Campaigners raise awareness with street stalls in Belfast city centre in Feb 2016.
The single most significant factor in what happens next is the community response in your area. With 60% of the UK available to fracking companies and around 10 million acres already licensed, this industry is a threat to us all.
1) Find concerned / like minded people and start getting organised as soon as possible
The earlier you start campaigning the greater the advantage you will have. Informing people about the scale of the threat before the company has a chance to start the their PR and spin will give you a great advantage. Fracking companies are vulnerable at every stage of the process (see diagram). The sooner you start raising awareness and get people to take action, the better your chance of slowing them down and stopping them. Generating conspicuous and vocal opposition to fracking in your area is essential.
2) Raise Awareness – Conspicuous opposition and community organising works
When communities threatened by fracking get organised to resist this invasion they have a massive effect. Stopping any single well can be very difficult, but in the long-term, massive investment will be required to make fracking a reality. Such investment will not be forth-coming if these projects do not look financially or politically viable. Fracking in the UK is a speculative activity, most companies are aiming to gather enough data to sell out to a larger company that has the money to drill thousands of wells needed for full scale production. Fracking companies are gathering social data as well as data about the geology! A massive outcry and response from the community living in an area makes it very hard for fracking companies to operate and secure investment.
3) Start an active group where you live
Getting together with people that live in your area, your friends and neighbours, is a extremely important. Working together and meeting regularly to plan and organise starts the process of rebuilding community. It allows people to get involved in activities that raise awareness and gets everyone ready to face down the fracking industry. Get a pack of materials containing community action guides, printed resources and a DVD of films. The guides in this pack are suitable for anyone regardless of previous experience. In conjunction with the resources, the pack will also be useful for new groups and organisers that have had some success already and want to build a stronger community group in their area.
Resource Pack One
If you would like to receive Resource Pack One please email us at outreach@frack-off.org and include a postal address where you are happy to receive an A3 size parcel.
We will also include a selection of flyers, badges and stickers and printed resources relevant to your area.
We are working on Pack Two for further group development. Watch this space…
