Tina Louise Rothery, part of a protest group known as the Nanas, staged a three-week occupation of a field near Blackpool

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

An anti-fracking campaigner has been spared jail after she refused to pay more than £55,000 of legal fees to the oil and gas firm Cuadrilla.



Tina Louise Rothery, 54, had been ordered to pay £55,342 of fees to the British company and a group of landowners, or face a 14-day prison sentence, after she sought to stop an injunction that would prevent protesters from gathering on a stretch of land being considered for shale gas exploration.

Representing herself in court, Rothery had failed to submit a defence against the injunction, brought by Cuadrilla, before a deadline and was subsequently ordered to pay the firm’s legal costs.

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Paul Ridge, a partner at the law firm Bindmans, who provided legal advice to Rothery, said she was being bullied by the fracking firm, and many professional lawyers would have struggled with the complexities of such a legal process.

“She is effectively being bullied by a multinational, [which is acting] against one individual who had the courage to stand up and say: ‘I’m standing here for everybody,’” he said, adding: “They have instructed expensive city solicitors to gun her down.”

Appearing at Blackpool district registry in June, Rothery refused on principle to provide evidence of her financial means in order to avoid paying the fees and was held in contempt of court.

Appearing at Preston combined court on Friday, she provided evidence that she could not pay the fees and the contempt charge was dropped.

In August 2014 a group calling themselves the Nanas, of which Rothery was a member, staged a three-week anti-fracking occupation of a field near Blackpool that was being considered for shale gas exploration.

Cuadrilla, which had rented the field from a farmer, argued that the occupation caused disruption and distress to the farmer’s family and his business, and applied for an injunction to prevent further protests in the area.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Tina Louise Rothery – the Green party candidate – with Tory candidate George Osborne and Labour candidate David Pinto-Duschinsky in a hustings for the Tatton constituency at the 2015 general election. Photograph: Christopher Thomond for the Guardian

The company was granted the injunction to prevent activists from entering land throughout the Fylde peninsula in Lancashire in October 2014, and part of its legal costs were awarded against Rothery as the only named defendant in the case.

A spokesperson for Cuadrilla said on Friday: “Having previously been found in contempt of court, Ms Rothery has today attended court and complied with the court’s order to provide information as to her financial means, thus purging her contempt. A barrister attended court on behalf of the judgment creditors (Cuadrilla and the landowners) as the court required him to do so.

“The outstanding costs were awarded against Ms Rothery in October 2014 for wasting court time by failing to submit a defence after asking for a time extension in order to do so, the debt will remain unpaid and we will not pursue costs whilst she clearly has no assets to make any payment.

“The position will be kept under review and revisited should Ms Rothery’s financial circumstances change.”

More than 150 supporters marched with Rothery to the Preston court, where she faced a 90-minute hearing in closed chambers. Her supporters waited outside the building for the case to finish, with placards and drums at the ready.

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Emerging victorious, Rothery sprayed the crowd with champagne and told onlookers: “The judge has discharged the order against me. I am no longer being pursued. If my circumstances change in the future then that may change. I am not going to jail.”

She added: “Cuadrilla offloaded to the media all week that it was nothing to do with them. The judge made it very clear Cuadrilla had brought us into the courtroom.”

Rothery, who stood against George Osborne for the Green party in Tatton during the general election, has attracted a number of high-profile supporters, including the fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and the actor Emma Thompson.

After the verdict, the Green party gave Rothery lifetime membership “in recognition of her bravery”. Jonathan Bartley, co-leader of the Greens, said: “Today marks a great victory for everyone who believes in the right to peaceful protest and the fight against climate change.

“It would have been utterly unjust to jail Tina Rothery, who has shown exceptional courage protecting her community from the threat of fracking. It is an honour to give Tina lifetime Green party membership in recognition of her bravery in the fight to protect our planet.”