24th February 2014 Balcombe Parish Council today received the results of the latest poll on residents’ attitudes to drilling for oil and gas in the village and potential fracking. The poll, which asked three questions, was conducted by Electoral Reform Services and sent to every Balcombe resident on […]
31/1/14 The Crown Prosecution Service reveals that 35 charges arising from the Balcombe anti-fracking protests have been dropped before reaching trial. More
18/2/14 The South Downs National Park Authority is to tell the government that no more oil or gas licences should be sold in protected landscapes. The comment will be part of the authority’s response to a government consultation on the next round of Petroleum Development and Exploration Licences […]
18/2/14 Frack Free Balcombe Residents’ Association has responded to an interview (reported here last week) by Shale World with the village’s parish council chair Alison Stevenson. The full response is posted below from FFBRA’s latest newsletter. Community benefit FFBRA challenged Alison’s Stevenson’s suggestion that Balcombe could receive £80,000 from […]
13/2/14 A climate change campaigner locked himself to the top of a water tanker leaving Cuadrilla’s oil exploration site at Balcombe to persuade the media that the anti-fracking protests were not petering out. 66-year old Robert Basto, who has a PhD in physics, told Brighton Magistrates Court that […]
13/2/14 Charges brought under trades union legislation against two anti-fracking campaigners were dropped this morning before they gave evidence in court. Robert Basto, 66, of Reigate, and Jamie Spiers, 29, of no fixed address, had denied besetting Cuadrilla’s staff, contractors and suppliers at its oil exploration site at […]
12/2/14 The use of trades union legislation to prosecute a group of anti-fracking campaigners is under review tonight. District Judge William Ashwort, is considering whether there is a case to answer against five people who took part in the Balcombe protests and were charged under Section 241 of […]
12\2\14 An anti-fracking campaigner padlocked herself to the gate into Cuadrilla’s oil exploration site at Balcombe because “the government wasn’t listening”. Nichola Sanger, on trial for an alleged offence arising from last summer’s Balcombe protests, told the independent video company, You and I Films, that fracking was wrong […]
11/2/14 Cuadrilla’s drilling supervisor at its site at Balcombe told Brighton Magistrates Court this afternoon that delays caused by last summer’s protests cost the oil exploration company £2,500 an hour. James Whitham was giving evidence on the first day of the trial of five environmental campaigners, including Natalie […]
10/2/14 The American energy entrepreneur, Chris Wright, told the House of Lords last month (14/1/14) that Britain would need only 35 shale gas drilling rigs and 700 wells a year. Giving evidence to the Economic Affairs Committee investigation into shale gas, he said his figure was based on the […]
DRILL OR DROP? 