August 22: Fast-tracking policy no threat to democracy

WITHOUT wishing to debate further the rights or wrongs of fracking, I do take issue with your two correspondents, Mike Potter, and B. J. Hopkins, who claim that the Government potentially intervening and fast-tracking fracking planning applications is somehow a threat to democracy (The Yorkshire Post, August 21). It is quite the reverse.

As recently as May, the current Government was elected with a manifesto that clearly included a commitment to fracking, and, as a result, have a clear democratic mandate to follow this through.

None of the protest groups have any democratic mandate of any form. Nor do any councils have any democratic mandate to oppose fracking, none have majorities of councillors who were elected on an anti-fracking manifesto.

If the anti-fracking protest groups want a democratic mandate, then they should put up candidates as councillors and MPs. That will be the true test of public support, and, if their arguments are as strong as they claim, it will be reflected in any result. One such group, in Boston, although not an anti-fracking group, did just that a few years ago and won control of the council, so it can be done with the right candidates and arguments. At the moment, it is the Government which hold the democratic legitimacy.