Following announcements Drax earned over one billion pounds in 2024, activists have staged a protest calling for no more public money to burning trees for electricity.

Drax Group, owner of eponymous wood burning Drax Power Station, has made record profits in the same month the government granted them two billion in bill payer subsidies. Activists from Axe Drax and Extinction Rebellion held a burning banner that read “Our Money, Our Future” outside the power station, highlighting their anger at Labour giving any more money to Drax.

Rosie, from Axe Drax said:

“It is perverse hypocrisy that the same private company can have billions in subsidies from our bills pledged in the same month they announce over a billion in earnings, all while our genuine public services continue to crumble. We should not be lining the pockets for Drax’s shareholders while seeing cruel cuts to winter fuel payment and disability benefits.”

Helen Hart from Extinction Rebellion Leeds said:

“Burning trees in power stations for six more years is not a climate solution. It’s a climate crime that’s taking a torch to our future. If that wasn’t bad enough, this madness is being underwritten by billions of pounds that is being added to our energy bills, which is ending up in the pockets of mega-rich shareholders when it is badly needed to fix our broken public services.

“Time and again we are seeing this government failing to stand up to powerful interests and do the right thing. That’s why we need a citizens’ assembly that is independent and made up of a cross-section of ordinary people.”

Find out more here - axedrax.uk