ACTIVISTS occupied the entrance to a South Downs National Park Authority building in West Sussex yesterday.

The Greenpeace Not for Shale protest in Midhurst comes weeks before the authority considers a planning application for shale exploration inside South Downs National Park.

Simon Clydesdale, Greenpeace UK energy campaigner, said: “We need to fight back against companies and authorities who are trying to quite literally undermine the property and rights of people across the South Downs and Sussex, putting both the local environment and the climate at risk, without asking permission.”

Recent Greenpeace polling shows that two thirds of people surveyed in Sussex are against fracking.

Over 14,500 South Downs residents have signed a Greenpeace petition calling on David Cameron to stop his fracking plans.

Greenpeace are urging anyone with information on fracking in Sussex to email fracker tracker.uk@greenpeace.org.

Mr Clydesdale said: “This is against the interests of Sussex and against the stated purpose of the South Downs National Park.

“You’re the game-keeper here, it’s not your job to help the poachers.”