Blood money: The duty of care to veterans of UK nuclear weapons tests

Abstract

Fifty years after the first UK nuclear weapon test at Monte Bello off the north‐west coast of Australia in October 1952, this article documents the deliberate and repeated decisions not to provide adequate radiation protection to most of the 40,000 men who participated in the British programme in the 1950s in Australia and Christmas Island, precisely to avoid future liability claims. The evidence lies in the minutes and memoranda of the scientists, doctors and military leaders overseeing these tests. Archival material in the United Kingdom Public Records Office and the National Archives of Australia is, according to senior barristers, sufficient to sustain an allegation of negligence, even by the standards of 50 years ago, against the government of the day and an allegation of cover‐up by the current government, faced with potentially huge compensation bills and pension pay‐outs for long‐term radiation injury to former servicemen. Recent governments have tried to reassure the veterans with epidemiological studies, which are almost inevitably inconclusive. However, pilot studies have now begun on radiobiological tests that may be able to determine whether a particular individual was irradiated significantly 40 or 50 years ago and whether he has subsequently suffered cancers or other ill health because of this radiation burden. The first results from these studies should be available around the time of the fiftieth anniversary of the first UK test.

Key Words:

• Australia
• Fall‐out
• Nuclear weapons tests
• Radiation exposures
• United Kingdom