Date set for Whitehaven coal mine legal challenge

A computer-generated image of what the coal mine would look like. Credit: West Cumbria Mining.

A date has been set to hear two legal challenges to the government's decision to approve a new coal mine in Whitehaven.

Challenges by campaign groups Friends of the Earth and South Lakes Action on Climate Change will be heard on 24-26 October at the High Court in London.

The campaigners say the government failed to take into account the impact of the mine on the climate.

The High Court initially refused to hear a legal challenge against the decision to allow coking coal, used in steelmaking, to be extracted from under the sea near Whitehaven.

Cumbria County Council approved the mine three times before deciding to reconsider the proposal in February 2021.

A month later UK government Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick decided to 'call in' the mine, saying it raises "issues of more than local importance".

The mine was approved by Communities Secretary Michael Gove in December.

West Cumbria Mining say the mine will create five hundred jobs.

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