BOTH sides of the council chamber erupted in applause after a Conservative member led calls for her own party’s Government to reconsider how fracking decisions are made.

At a meeting on Thursday, members of Cheshire West and Chester Council unanimously agreed that the council should have its say in a Government consultation on whether or not planning decisions for fracking are determined by local planning authorities.

Members supported a motion put forward by Cllr Jill Houlbrook, Conservative, and seconded by Cllr Matt Bryan, Labour, which said that CWAC is ‘committed to the principles of localism’ and called for fracking applications to be determined by councils.

Cllr Houlbrook said: “Members, the motion before you this evening is about our communities, and our communities are the reason we are all sitting in this chamber.

“This evening is one of those occasions where it is necessary for us to stand together, and to send a message to our Government – to the Government for which I voted.

“That message must be loud and clear – that we expect, we demand, that planning decisions should be local decisions.

“This means all planning decisions, and that Government should not pick and choose which planning decisions should be local and which are taken out of the hands of our communities.

“This motion needs no debate, it simply needs the support of everyone here this evening. It needs to be listened to by Parliament – and implemented by Parliament as well.”

The Government is currently consulting on proposals it drew up in May to redefine fracking as permitted development – the same rights homeowners can use to build extensions without planning permission up to a certain size.

At the same time, the Government has also proposed that large scale gas production sites could be considered as Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects – meaning they would be exempt from the planning process.

Praising the cooperation of all CWAC members, Cllr Bryan added: “You can just feel the unity and positivity oozing out of this chamber. I think it’s a real step forward that we can work together.”

CWAC’s consultation response will also be shared with Cheshire MPs and relevant Government ministers.