Public question to the Executive Meeting of Worthing Borough Council, 23 March 2004

Background

James Appleton, Assistant Director, Planning Services and Haydn Smith, Assistant Director, Health and Housing, wrote a report on TETRA for debate by the Executive of Worthing Borough Council on 22 March 2004. The paper presents the Home Office stance, pretty much verbatim, and ‘Views of Opponents of TETRA’ in somewhat briefer form. It has a section on planning requirements and the difficulties the guidelines present to Councils. The conclusion is that ‘there is considerable public anxiety about mobile phone masts and in particular Tetra technology’ and seems to be generally content with the government’s line on safety levels. Much wringing of hands and murmurs of helplessness: ‘the Council’s hands are tied with regard to taking action to counter the real, or perceived, health aspects of Tetra technology.’

Are you serious? You can’t do anything about something harmful to health? You can stop a potentially dangerous child’s toy at Christmas! What a sad indictment on attitudes to actual public health.

The paper ends with two recommendations:

1. that, the Home Office be urged to carry out its further research into the possible adverse health effects associated with Tetra technology as quickly as possible to help allay public concern and anxiety and,
2. Members endorse the request for Ofcom to carry out an audit of the telecommunications equipment installed at Worthing Football Club.

We are past having our fears allayed. We are geting ill already. This is the request sent to each member of the Council Executive.

Date: 18 March 2004 Subject: Urgent question for the Executive Meeting 23 March 2004 Members of Worthing Borough Council Executive On March 22 your Executive meeting has, I believe as item 4 on its agenda, the matter of TETRA masts. I have read the report by James Appleton and Haydn Smith, and the two recommendations in its conclusion. As both a member of the 'Worthing says no to TETRA' group committee, and as in individual citizen of Worthing in your care as elected Council, I wish to put a question on this matter to the Executive for consideration during its debate. Being unfamiliar with the way these meetings are held, I should like to put this question to you in public and on record, and shall be present with that intention. Should that mechanism not be open to me, I do wish that you should receive our request in any case. I address your recommendations: Recommendation (i): comment The Home Office has dictated the format of research into TETRA so far, and none of the research relates to identifying the causes of manifestations of ill health in the vicinity of TETRA masts. Recommendation (ii): comment Any audit of the Woodside Road site by Ofcom will reveal nothing of the extent of these manifestations around this particular site. Whilst it may be reassuring to receive confirmation that the cumulative output of the mobile phones masts in that location falls within the ICNIRP guidelines, this is not a primary concern of the residents and in any case does not relate in any way to the non-thermal effects of such radiation. Specifically, it has nothing to do with concerns over the pulsed component of this radiation, which has been independently measured on 5 March 2004 at Woodside Road. Question to the Executive of Worthing Borough Council, March 22, 2004 In the light of these inadequacies, would the Executive be prepared to add a third recommendation to its report? We, the residents of Worthing do not want our "concern and anxiety allayed". We want to know why we have been extensively experiencing unusual health disorders (similar to many other places in the UK where TETRA has been introduced) since, and only since, the TETRA mast was switched on. We also need to know how many other people have experienced similar unusual disorders within a given radius of the mast, where they, and their GPs, are unaware of the TETRA issue. Recommendation (proposed) that an independent epidemiological survey be urgently carried out by the relevant local authorities with a duty to public health, to determine the extent and likely source of symptoms of ill health coincident with the location and time of activation of the Woodside Road mast. yours sincerely Andy Davidson

back
 

top of page