YP Letters: Water shortages vindicate fracking opponents

From: Anne Nightingale, Station Road, Helmsley.
Should fracking take place in Yorkshire?Should fracking take place in Yorkshire?
Should fracking take place in Yorkshire?

CLAIRE Perry, Minister for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, announced that final permission had been given for Cuadrilla to complete a test frack at their Preston New Road site in Lancashire (The Yorkshire Post, July 25).

Not only was this sneaked into the news in the last few hours before the Government’s summer recess, but in the midst of a water shortage where those living and working in the United Utilities supply area, including Carlisle, Liverpool, Blackpool, Manchester, Preston, Barrow in Furness and Kendal, have been put on notice of a hosepipe ban from August 5.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

United Utilities has submitted a request to Defra and the Environment Agency for drought orders to extract water from Ennerdale, Ullswater and Windermere to protect public water supplies.

How can the Government justify permitting an industry in this country which uses millions of gallons of fresh water during its fracking process? Fracking needs fresh water for each frack and, once used, this will be lost to the system. If fracking goes into production, the amount of water needed to sustain it will be phenomenal.

We should be protecting our water supplies for the public and also food production, not supplying water to another fossil fuel industry which will contribute to climate change and result in more of the extreme weather conditions we are experiencing here and throughout the world.

From: David Cragg-James, Stonegrave, York.

ON the day when extreme weather events resulted in significant loss of life through fires in Greece and floods in Laos, the Government gave the go-ahead for fracking in Lancashire, an activity which, if followed as a precedent, will inevitably result in a boost to global warming, to climate change and to the subsequent increased incidence and severity of such events.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

One’s disgust is matched only by one’s anger at the stupidity, cupidity and avarice which keeps these puppets tied to the fossil fuel industry. Enough is enough.

Sacrifices for our self-rule

From: Ian Oglesby, High Catton Road, Stamford Bridge, York.

REMAINERS have decided to forget that thousands gave their lives in order to preserve self-government of the UK.

The same people know that the unelected in Brussels are determined to abolish individual nation states and dictate finances, defence, law-making, policing and border control.

In avoiding such an appalling outcome, we may be forced to accept “no deal” and it is disturbing that some heads of companies have so little allegiance to the UK that they refuse to contemplate trade under the aegis of WTO, widely adhered to across the globe.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

EU negotiators are angry because they realise that they will not be breaking up the UK, taking over our armed forces and persuading our country with all-powerful EU police.

‘No deal’ will harm the EU more than the UK whose prospects are far brighter than the EU which is increasingly beset with insoluble, fundamental disagreements.

Wasps’ nest is a work of art

From: Jake Potts, Thornton Watlass, Near Ripon.

AS a long-time gardener, latterly professional, I feel I must make some comment in support of wasps (The Yorkshire Post, July 21). I have only been stung three times in 71 years and this incident was entirely my fault when I entered an old shed in springtime to find a large wasp fall down the back of my neck, furious at being disturbed suddenly from his long winter sleep.

At present I have two nests in the garden, both in large ‘bird boxes’ which perhaps should be renamed. The inmates seem contented, even when given a shower from the hose after a particuarly hot day.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

I work round them and they me. One of my most prized possessions is a three-year-old nest still attached to a beam in my shed roof which is, frankly, a work of art.

Player was so graceful

From: Tony Winstanley, West Street, Castleford.

IT was with great sadness that I read of the passing of former Leeds United great Paul Madeley (The Yorkshire Post, July 24).

The title of great footballer is often used, but our own “Eleven Pauls” was one of football’s greats. Don Revie named him Leeds United’s “Rolls Royce”.

I have never seen a more graceful player in all the 57 years I have watched the game. I have no doubt that our “Shergar” could have run the length of the Elland Road pitch, carrying a tray of Champagne, headed the ball into the net and not spilled a drop. I am forever grateful that I was there to see him grace the football pitches of Europe.

Failure to get the young fit

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

From: Edward Grainger, Botany Way, Nunthorpe, Middlesbrough.

BARONESS Tanni Grey-Thompson, who I had the pleasure of meeting when some years ago my son Neil ran the Redcar Half-Marathon, is so right about the curse to our modern generation as a result of obesity (The Yorkshire Post, July 24).

She is correct to point to the dangers to our young. In the fight to defeat obesity at all ages, and levels, our efforts collectively have been a dismal failure.

In one of our driest and warmest summers the number of people enjoying the weather and exercise compared to people travelling by car, even short distances, remains extremely low and often non-existent.