Anti-fracking protest at Osborne’s constituency

Guardian News an Media/London

Greenpeace protesters have launched an ambush over fracking for gas in the Cheshire constituency of George Osborne.

Demonstrators set up a drilling rig on Knutsford Heath during yesterday morning rush hour in the well-heeled part of Cheshire where licences for gas exploration have been issued to potential fracking companies, including one with a quarter stake held by the Chinese government.

Wearing high-visibility jackets, the team first attached a large sign reading Frack Go - the name of their fictional firm - over the sign of the local Conservative headquarters sign and then erected a metal “drilling rig” on the central reservation of the road opposite.

Watched by startled but largely amused passersby, the protesters avoided disrupting traffic and put up large signs saying: “We apologise for any inconvenience while we frack your town.”

The group also blockaded the constituency’s tourist office overlooking the green, which secured a place in political history in 1997 when the former BBC reporter Martin Bell was confronted by Neil Hamilton during a by-election campaign, which resulted in the sleaze-beset Tory MP suffering a humiliating defeat.

The protest followed polling in Tatton commissioned by Greenpeace from ComRes which shows that just over half of Osborne’s constituents would opt for wind or solar, compared with just 15% who want gas. A total of 52% went for the green energy systems while 22% backed nuclear, 4% coal and 3% could not make up their minds or didn’t know.

Licences granted for exploratory drilling for gas-fracking include one to IGas, which is 22% owned by a Chinese state oil and gas company.

The firm has said it considers rocks in the area to contain shale with a “high potential to be hydrocarbon bearing”.

Greenpeace energy campaigner Lawrence Carter said: “Tatton is just one of hundreds of constituencies up and down the country earmarked for possible fracking as part of George Osborne’s disastrous energy plan.

“The chancellor needs to explain to his constituents why he’s happy for their local area to be fracked when everyone from Ofgem to BP to the energy secretary says shale gas won’t reduce our energy bills. And he must explain why increasing UK reliance on expensive, polluting gas is a good idea when we should be moving towards a carbon-free electricity system.

“He has also used the fantasy of a UK shale gas boom to justify building 40 new gas fired power stations and increase the UK’s reliance on gas. Consumers will end up paying the price for this.”

The Tatton poll also suggested that 12% of local people who voted Conservative at the 2010 general election would be likely to switch if fracking went ahead in the area, which is also beset by protests against the HS2 train, whose proposed north-western route crosses the constituency. The area is one of the most affluent areas of the north-west, which has long been the home of well-off commuters to Manchester, Liverpool and the West Midlands.