**UPDATE, 6 November 2019: We won! Following the government's announcement to immediately suspend fracking operations on 1st November, 3 days later the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy published the outcome of its consultation. It identified lack of support for fast-tracking planning applications for fracking, and so back-tracked on the plans. Thank you for being part of this victory!**

**UPDATE, 16 October 2018: We'll be delivering this petition to Greg Clark on 25 October -- the day the consultation closes. Make sure your name is included!**

**UPDATE, 24 July 2018: A government consultation on these fracking-friendly new rules has just been launched, as news breaks that the energy minister has overruled local opposition to allow Cuadrilla to frack in Lancashire. There's already a spanner in the works from within parliament over the new plans. A committee of MPs is critical of the them -- they recently released a report recommending that planning permission for fracking should not be fast-tracked, and decision making must remain at a local level. A huge petition showing that the public don’t like the government’s plans either, could make all the difference, so please add your name today!**

Fracking company bosses must feel like all their wishes are about to come true. Energy Secretary Greg Clarke has just announced plans to fast track planning applications for fracking developments.

The proposed new laws would mean that exploratory drilling and seismic surveys would be treated in just the same way if you or I wanted to make minor home improvements -- they'd not need planning permission at all. Local councils would also lose any right to have their say in the matter.

It’s a move that could put an area nearly the size of Wales at immediate risk of drilling. We can’t let the frackers get their way.

Tell Greg Clark MP not to fast track fracking, not to allow fracking companies to drill without permission, and ensure local councils retain the right to make planning decisions on fracking.

Communities and local councils have repeatedly said no to fracking, much to the annoyance of companies like Cuadrilla, Third Energy and Ineos. So the government’s solution to make frackers’ lives easier? Remove local opposition from the equation.

Welcoming the government’s proposals, Cuadrilla’s boss Francis Eagan complained of the ‘lengthy and costly three-year process' it’s taken to force exploratory wells on Lancashire residents who continue to resist fracking on their doorsteps.

The proposed changes almost look like they could have been written by Eagan and his fracking pals themselves. As well as proposing that shale gas exploration would no longer need planning application, environmental impact assessment or the approval of local governments, fracking sites would be classed as ‘nationally important infrastructure’ so approval would come from national, rather than local level.

Greg Clark MP: don’t make it easy for fracking companies to make a quick profit at the expense of our environment and health of local communities.

The government is shamelessly promoting fracking, despite the considerable risks to the environment, water and health. Earlier this year, it was forced to release a previously unpublished report that suggested both it and fracking industry bosses exaggerated the potential of a fracking boom in the UK.

Noting then that the industry didn’t even look viable on its own measures, of Greg Clarke’s latest announcement, Green party leader Caroline Lucas says: “Britain’s fracking experiment was on life support and now the government is trying its best to shock it back into life.”

Let’s make sure that doesn’t happen.

Tell Greg Clark MP not to fast track fracking, not to allow fracking companies to drill without permission, and ensure local councils retain the right to make planning decisions on fracking.

SumOfUs members like you have acted in solidarity with the local communities of Lancashire and North Yorkshire in their fights against Cuadrilla and Third Energy over and over again. Together we have made sure that not a single well has been fracked in the UK since a ban was lifted in 2013.

To keep it that way, we have to come together again to make sure that Energy Minister Greg Clarke doesn’t fast-track fracking, and give the frackers an easy ride.

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