Press release: Days of action against fracking begin at Balcombe
Contact:
07447027112 or 07746339931
press@nodashforgas.org.uk
@nodashforgas
Map: goo.gl/maps/9j6Z9
Filming opportunities:
March from Balcombe train station to drill site: 3pm
Training for action at Reclaim the Power: please arrange filming with camp media team before you arrive
Balcombe residents and supporting protestors at Reclaim the Power will gather to march together to Cuadrilla’s drill site on Sunday at 3pm. Meanwhile, camp participants are also preparing for two days of action against Cuadrilla on Monday and Tuesday.
Balcombe resident Douglas Wragg said, “Because we have here a travesty of democracy and we’ve tried every democratic path to use, the only choice we have left is direct action. I’ve been living here for 20 years and I would never have imagined myself being involved in protest. But you either lie down and let Cuadrilla ride roughshod over you, or take direct action.”
On Saturday hundreds of participants and locals at the camp joined workshops whose topics included struggles against extreme energy around the world, resistance to fracking around the UK, and ending fuel poverty.
Protestor Emma Hughes said, “I’m here in solidarity with the community of Balcombe, and I’m here because we can’t afford to extract new fossil fuels when climate change is already killing hundreds of thousands of people. We’re all locals when it comes to the impact of fossil fuels on the planet.”
Balcombe resident and chemical and condensed matter physics expert, Professor Lawrence Dunne, said of Cuadrilla’s plans to flare gas at the rig: “Contrary to what is put out by the government, no serious environmental assessment of fracking operations in Britain has occurred. In my view, flaring emissions over populations with a high density of flares would be disastrous. The government has done no publicly-scrutinisable work on this. It is a disgrace to pretend otherwise.”