It is a pleasure to speak in this Backbench Business Committee debate with you in the Chair, Mr Bone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) on securing the debate and on the way in which she opened it. I have a potential site for fracking for shale gas at Barton Moss in my constituency, and I want to talk about constituency concerns, as the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Eric Ollerenshaw) has just done. My constituents have a number of concerns, and they are building by the week and month. I want to talk about those concerns over the potential impact of fracking for shale gas on their quality of life, because that is the key issue for me.
First, even the suggestion of fracking for shale gas moving into the area is bringing house prices down. I had a quick look before I came to the debate, and found various articles talking about a house price downturn of up to 30% in various parts of Manchester and the north-west. When major projects such as large rail schemes are introduced into an area, they bring house prices down. Such a loss would mean a cost running into millions of pounds for all the local people affected by a house price downturn.