this. This community is against the planning application and they’re against fracking.”

Cllr Bastiman said members of the planning committee must read every document:

“Too much work has gone into the objections to this by the good people of my division just to write it off.

“I will make members aware that they should read every document and do not be afraid to go against officer recommendations.”

He also described as “an absolute disgrace” the decision of the North York Moors National Park Authority not to object to the application. Members of the authority’s planning committee “should be ashamed of themselves”, he said. The proposed site is close to the edge of the national park boundary.

Cllr Janet Jefferson, independent, said:

“When you join North Yorkshire Council you aren’t there just to represent your division. You are there to represent North Yorkshire residents as a whole.”

A member of Cloughton Parish Council said the industry regulator, the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA), had told residents it was not its “modus operandi to communicate with communities in any sort of transparent way about our concerns”.

The parish councillor said:

[Europa is] “extremely good at giving general assurances that all will be well and there is no worry, and every risk is mitigated as low. If they [the NSTA] only listen to Europa, they are missing a big part of the picture.”

Asked about this concern, a spokesperson for the NSTA said:

“The NSTA strives to be transparent wherever possible and take our responsibility of responding to correspondence and other requests very seriously. Whilst we appreciate that on occasion we are unable to respond to a specific enquiry, the NSTA can only act within its regulatory remit.

“In the case that we receive an application to drill a new well, our procedure is to contact the local authority to notify them that we have received an application and also to get confirmation of the planning permissions the operator has stated they hold.”

Government claims on proppant squeeze

Another resident called on the government to update its claims that proppant squeeze was “commonplace” in the water industry.

The claim was made in a letter to Alison Hume, from the energy minister, Michael Shanks.

But earlier this month, DrillOrDrop reported research by campaigner Dennis May who found that 13 water companies and the Environment Agency had no record or had not used proppant squeeze in the past 20 years.

Ms Hume told the meeting:

“I’m not convinced about this proppant squeeze. When has it been used? How many times and by whom?

“It’s sort of enshrined as if it’s a well-used, often-used technique and I’m not convinced.

“So I am working with the minister’s special advisors and the team to make sure that there’ll be an update soon.”

Cllr Parsons urged people to stop using the term ‘proppant squeeze’. He said it was “playing straight into the hands of Europa”. The term was designed by Europa to make the process appear acceptable, he said.

Cllr Mason said the North Yorkshire Minerals Plan had its own definition of fracking that did not rely on the volume of fluid.

He said:

“This [application] has to be decided on fracking as a technique, no matter what volume.

“I would urge everyone in this room to make sure you’re lobbying North Yorkshire Council to make sure they recognise fracking as the definition in their own minerals plan.”

Lost confidence in planning process

Another resident and member of the Frack Free Coastal Communities steering group said:

“We are finding that we’re losing confidence in the whole planning process.”

She said the North Yorkshire Council online planning portal was broken for several months at the start of the public consultation on Europa’s application. Even now it was not possible to add an attachment, she said.

“They’ve known about this for a year and it’s not been fixed”.

She also said people were not receiving replies. Friends of the Earth was “very worried” that North Yorkshire planners had not put any questions to Europa about the application, she added.

The resident said:

“We don’t feel the whole thing has been taken seriously by them and we’re not sure if they’re even properly qualified. It’s a very serious problem.”

Alison Hume said she would raise this with the council’s chief executive at a meeting next week.

Cllr Jefferson said there had been concerns that the planning department did not have enough staff.

Cllr Mason urged people to send their responses to the council by email.

Cllr Bastiman advised people to contact council executives and senior councillors. See list at the end of this article.

Rural site

A member of Cloughton Parish Council welcomed drone footage of the area of the proposed site shown at the start of the meeting.

The councillor said:

“This gives the lie to Europa’s claim that this is an industrial area. There is a rurality that needs to be protected … Burniston is a totally inappropriate place for this procedure to happen.”

Alison Hume said she had a lump in her throat watching the footage:

“What an absolutely beautiful area that you live in and this is what we need to protect.”

Fossil fuel applications

Another member of the audience asked why the government was allowing a planning application for fossil fuel exploration in a climate crisis.

Cllr Mason said:

“We don’t need the energy from onshore oil and gas. The production that’s made by these wells is so insignificant. The companies all claim the wells are needed for energy security.”

But he said the companies “ran away” from assessing the carbon emissions from burning oil and gas.

He added:

“You can’t have it both ways. It’s either substantive enough to contribute to energy security or it’s not substantial that you don’t want to test how you’re going to use the fossil fuels.”

He said most political parties supported a just transition to a low carbon economy. But he said:

““How on earth can we expect to impose fossil fuel infrastructure on new communities when we’re also talking about helping other communities move away from fossil fuels. It is crazy.”

Alison Hume said:

“We’re all deeply concerned about the devastation and disruption caused by the massive wildfire at Langdale and Fylingdales.

“It is a very, very stark reminder about the very real and present danger of the growing threat of climate change. And in government there is a sense that we have to do much more, not just to mitigate against wildfire risk.”

Fear of appeal costs

Another resident said she wanted reassurance that North Yorkshire councillors would not approve the application because they were worried that refusal would lead to an appeal and costs.

Cllr Bastiman said:

“I will not be hiding in a corner over this. I will fight and I’ll fight as hard as I can for the outcome for the area that I was born and brought up in.”

Cllr Mason, who is also expected to speak at the planning committee, said:

“I will be saying in a statement to the committee that appeal is not a reason to object or approve. The councillors are not allowed to take that into account. If they do, it opens up the possibility of legal action. I will be reminding the council about this.”

More applications

One resident said he was concerned that if Europa’s application were approved, in future the company would be able to do “whatever they like because nobody wants to shut it down”.

Cllr Parsons said:

“We’ve met with Europa, we’ve had numerous conversations with them, and they know what’s under the ground here. And they know that because this was tested in the mid-1990s. They know that it would be financially viable.”

He added that if the current application were approved the company knew that “full production is very easy to follow”.  He said:

“If they win this application, they will be all over North Yorkshire.”

Cllr Mason said:

“The primary fear of a lot of us is the proliferation of the industry.”

Alison Hume said:

“When I met the executives of Europa Oil & Gas at the site, they were at pains to get me to understand this wasn’t actually the full drill that they were applying for but just an appraisal to see maybe there might be some gas down there somewhere.

“But we know if they get the planning permission for test drilling and they get a good response, they will put in another application that will be granted. And before you know it you’ve got a full drill pad and it’s all hands on deck and we’ve got to stop that. We know that one application will follow another. “

Key North Yorkshire Council staff and members

NYC chief executive: Richard Flinton
Richard.flinton@northyorks.gov.uk

Corporate director community development: Nic Harne
nic.harne@northyorks.gov.uk

Head of development management: Martin Grainger
martin.grainger@northyorks.gov.uk

Leader of the council: Carl Les

Cabinet member for highways: Malcolm Taylor

Cabinet member for environment: Mark Crane