Pause Frack: cautious celebration and Conscientious Protectors

Authors: Jojo Mehta & Louise Somerville

There is no doubt that the recently announced official fracking moratorium “until the science changes” (Andrea Leadsom, business minister) is a serious blow to commercial gas and oil fracking in the UK.

It will make it very hard for potential fracking companies to attract and sustain financial investment. 

From the first earth tremors in Blackpool in 2011 to the 2.9 quake this summer which halted fracking in Lancashire, there has been strong and effective local and national campaigning and there is absolutely cause to celebrate this as a victory for the grassroots anti-fracking movement.

However, anti-fracking campaigners are not complacent. Campaigns will continue, nationwide – it has been made clear that the moratorium is temporary, and the timing – to coincide with the launch of the Conservative election campaign – is likely to be cynically chosen.

The movement has particular significance for the Stop Ecocide campaign because the first flurry of people signing up as Earth Protectors were anti-fracking campaigners. Stop Ecocide compiled a fracking “harms dossier” which was, and still is, available for use as part of their legal defence in court, and it was the cases brought by these activists that demonstrated the power of the Conscientious Protector approach (relying on the human right to Freedom of Conscience, ECHR art. 9, UDHR art. 18).

Helen Chuntso from Frack Free Greater Manchester was the among the first Conscientious Protectors to use the Freedom of Conscience line of argument in court. She did so in the context of fracking - to striking effect – indeed she was told by the judge that in a parallel life she could have been the brightest barrister of her generation!  Other defendants were likewise given unusual leeway to express their convictions and bring their evidence in situations where a criminal court would often restrict evidence to whether or not the precise offence (eg obstruction of the highway) took place.

This approach is not about “winning” or “getting off” – and for that reason is often dismissed by lawyers trained to use established defences to achieve exactly that.  Rather it’s about inserting a wedge into the court procedure to enable the activist’s voice to be heard, and we have found it to be effective (when used along with for example a defence of necessity) in doing this. 

Legal rights and legal defences do not spring into being of their own accord – and they do not spring into being at all if they are not attempted or discussed. Conscientious Objectors of the 20th century won the human right to Freedom of Conscience over decades.  Now arguments of conscience are beginning to surface more and more frequently, and we trust it will not be long before Conscientious Protectors also gain recognition in law.  Just this week Angela Ditchfield, an XR activist was acquitted on the basis of necessity, which she argued alongside the Christian convictions that spurred her conscience.

Signing up as an Earth Protector can similarly evidence a deeply held belief justifying an act of conscience – a belief that all of nature has the right to peaceful enjoyment and that severe disruption of that natural unfolding of life should be a crime.