Bez joins campaigners in fight over fracking

The Happy Mondays dancer - famed for his dancing and playing the maracas - turned up at the Preston New Road site for a day of action yesterday.

Bob Dennett, from Residents Action on Fylde Fracking, said the local opponents of shale gas drilling were delighted to get the support of the 52-year-old Happy Mondays band member.

He said Bez, who has previously shown support for the anti-fracking campaign on the Fylde Coast including a visit to a residents’ meeting in Fleetwood, was concerned about the effects that fracking might have on the environment and people’s health near to drill sites.

​Mr Dennett said: “It was great to get the support from Bez, he is a lovely man.

“He is obviously well known and it has brought a lot of people down to support us.

“There were more than 50 people there in the morning which meant that we could carry out one of the agreed slow walk protests in front​ of a lorry leaving the site all the way up to Wensley’s Farm.”

He said after visiting the drill site, Bez was due to visit the two anti-fracking protest camps in the area.

Meanwhile, a road was closed in Carnforth yesterday by police after activists held a demo at the entrance to Leapers Wood Quarry.

The blockade marks the launch action of Break the Chain, a fortnight of interventions called by national social and climate justice group Reclaim the Power.

According to protesters, Aggregate Industries supplies the Cuadrilla fracking site on Preston New Road currently under construction.

Lorry access to the Aggregate Industries’ quarry in Carnforth was suspended by the appearance of two protesters on swings which were rigged onto height restriction bars at two key access points, blocking all lorry movements.