Small-scale Fracking Ban

I now call Alison Hume to move the motion and I shall then call the Minister to respond. I have been given no notice of any other speeches with prior permission, so no other Member will be permitted to participate other than through an intervention. There will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up, as is the convention in 30-minute debates.

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the potential merits of banning small-scale fracking operation.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Roger. It is also a pleasure to lead a debate on banning small-scale fracking—an issue that I have campaigned on since I was elected MP for Scarborough and Whitby. It has huge local, national and international significance.

The issue of small-scale fracking first came to my attention when Europa Oil & Gas applied to explore for gas at Burniston, just outside the picturesque North York Moors. The plans, published in full in March, include erecting a 38-metre-high drilling rig and proposals to carry out small-scale hydraulic fracturing, which Europa calls “proppant squeeze”. The planning application is due to be heard by North Yorkshire council’s strategic planning committee imminently, making this debate extremely timely.

I thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate. Like her, I have fought against fracking for years, but Reform UK wants to drill into our beautiful countryside in York Outer, destroying towns and villages and allowing house prices to plummet in the process. They want to drill into and vandalise our beautiful York and North Yorkshire countryside. Does my hon. Friend agree that Reform poses a danger, that it would totally ruin York Outer and Scarborough and Whitby, and that it must be stopped?

I completely agree with my hon. Friend that Reform’s plans are a threat to our beautiful countryside, and our constituents do not want them.

Europa’s plans have been widely opposed by the local community. In response, campaigners launched a petition that has garnered more than 10,000 signatories calling for a Government ban on small-scale fracking. Fracking—short for “hydraulic fracturing”—is the process of injecting fluid at high pressure into an underground rock formation to release the gas or oil inside.

I commend the hon. Lady for securing this debate. The Government must commit to ensuring that local people have the final say. In terms of buying property or businesses in a certain area, fracking should be unable to go ahead without the say-so of the entire local community and the Government must abide by that decision. Does the hon. Lady agree?

I completely agree with the hon. Member. We must listen to our local communities, who are telling us loud and clear that they do not want fracking on their back door, in their beautiful fields or in the countryside.

Since 2019, there has been a moratorium on fracking across the UK—a decision taken after Lancashire was rocked by an earthquake caused by fracking operations at Preston New Road. However, not all forms of fracking are currently covered by the moratorium. The Petroleum Act 1998 uses a fluid-based definition for fracking. Section 4B(1)(b) describes it as

“the injection of…more than 1,000 cubic metres of fluid at each stage, or expected stage, of the hydraulic fracturing, or…more than 10,000 cubic metres of fluid in total.”

The volume of liquid proposed for the Burniston site is under that threshold, so despite the intent of the plans being exactly the same—to explore for and to extract gas by injecting a substance into the rock at pressure to cause it to fracture—the current legislation actually allows Europa to do exactly what the moratorium should be there to block. It is clear that the volume-based definition has created a legal loophole for oil and gas companies to evade the Government’s ban on fracking and proceed to do so under a different name—in this case, “proppant squeeze”.

The Burniston application is not the first time that planning permission has been sought in England for proppant squeeze. Between 2016 and 2019, Egdon Resources applied several times and was eventually granted planning permission for a proppant squeeze in north Lincolnshire, with a hydraulic fracture plan approved in May 2021. In November 2024 another company, Rathlin Energy, also applied to the Environment Agency for permission to carry out similar work at West Newton, an oil and gas site in East Yorkshire.

There is no evidence that the volume of fluid used can accurately determine the risk of seismic events. However, the volume of fluid proposed for use at the Burniston site in my constituency surpasses the highest daily fluid amount in the week leading up to the 2019 earthquake that triggered the existing moratorium. Seismologists have warned that our country’s geology responds unpredictably to even small injections, under- scoring that any fracking has risk, regardless of fluid volume.

Parts of Derbyshire are threatened by fracking because they fall within the Bowland-Hodder basin. We have a complex limestone geography, historical mine workings and natural cave systems. Fracking could undermine sub-surface stability and cause earthquakes, as it has elsewhere. Reform is promising to end the moratorium on fracking. That threatens the character of our natural landscapes and would further pollute our rivers. The last time I looked, we were in the middle of a climate emergency and the last thing that we need is more fossil fuels. Does my hon. Friend agree that a national ban on all types of fracking is the only way to protect our landscapes and environment?

Order. I will place this on the record: Mr Speaker deprecates prepared interventions. Interventions are supposed to be a comment on what is being said at the time. I understand that even Members from areas as far from Yorkshire and Derbyshire as Northern Ireland have constituency interests in this topic, but what you say really must relate to the debate.

Thank you, Sir Roger. I appreciate your advice. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (John Whitby) for his intervention; he makes a good point that our English countryside, wherever it is, needs to be protected. The only way to do that is to ban all forms of fracking.

A 2020 summary of the findings of studies commissioned by what was then the Oil and Gas Authority into seismicity resulting from the operations at Preston New Road emphasised that

“it is not yet possible to accurately predict the seismic response to hydraulic fracturing, if any, in relation to variables such as site characteristics, fluid volume, rate or pressure. Where induced seismicity has occurred, mitigation measures have shown only limited success, and there can only be low confidence in their effectiveness currently.”

