Hydraulic Fracturing: North East Derbyshire

Lord Harrington of Watford Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd November 2017 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Richard Harrington)]

As ever, it is a great pleasure to take part in a debate chaired by you, Mrs Main. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley) for securing the debate and the other hon. Members for their interventions. I am afraid that I do not know his constituency personally, but I say to the Opposition Members from Sheffield that I was brought up in Attercliffe in Sheffield, so I know the area quite well. [Interruption.] It is not the posh bit, it would be fair to say. Apart from my memories of Castle Market in Sheffield, where my father had his market stall for most of my childhood, I have no local knowledge, but I have listened carefully to my hon. Friend.

I accept that this is not really a debate about fracking versus not fracking—a topic that this Chamber and the main Chamber could discuss for several hours, if not several days—but I want to put on record my view that shale gas clearly has the potential to power growth, support thousands of jobs and provide a new energy source. My hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Damien Moore) said that fracking has its plus points and makes us less reliant on imports from abroad, and so on. I felt that point was well made, and it does have to be made.

As my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire is aware, it is not really for me to comment on the Marsh Lane planning application. That is exactly what our local planning system is for. However, having heard from him in his eloquent remarks about the number of protests in the area against the petition and all the official responses, I feel that while my job has its contentions, I would not like to be one of the local councillors on the evening when that is considered.

It is for me to mention some of the matters that a local planning authority should consider when making its decision. Planning is a quasi-judicial process and any planning decision should be taken in line with due process and a fair hearing. To ensure that the local community has had the opportunity to raise any material considerations, the planning authority will seek views from the local community—as the planning authority presumably has, given what my hon. Friend said. That provides, quite properly in a democratic system, precisely the platform for the kind of process that he mentioned.

[Rachael Maskell]

Given that 99.2% of people around Kirby Misperton raised serious concerns in the consultation, how can the community have a voice when it was completely ignored and the fracking went ahead?

[Richard Harrington]

I am afraid that I do not know about that particular application, but we have been discussing the local planning procedure and I am sure that the officers and councillors of that area would take that into consideration—[Interruption.] Well, in my experience of a lot of planning applications in my constituency, they do in some and in some they do not. I cannot say that we have had anything like fracking, but in the normal system, that is what the democratic process involves.

The cumulative effect of shale developments need to be taken into account. The national policy is clear: when planning permission is granted for shale gas, the cumulative impact of potentially multiple shale sites has to be considered. My hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire made that point towards the end of his speech. Such sites are not just considered in isolation. That is part of the national planning policy. Local authorities have the power to assess and restrict the cumulative effects of shale sites, which include some points that he made about the adverse impact on the natural or historical environment. The Government’s view is that the protections are sufficient.

As with any construction project—my hon. Friend might not want any in his constituency; that is a perfectly reasonable view—there will be some element of disruption. The planning guidance clearly sets out how surface-level considerations—such as noise, dust, air quality, lighting and the visual impact on the local and wider landscape, as well as traffic, which the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) mentioned—should all be addressed by the local planning authority. That has to be considered. Such authorities, including his own, can refuse the application or impose operational restrictions for that reason or any other that they consider appropriate.

In my understanding, from the research that we did when we found out about this debate, the application at Marsh Lane is not for hydraulic fracturing, but for stratigraphy tests—I hope hon. Members will excuse my lack of a scientific background, but the application is not for hydraulic fracturing.

[Ruth George]

My constituency also falls under the same local authority. Given that the Minister will ask the local authority to look into all the very valid points raised by the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley), if the application is thereby refused by the local authority and is called up before the Secretary of State, will the Secretary of State then give due weighting to exactly the same arguments from the community in contravention of the guidance that has been given?

[Richard Harrington]

I am not actually making a point about this case; I am saying that there is a duty to look into all these points.

[Ruth George]

Should the Secretary of State not do so as well?

[Richard Harrington]

The Secretary of State at the Department for Communities and Local Government—not at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, because this is not dealt with commercially, but as a planning application—does, I am sure, know their duties perfectly well, which in this case are quasi-judicial in nature and, I am sure, include those particular things—[Interruption.] Well, they do.

As for the benefits of shale, all our constituents have to consider what the benefits and disadvantages might be, as with anything else. The benefits might include a community benefit fund, for example. In Lancashire, there was an application in which Cuadrilla—another company that does this sort of thing—announced that £100,000 would be given to an independent community benefit fund. Local residents are consulted on this matter. The Treasury recently set out proposals on how the new shale wealth fund will be delivered. I will not go into detail on that, because I know there is very little time left.

Local people are part of the whole system, which could deliver very large sums of money to constituents in these areas. They may decide it is not for them, but they also have the right to decide democratically that it might be. I would not rule that out. That money is in addition to any existing local government funding. It is not there to replace existing projects, but it would improve local jobs and tax revenues, and so on. There are plus points.

The Government will only allow the development of a shale gas industry in a safe way, both for the environment and local people. There are plenty of legal safeguards, through the Infrastructure Act 2015 and other measures. Some environmental issues were mentioned in relation to mining in previous generations, including flooding, all of which the ancestors of my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire would have suffered from, so those are already in the system. We have banned fracking from many valuable areas such as national parks, the broads and areas of outstanding natural beauty.

I wish I had more time, but I will conclude by saying that, if successful, the shale gas industry could have good points for the country, but as with anything else there is a balance between supporting the industry and protecting the countryside. There is flexibility in the local planning system to ensure that the views of local communities are considered and that local planning authorities take into account the particular characteristics of a proposed site—that is why it is a “local” system. The Government are keen to see shale gas go ahead in the UK, because we want the opportunity for the country to benefit from it, but I fully accept all the points made by my hon. Friend. I congratulate him on making those points—everything he said has been carefully noted.

Question put and agreed to.