Government 'delayed fracking report' until after vote, Greenpeace claims Published duration 25 November 2016

image copyright Getty Images image caption The unredacted report was released two days after Lancashire County Council's vote

The government deliberately delayed a report which was critical of fracking until after a council's vote on whether to allow it, Greenpeace has claimed.

Lancashire County Council (LCC) refused permission to extract shale gas at two sites in June 2015, a decision which was overturned on appeal in October

Greenpeace said emails from the time showed ministers delayed a report before the council voted.

The government said the report was not "robust" enough to influence policy.

Greenpeace claim the documents - including some from then Minister of State at the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) Andrea Leadsom - show ministers "worked together to limit damage to the fracking industry" from a previously censored report.

The Shale Gas Rural Economy Impacts report , which suggested negative impacts on tourism, congestion, housing and noise, was published in a heavily redacted form in 2014.

'Dirty tricks'

The environmental organisation appealed to the information commissioner, who ordered the release of the study in an unedited version.

It was eventually put out on 1 July 2015, two days after Lancashire councillors voted to refuse energy company Cuadrilla's application to frack at Little Plumpton and Roseacre Wood.

Greenpeace claims ministers were aware the commissioner ruled it should be released unredacted, but "chose to delay until as late as possible in the 35-day window they were given".

image copyright AP image caption Andrea Leadsom was Minister of State at the Department of Energy and Climate Change at the time

One email, sent on 15 June 2015 by Mrs Leadsom's private secretary and which copied in the then DECC Secretary of State Amber Rudd, said the minister "suggests we do nothing before Cuafrilla's [sic] planning decision if we have time".

Greenpeace received the emails following a Freedom of Information "battle" with the DECC, which it said had taken "over a year".

Emma Gibson from Greenpeace said the correspondence showed "they waited until the last possible moment to release this report, just before they were about to be in contempt of court for not releasing it".

"They did that deliberately so that [Lancashire] councillors would not have access to information that was critical about the fracking industry."

Marcus Johnstone, Labour councillor for Padiham and Burnley West, took part in the LCC vote and said he was "shocked and horrified at the lengths to which Whitehall went to delay publishing this report".

A spokesman for the new Business and Energy Department said all offices had "complied fully with the information commissioner's ruling".