In other words, all forms of fracking carry significant risk in relation to seismicity, irrelevant of the volume of liquid proposed.

Other environmental concerns with fracking remain; they are exactly the same for proppant squeeze: potential groundwater contamination from methane migration or the chemicals in frack fluid, methane leaks, flaring and air pollution. Of course, as hon. Members have already drawn attention to, fracking at any volume also leads to more greenhouse gas emissions, which contribute to climate change. Clearly, the regulatory loopholes around fluid volume are arbitrary and unhelpful. Proppant squeeze carries the same intent and the same risks as higher-volume fracking. It is fracking in all but name.

It is the legal opinion of Estelle Dehon KC that the wording of the Petroleum Act 1998 should be changed to include proppant squeeze. She writes that the current definition has

“caused confusion and proved difficult to apply”,

and instead suggests adopting “a simple, broad definition”, which

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. On these planning applications, we must incorporate the fact that fracking leads to water scarcity—and our region has had a hosepipe ban that has only recently been lifted. Would my hon. Friend agree that, when it comes to these planning applications, we must understand the impacts on water scarcity?

I thank my hon. Friend for his excellent intervention. Indeed, the hosepipe ban in Yorkshire has brought to everybody’s attention that our water is precious and must not be contaminated by any form of fracking.

There are various ways that the Government could amend legislation to prevent oil and gas companies from applying for new permission to frack. If I may, there are two main changes that I would like the Minister to consider. First, we could consider revoking the current provisions in the Petroleum Act 1998 and the Infrastructure Act 2015 and replacing them with a flat prohibition either on the grant of any licences permitting fracking or on any person carrying out fracking. Secondly, might he consider amending the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 to include a general ban, ensuring that no application for planning permission that uses the technique of fracking may be granted by a local planning authority or by the Secretary of State?

More broadly, this Government are committed to restoring the UK’s position as a global leader when it comes to climate action; among various pledges, we have committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and to achieving net zero by 2050. Banning all fracking operations to prevent damaging greenhouse gas emissions would ensure that this policy is in line with our climate commitments. Would the Minister consider introducing a comprehensive ban on fracking so that Government policy fully reflects those obligations?

When it comes to fracking, the case is clear: so-called small-scale fracking, or proppant squeeze, is no different in intent or risk than larger-scale operations; it can lead to earthquakes and environmental damage, and contributes to climate change. The loopholes that exist in current legislation are arbitrary, unscientific, and undermine both the Government’s moratorium and any future ban on fracking.

The moratorium signalled a fundamental change in the UK, shifting focus on to energy alternatives; a total ban will encourage investment in renewable energy, promote green jobs and reinforce public trust in the Government’s green growth mission. If this Government want our legislation to be clear and consistent, and want to safeguard the national environment, listen to the concerns in all our communities and meet our climate commitments, they must introduce a comprehensive ban on fracking based on intent and process, and which disregards fluid volumes.

It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Roger. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Alison Hume) for securing this debate, for her fantastic speech and for all her campaigning on this issue and many others since she was elected. She is a fantastic champion for her community. I also thank her for all the conversations we have had on this issue.

My hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby noted the importance of this Government’s climate commitments. I think it is useful to restate those for context. In the face of a fractured consensus—pardon the pun—this Government are absolutely committed to tackling the climate emergency. That is why our clean power mission and everything we are doing in Government is about getting us off the rollercoaster of fossil fuels as quickly as possible. It also means managing the role that oil and gas plays in the country at the moment.

Just a fortnight ago we published our response to the consultation on the future of the North sea—our “North Sea Future Plan”—which includes not just the future actions in the North sea, but our approach to the onshore oil and gas sector. We have set an ambitious and pragmatic approach to cease new oil and gas licensing and explore new offshore and onshore fields while managing existing fields for their lifespan; I will come back to that point later. That is all about helping manage our transition from fossil fuels—what we have to do for climate change—but also how we invest in what comes next and the clean energy that will bring down people’s bills and deliver our energy security.

I have listened closely to the points made by my hon. Friend in today’s debate, and in the correspondence that I have had with her and our other meetings. My Department has also been aware of these concerns through correspondence from other Members in this place and the recent e-petition that was considered. I want to be clear on this Government’s position towards hydraulic fracturing—both high-volume hydraulic fracturing for shale gas and more conventional low-volume hydraulic fracturing.

In that evidence, will the Minister include water scarcity? In York and across the region, people have not been able to fill up a paddling pool, so why should water be used in low-volume fracking?

I appreciate that point; I am sorry for not mentioning it earlier, as my hon. Friend made it before. It is an important point, and we need to look at water scarcity right across the policy landscape. Demand for water is increasing in a number of areas—for example, I am looking at it in terms of data centres at the moment. The Government must look at the uses of water, as well as building new reservoirs to ensure we have water supply. That is an important point that will be taken into consideration by the Environment Agency and as part of the local planning process, but I will take it away and see whether there is anything more we can do on that.

The Department and I are keeping low-volume hydraulic fracturing under active review. We are open to receiving objective evidence, wherever that may come from; we will review that and look at whether definitions need to change and whether other legislation is required, but the position is as I have set out at the moment. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby again for bringing this debate to Westminster Hall, and other hon. Members who have participated. I appreciate the engagement on the issue, which I am confident that my hon. Friend will continue. I look forward to that.