"Jingle Bells, Fracking Smells"

We decided to celebrate Christmas this year with some divestment campaigning, by joining Red Leicester Choir to sing anti-fossil fuel carols in three banks in Leicester. 

In Barclays, we sang ‘We wish you would stop drilling’, in HSBC we sang ‘Jingle bells, fracking smells’ and in Santander we sang ‘Dirty energy, dirty energy’ to the tune of ‘Oh Christmas tree’. All three banks invest their customers’ money in dirty fossil fuels and we wanted to voice our objection to this and encourage people to move their money. We hope these banks will make a New Year’s resolution to clean up their investment policy!

Clean up the banks!

To highlight that the banks are investing enormous amounts of their customers’ money in dirty fossil fuels, we staged a cleaning flash mob at branches of Barclays, HSBC, Santander and Natwest in Leicester city centre.



We wore our cleaning clothes and brought dusters, brushes and polishing cloths to symbolically clean up the banks. While some of us cleaned, Melanie Wakley explained why we were there with a loud hailer:

“Scientists tell us that we’ve got 11 years left to take action if we want to avoid irreversible changes to the climate.

Runaway climate change would be an unthinkable disaster – it would mean drought, floods, extreme heatwaves and sea level rises. The poorest people would be the worst affected and it would become impossible for humans to live on parts of the planet.

We need to be investing in clean energy and a liveable planet. It’s time for these banks to move their customers’ money out of fossil fuels.”

Outside the banks, we also spoke to customers about how they can move their money out of dirty energy.



Between 2016 and 2018, Barclays invested $85.1 billion in fossil fuels; they are one of the top investors in oil mining. In the same period, HSBC invested $57.8 billion in dirty energy, including tar sands, Arctic drilling, coal mining and fracking. Santander have increased their investment in fossil fuels since the Paris Agreement to tackle climate change was signed in 2015, investing $14.9 billion in dirty energy in three years.



Following a meeting with a member of Leicester Friends of the Earth last week, Leicester East MP, Keith Vaz, signed a cross-party letter to the prime minister in support of onshore wind energy. Onshore wind turbines are now the cheapest source of energy in the UK. They are also hugely popular, with over three quarters of the public backing their use, according to the government’s own statistics. However, since 2015, the government has introduced planning and financial barriers that have stood in the way of new projects. The campaigners are hoping that Leicester’s other MPs, Jon Ashworth and Liz Kendall, will also sign the letter and support clean energy.

Can you spot the fracking difference?

Over the summer, the government is consulting about whether to change the law to reclassify fracking as ‘permitted development’. This is part of the UK planning law that allows people to carry out improvements on their home or property, such as putting up a garden shed, without having to apply to the local council for planning permission. The government is proposing that exploratory drilling for shale gas should also be considered as permitted development, which means that oil and gas companies would not need to apply for planning permission to construct an exploratory fracking well pad. Well pads can cover 1.5 hectares and result in noisy day-and-night drilling for up to 8 months. They require over 60 HGV journeys a day.

It seems that the government can’t tell the difference between a fracking rig and a garden shed. These proposals are an attack on our local democracy, as they would prevent councils from opposing fracking in their area. The government has realised that they are never going to persuade rural communities to accept fracking, so they are now trying to find some way for the fracking industry to start drilling without consulting local people.

An area of north-west Leicestershire has already been licensed for fracking. If the government succeeds in changing the law, oil and gas companies would be able to move in and start exploratory drilling without even applying for planning permission. Fracking has been banned in many countries, including Scotland and France, because people are concerned about the health risks and pollution. It is not fair that it should be forced on communities without them even being able to have a say.
Fracked gas will increase climate change at a time when we should be moving towards clean renewable energy. The Paris climate agreement acknowledges that we need to keep fossil fuels in the ground if we want to avoid dangerous climate change.

We asked people if they would sign our petition to Leicestershire County Council, asking them to speak out against the proposals to fast-track fracking. The shed and the fracking rig attracted a lot of attention and most people we spoke to were keen to sign the petition and prevent this unfair change to the law.

Stop breaking our hearts, Barclays!

For Valentine's Day, we held an action outside Barclays in Leicester, asking them to stop breaking our hearts and withdraw their money from fracking, as they promised. Passersby signed our Valentine's Day card, which we then presented to the branch manager.

All we want is a frack-free Christmas

We gathered with Red Leicester choir to sing some alternative Christmas carols outside Barclays Bank on Humberstone Gate. Previously, campaigners have asked Barclays to cease funding Dirty Energy, and particularly to sell their 97% stake in Third Energy – the company that plan to frack in Ryedale in Yorkshire.

Following Leicester Friends of the Earth’s ‘Frack-Free Festival’ on Humberstone Gate in May, Barclays Chair John McFarlane announced his intention to withdraw Barclays’ financial backing from Third Energy. However, despite repeated requests and letters sent by campaigners, Barclays has failed to set a date for the withdrawal of their investment and campaigners are concerned that Barclays are not serious about withdrawing from this highly controversial form of fossil fuel extraction.

Fracking is a technique for exploiting oil and gas reserves that are too tightly trapped in rocks for conventional drilling techniques to extract. It involves breaking up the deposits where oil or gas are trapped by injecting a mixture of water, sand and chemicals, under high pressure. Several countries, including Scotland and Wales, have banned fracking due to the dangers it poses to the environment, health and its contribution to climate change.

