Fracking 'could be a vote-winner', energy minister Michael Fallon says

Earlier, Mr Fallon vowed that the Conservatives would end onshore wind subsidies, seen as deeply unpopular in Tory heartlands, if they win the 2015 election.

By contrast Tory ministers have given enthusiastic backing to shale gas despite the fears of some backbenchers that fracking will provoke local opposition.

Mr Fallon also played down the significance of planned changes to trespass laws to pave the way for shale gas exploration under properties without their owners' permission, as first revealed by the Telegraph in January.

“The fracking doesn’t take place beneath their home, what we are discussing is whether the horizontal drilling... the pipe should pass several thousand feet below your house, what the legal position is there," he told the Telegraph.

The comments contradict those by Ed Davey, the energy secretary, who yesterday told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "It's not so much it's the pipelines it's the actual fracking process that can go horizontally underground and under different landowners' land. The real issue is the fracking process."

Mr Fallon said levels of compensation, if any, for affected homeowner were yet to be decided.

The Renewable Energy Association accused Mr Fallon of “political bluster” over his onshore wind vow and said the green energy industry already supported more UK jobs than shale gas could.

“This kind of nakedly political positioning from the Conservatives undermines all the positive work this Government has put into renewables. The shale gas industry has Government’s unwavering support, and yet according to its own figures its potential for jobs is less than the renewables industry already achieves in the UK," REA head of public affairs James Court said.

more