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The 6 Most Kick-Arse Moments of #Frackminster

Posted by India Thorogood - 10th February 2016


This week hasn’t been a normal one at Westminster. On Tuesday, 30 Greenpeace volunteers built a blooming huge fracking rig right on David Cameron’s doorstep. It spewed fire out of the top, leaving passers by confused and amused, and causing a stir with MPs.

In case you missed it, here are five brilliant bits of the day we took a fracking rig to Parliament

1. This totally bemused TV presenter

Daily politics presenter Adam

Daily Politics presenter Adam brought day time political TV to our fake fracking rig. He’d noticed the “really, really, really noisy” protest on his way to work.

“You know what would be really impressive, if next week, they could build a full size nuclear power plant” he said.

That’s unlikely, Adam. But thanks for coming along with your cameras and making sure our anti-fracking message made it through to national news – that totally kicked arse.

2. This grandma who travelled all the way from Blackpool

Anti-fracking protester

Tina travelled 300 miles to join the protest at Westminster. She’s been resisting the fracking industry in Lancashire for more than four years as part of a group called Nanas Against Fracking.

As Tina said on the day: “What we want is clean, safe energy for us, for our children, and for generations to come. We want our voices to be heard and for our right to refuse the fossil fuel industry to be respected. Is that really too much to ask?”

We don’t think it is, Tina. Thanks for taking a stand. In our eyes you are unquestionably kick arse.

 

 

3. This giant road sign

Keep it in the ground roadsign

Often politics is about sending emails and letters to MPs (and, if you’re like me, it’s also about sitting and shouting at Question Time). But on Tuesday we tried something different. As part of our protest we rolled out a two metre high road sign onto the pavement outside of the heart of UK political power.

Your messages flooded in from Twitter and Facebook. Thanks to everyone who sent us suggestions to display on the road sign throughout the day. Your messages 100% kicked arse.

4. This dragon

Deborah MeadenOur fracking protest even caught the attention of Deborah Meaden. Deborah’s usually kicking arse as one of the investors on Dragon’s Den, but it turns out she’s an outspoken supporter of renewable energy too. Nice one, Deborah!

 

 

 

 

 

5. Speaking of dragons

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Speaking of dragons, did we mention our protest had fire?! We worked with the kick arse pyrotechnics team from Glastonbury to add a flare to our fake fracking rig. There was a serious point to this though. The REAL gas flares that some fracking firms will be allowed to burn while they drill will be much bigger, much scarier, and risk pumping out greenhouse gas emissions on a massive scale.

6. And last but by no means least… YOU

Anti-fracking protesters

A HUGE thanks to all of you who tweeted, shared, and commented online during our #frackminster protest. Soon we’ll be handing in our petition to Greg Clark, the government minister who could overrule councils that vote against fracking. If you’ve haven’t signed the petition already, add your name here.

 

 


Article Tagged as: Featured, Fracking, fracking


About India Thorogood

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Digital Campaigner at Greenpeace UK