Shale Gas Production

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 15th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Greg Hands]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for his ongoing interest in all matters relating to energy, but I must say to him that Cuadrilla was told almost a year ago, in June 2021, of the requirement to decommission the two wells by the end of June 2022. It was given a huge amount of notice to do that. I mentioned earlier that the Secretary of State and I have spoken to the Oil and Gas Authority today, and I believe that further communication will happen with the company.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I am glad the Minister has acknowledged that fracking would do nothing to increase our energy security, given that the energy would then be sold on global markets at international prices. I am also grateful that he talks of the importance of public consent. He will know that, given that only 14% of people support fracking and the fact that it would require 6,000 wells to replace even half the gas we are currently using, that will not happen any time soon. However, I urge him to do more on energy demand. This whole debate has been about energy supply—where is the action on reducing demand? That is where the Government are dragging their feet and that needs to change now.

[Greg Hands]

We have comprehensive investments going on through the heat and buildings strategy and other initiatives to ensure that energy demand is also addressed. But may I say this, because I think the hon. Member missed the last couple of occasions to put questions to the Dispatch Box? One thing I am sure of is that I am glad we did not follow the advice of the Green party back in 1989, when it scored its record result in an election with 15%. Its advice was that it was impossible to take action on emissions while simultaneously growing the economy. I am really glad that we decided to ignore that advice, because in the intervening 30 years we have grown the economy by 78% and reduced our emissions by 44%, comprehensively proving the Green party totally wrong.