After Ineos chief executive Jim Ratcliffe stated last week that the SNP Government were not opposed to fracking, Ms Hilton issued a call for local people to be able to have a voice on the subject.

“The SNP Government in Edinburgh is trying to face both ways on fracking, they have to come clean and be honest with people in Dunfermline and across Scotland,” she said. “Scottish Labour supports giving local communities the final say over fracking, with a local referendum that would give a veto to the people affected by fracking. The SNP Government have consistently failed to support this, and their plans for a consultation on fracking have been kicked into the long grass.” Ms Hilton campaigned for the moratorium to include underground coal gasification, a project which could soon be under way in Kincardine (see story top left), and poses “a real danger” to West Fife communities.

A Scottish Government spokesman said, “No fracking can or will take place in Scotland while the moratorium we have announced remains in place, a policy that has received wide support from both environmental groups and industry. We are taking a careful, considered and evidence-based approach to unconventional oil and gas, and the moratorium and the planned public consultation will allow all stakeholders and local communities to have their say.”