Fife MSP calls for full fracking ban

After making a submission, she said: “The current moratorium is only a short term pause and it leaves the door open for fracking in the future.

Yet evidence points to the fact that fracking can have a negative impact on our environment.”

Scottish Labour colleague, Claudia Beamish MSP, is planning to bring forward a member’s bill to ban fracking in Scotland after the Scottish Government failed to commit to doing so.

Currently the Government has only introduced a moratorium, leading to fears that fracking could still play a part of a future government’s energy plans.

Ms Baker added: “This bill is about the air we breathe, that water we drink and the communities we live in.

“It will change the law to ban fracking in Scotland, just as we promised in our election manifesto.

A moratorium exists on the practice in Scotland currently but that leves the fdor open Scotland and Fife has submitted a response to an open consultation on plans to ban fracking in Scotland.”

Last year a motion was passed in the Scottish Parliament calling for such a ban after Labour MSPs voted it through, whilst the Scottish Government abstained.

The call follows Ms Baker’s successful campaign to have underground coal gasification (UCG) banned in Fife and across Scotland.

The Scottish Labour MSP first raised her concerns over the potential for Underground Coal Gasification in Fife in 2013, and has been repeatedly campaigning on the issue since.