Ban on Fracking for Shale Gas Bill

Debate between Edward Miliband and Maria Caulfield

Wednesday 19th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Edward Miliband]

I am glad we have a Conservative Member who wants to uphold their manifesto commitments. It is a refreshing change, I have to say. But here’s the thing: he should be directing his point to the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State was explicitly asked on the radio last week whether he would give the House a binding vote on this issue—I think the case for that is massively strengthened by the fact that the Conservative party is breaking its manifesto promise—and he said no. We are forcing this debate because it is the only way we can give the House a binding vote on this issue.

I want to talk about price. I know he is not exactly flavour of the month, but the recently departed Chancellor of the Exchequer said in February that

“even if we lifted the fracking moratorium tomorrow…no amount of shale gas from hundreds of wells dotted across rural England would be enough to lower the European price…private companies are not going to sell the shale gas they produce to UK consumers below the market price. They are not charities, after all.”

The Climate Change Committee says the same. Even the founder of Cuadrilla, Chris Cornelius, says:

“Even if the UK were to generate significant gas, we are not likely to see lower gas prices—any more than living next to a farm would mean paying less for milk.”

The reason is that prices are set in the European market, and the best evidence from the British geological survey is that fracking can meet less than 1% of European gas demand, and even that in a number of years’ time. Hence it will make no difference to price, and no amount of hand waving from the Secretary of State will change that fact.

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

Is it not true that the right hon. Gentleman said at the Labour party conference on 24 September 2013:

“Of course, there could be a role”

for fracking

“if it can meet safety concerns”?

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Miliband]

I am very glad the hon. Lady has done her research about what I said on 24 September 2013, because so have I. [Interruption.] I think she should listen. This is what I said:

“I believe when George Osborne says fracking is a panacea he is totally misguided”,

and that the “notion” it could “solve Britain’s energy problems” was “just nonsense.”

I went to say that it needed to

“meet safety concerns and the needs of local residents”.

Since then—

[Maria Caulfield]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Edward Miliband]

No. Since then, it has been shown that fracking cannot meet safety concerns or the needs of local residents.

The second question I want to explore is whether fracking is safe, which has long been the subject of debate—a debate we led in 2013. The Conservative manifesto said:

“We will not support fracking unless the science shows categorically that it can be done safely.”

It is important to go back to what happened in 2019 and the reasons why the Government introduced the moratorium. The then Business Secretary, the right hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Dame Andrea Leadsom)—hardly a tofu-eating, woke lefty—said that

“it is clear that we cannot rule out future unacceptable impacts on the local community.”

It is not surprising that the right hon. Lady concluded that. Has the current Business Secretary read the official report from the time? I have, because I am a nerd. It said it could not rule out an event of 4.5 on the Richter scale, having already seen a 2.9 Richter scale event at Preston New Road. Let me tell the House what the impact of such an event would be by reading from the report. It would

“be widely felt…there could be widespread building damage in the study area, with cracked plasterwork affecting approximately 10 percent of buildings, more serious structural damage (of varying degrees) affecting 5.4 percent of buildings”—

including chimney failure. It continued:

“Some damage would be caused to buildings outside of the study area.”

That is why the Government banned fracking and said that they would not restart it unless the British Geological Survey said it was safe.

In the words of the then Business Secretary in April this year:

“Unless the latest scientific evidence demonstrates that shale gas extraction is safe, sustainable and of minimal disturbance to those living and working nearby, the pause in England will remain in place.”

No ifs, no buts. In its report published last month, the British Geological Survey said that it could not provide that assurance. Instead, it said that hydraulic fracturing

“can trigger earthquakes large enough to cause structural damage. These events were not predicted in advance of operations.”

Here is the key point for the whole House: there certainly is not the compelling evidence about safety that the Government promised would be the basis of any lifting of the ban. This is as clear an example of a broken manifesto promise as we are ever likely to see.