We dressed up as ‘Anti-fracking elves’, telling Christmas shoppers and Barclays customers that ‘Fracking is bad for your ‘elf’, telling Barclays that 'All we want for Christmas is for Barclays to keep its promises' and offering alternative versions of Christmas classics including ‘Jingle Bells’, ‘Oh Christmas Tree’ and ‘The twelve days of Christmas’.

Shoppers who enjoyed the entertainment donated money to the Yorkshire anti-fracking nannas campaign group and to Hurricane Relief in recognition of the role that continued fossil fuel extraction and burning has in the worsening impacts of hurricanes.

Barclays need to put their money where their mouth is and act on their promised dis-investment from Third Energy. If they think that campaigners will give up they are wrong. We will keep campaigning until they turn their words into action.

Jan Wild-Grant, a member of Red Leicester choir said ‘It’s great to use the power and beauty of song to work for positive change in the world. That’s what our choir is all about so we jumped at the chance to help campaigners to push for an end to Barclays’ Dirty Energy investment and to raise money for two good causes at the same time.’

Rolling Resistance in Lancashire

Report by Sara Thornton, Leicester Friends of the Earth member.

From the 19th to the 25th of July, I stayed at the Maple Farm camp by Preston New Road (PNR) to take part in the peaceful protests against Cuadrilla and their efforts of fracking in Lancashire. This week was part of Reclaim the Power’s month of ‘Rolling Resistance’ at PNR. It was a week of spending almost 12 hours a day out on the road in the sun and rain, taking part in sit-ins, singing songs, sharing food, documenting the events of the week and supporting those that had decided to lock themselves into arm tubes in their efforts to stop Cuadrilla’s work for the day. There was regular violence from both Cuadrilla’s security guards and police officers, but the spirit of those protesting endured in their conviction of protecting the environment their children and grandchildren would grow up in, protecting the health of the local communities as well as our global climate.

The food we shared was absolutely delicious (vegetarian and vegan) and cooked by volunteers. I also helped in the kitchen, cleaning the dishes after meals, and for those who do not want to be on the front lines of PNR by Cuadrilla’s gates, there is plenty of support work to be done back at camp. The weekend was spent with different workshops including workshops on Direct Action, Activist Meditation and organic farming. We listened to live music, and regained energy for the following week.

Until the day comes when Cuadrilla halts its work on Preston New Road, peaceful and determined resistance will surely continue. I would recommend anyone who has the chance to take a trip up to Blackpool and meet this inspiring group of local community members and activists. Sincere thanks go to all those who are at PNR, keep up the amazing work and keep the love in your hearts! You are an inspiration to us all and I hope I can join you again soon.

Springtime Frack Free Festival

Barclay's are still funding fracking and we are still not happy about it. We held another festival outside Barclay's Bank on Humberstone Gate to protest against fracking in Yorkshire and stand in solidarity with the people of Ryedale. We collected signatures on a petition for a moratorium on fracking, we gave out lots of information, we sang, we made a collage of flowers to give to Kirby Misperton Protection Camp to stand in solidarity with them.  We also ate lots of cake and cookies. It was a good afternoon, very productive – raising awareness of what the fracking industry are trying to do around the country.

Preston New Road Protest

A group of LAOD supporters arrived in Leicester at 8.00am to get on the coach to Lancashire on a cold February morning.  We travelled to Preston New Road to march peacefully in solidarity with the people of Lancashire as a sign of support to them and a way of showing Cuadrilla our opposition to fracking in Lancashire.  It was a lovely supportive group and we had a very proactive/productive day.

The people from Preston were very welcoming with tea and cake. There were fantastic speeches and a long walk down Preston New Road to the fracking site accompanied by masses of police. We threw red roses over the fence onto the working site in memory of the beautiful field it once was, with cows grazing peacefully in it. 

A big highlight was the singing – we sang all the way down PNR to the site and standing in front of a line of police and security guards sang songs of peace – ‘We are a gentle, angry people and we are singing, singing for our lives. We are an anti-fracking people and we are singing, singing for our lives…’  We were very lucky to have members of Red Leicester Choir with us – it was beautiful and brought tears to my eyes and to a few other people's as well. The songs are still reverberating in my head.  An amazing day!  Highlights of my day were the number of people driving past honking their horns as a sign of support to the rally - it was constant all day - even after people had been in long queues of traffic, they honked down the entire road and waved and shouted out of windows.  

Report by Melanie Wakley, Leicester Friends of the Earth anti-fracking co-ordinator

Don't frack Robin Hood

A group of anti-fracking supporters from Leicester drove to Sherwood Forest in Nottingham on Saturday 7th January 2017, to join a public gathering in the forest.  Frack Free Notts and Friends of the Earth had been shocked out of their Christmas lunches, to learn from their latest investigation into fracking that chemicals giant INEOS wants to carry out seismic surveys in Sherwood Forest - the first step towards fracking in an ancient woodland.  Hundreds of people arrived in the forest at very short notice (including us) to show solidarity with Nottinghamshire. The people walked from the visitor centre to the Major Oak tree then listened to speeches and sang songs of support – showing in no uncertain terms that we would all stand together to stop such an atrocity!  The people said NO!!