POLICE have moved a number of protestors who were sat at the entrance to the Kirby Misperton fracking site.

Officers attended earlier this afternoon to request that the protestors move as they were blocking vehicle access to the site.

Several refused and were lifted out of the way.

Police said in a statement: "Several protestors were moved away from the front of the site. There were no arrests.

"We will continue to take a ‘neighbourhood policing’ approach to any protest activity. That means we will engage with people, and explain what is acceptable in terms of safety and reasonableness, as we did this afternoon.

"We know that there are very different views about hydraulic fracturing, but as the local police, our responsibility is to carry out our duties impartially as a police service.

"This means we have a duty to make sure that people who want to assemble and protest do so safely, balancing this against a duty to ensure that businesses can go about their lawful commercial activity."

The presence of protestors at the site itself came following an announcement by the county council that all planning conditions have now been discharged.

Around 30 people joined together at the gates to the site where the fracking is due to start in the coming weeks.

Ian Conlan from Malton, who took part in the action said: "We have tried every other method of objecting to Third Energy’s plans to frack at Kirby Misperton and the will of local people who object to fracking taking place in Ryedale has been ignored, so we have no alternative left now but to protest in this way.

“We will continue to oppose Third Energy in a peaceful manner and urge others to join us."

Suzanne Rayment, who lives in the village of Kirby Misperton, added: "Everyone has a choice. You either decide to stand up against what is going to bring about the devastation of the countryside or you sit back and watch."

Protestors from the protection camp say they sat "quietly and calmly" across the gates once again this morning, when two maintenance vehicles arrived carrying Sodium Hydrochloride, until they were moved by North Yorkshire Police officers.

Another vehicle arrived an hour later, the protectors said, but they let it pass once they establised it was bringing people from the Environment Agency, there to carry out environmental monitoring.

Protection camp resident Michelle Easton said: "As far as we’re concerned all the work happening behind the gate will lead to fracking, even routine maintenance. While we feel the monitoring of the site is woefully inadequate, we don’t want to add to its ineffectiveness."

A North Yorkshire Police spokesman confirmed they had been at the site at around 10.15am, and had moved people away from the front of the site. They confirmed that no arrests had been made.

Campaigners have already announced they will hold a candlelit vigil outside the entrance to the KM8 fracking site, just outside Kirby Misperton village at 8pm this evening (September 13).