The Telegraph: New UK energy minister faces fracking battle

Matt Hancock's first major task on stepping into Michael Fallon’s shoes at the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc) will be to persuade world-scale oil and gas companies to bid in the biggest auction yet to develop shale resources.

However, the horse racing enthusiast faces a tough challenge convincing a sceptical industry to bet on fracking in Britain.

The Conservative MP for West Suffolk , who joins the department with no direct energy experience, will have a steep learning curve getting to grips with Fallon’s old upstream oil and gas beat. He takes up the role ahead of what is arguably the most important licencing round for new fossil fuel development in the UK since the Government first opened up the North Sea in the 1970s.
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