Letters - August 29, 2019

The past week has seen the strongest tremors yet caused by fracking on Preston New Road, reaching up to 2.9 in magnitude, that quite literally shook buildings across the Fylde coast.

This type of event did not often happen locally before fracking began, and with multiple such tremors this week then we should all be alarmed at their increasing frequency.

That this is happening is not a surprise, it’s quite simply what we’ve seen in areas that have been fracked across the world and what was predicted to happen here.

People can argue the science, but those arguments are made nonsense by the literal shaking of the ground beneath our feet - because that’s what this is about, the ground beneath our feet. And the water that we, and our children, drink from.

It’s about where the run-off waste chemicals go from the fracking process itself. It’s about the damage these seismic events cause to property, remembering that what we are feeling is from one well alone, not fields of wells operating 24/7.

And make no mistake, it is the ground beneath our feet that this is happening to, not beneath the government in London or the ground beneath Cuadrilla’s shareholders, but families and communities at the far end of the country from them here in Lancashire.

Put simply, this has to stop. Our government championing half-measures to combat the climate crisis whilst allowing fracking to continue reduces these efforts to the pantomime we know them to be. People must be put before profit. Mankind’s survival put before money. Our children before their shareholders.

The ground beneath our feet is the ground we all call home. Fracking must be permanently halted before it does any more damage to our communities.

Simon Cartmell

Chair, Blackpool South

Constituency Labour Party

* Let’s face it, Francis Egan will not be happy until he has been responsible for Blackpool Tower falling into the sea!

Seriously though, if, as we are told, that last tremor took place when no fracking was taking place, could it not be as the result of the sum of the whole? In other words a build up of all the previously poo- pooed small tremors coming together as one. Are there any boffins reading this who might give us an answer?

David Nicholls

Warton

BREXIT

Like a rope and a hanged man?

Joe Swinson is right to admonish Jeremy Corbyn for still wanting, after a successful vote of no confidence, to form a caretaker government with him as leader in order to prevent the PM taking us out of the EU without a deal.

Anyone striking a deal with a Marxist/Trotskyist is performing an act akin to the relationship between a rope and a hanged man.

Dr Barry Clayton

Thornton Cleveleys

BREXIT

They want to

stay in the EU

Jeremy Corbyn has held a meeting with all other party leaders to try and avert a no deal.

But hang on a minute, can this be right? We have Jo Swinson (Lib Dems), Ian Blackford (SNP), Caroline Lucas (Greens), Liz Saville Roberts (Plaid Cymru), and Anna Soubry (Change UK). None of them are interested in a deal or no deal. The only thing they want is no Brexit. All this talk about leaving with a deal is a smokescreen.

If the EU agreed to everything the UK has asked for, and offered to give us £39bn to leave, this alliance would still vote against it.

Their goal is to bring down the Conservative government. They couldn’t care less about what’s best for the country or carrying out the wishes of the people.

David Schofield

Address supplied

BREXIT

Vote should be

respected

Regarding letter from Kevan Benfold the Blackpool Liberal Democrat MP (Your Say, August 14).

He calls 1.3m a “small” majority! What planet is he on? A democratic vote is exactly that and its result should be respected.

All those who have not acted so and all those currently scheming for another referendum should be ashamed.

His excuse as to why he should continue to use “Democrat” in his title is laughable.

I assume that should the Lib Dems fare badly in future general elections he will want those re-run too! Unless they win!

Name and address

supplied

ENVIRONMENT

Green spaces need protection

I’m not an environmental zealot but I do take exception to Blackpool council paving over a section of the grassed area on one of the South Shore crescents with tarmac or asphalt.

I would have thought that a council which spent £100,000 on planting a few trees just a few months ago, would have more respect for the long-established green spaces in Blackpool.

I don’t know if local residents were consulted about the loss of one part of this green space but I certainly wasn’t aware of it happening and I sincerely hope it’s not a case of the council trying to push this through before anyone can object?

These green spaces are a precious asset and every part of them should be protected from this sort of official ‘vandalism’.

J Walker

Marton