Video: Fracking the Downs – Failing Our Future

Fracking the Downs – Failing Our Future

Sussex LRC event for Brighton Fringe 2014

Recorded Saturday 17 May 2014

1. Charles Metcalfe – Chairman of Frack Free Balcombe Residents Association (FFBRA), who has been at the forefront of resistance to Cuadrilla’s attempts to search for unconventional oil and gas very close to Balcombe village in Sussex.
2. Brenda Pollack – regional campaigner for Friends of the Earth in the South East, who tweets as @BrendaPollack
3. Professor Steve Thomas – an energy policy expert and media commentator on energy.  Now Director of Research and a member of the Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU) at the University of Greenwich Business School, Steve was previously a member of the Science Policy Research Unit at the University of Sussex in the Energy Policy Programme.
4. Michael Meacher MP – committed socialist, Labour MP for Oldham West and Royton, author of “The State We Need”, and former government minister, having been Minister of State for the Environment following Labour’s 1997 election victory until June 2003.  He writes a thought-provoking blog and tweets as @michaelmeacher
5. Speakers’ replies to audience questions – part 1 on transport, food miles, carbon capture & the future of coal, and rail re-nationalisation.
6. Speakers’ replies to audience questions – part 2 on fracking, biomass, biofuels, pump storage, R&D, public ownership of energy companies and energy co-operatives.
7. Speakers’ concluding remarks
8. View our photos of the meeting