asked the Minister for Energy if in view of the publication of the findings on the accident at Windscale he will now protest to the British authorities about the breach of Government rules in that plant.
Written Answers. - Accident at Windscale.
354.
I met with Mr. Patrick Jenkin, M.P., UK Secretary of State for the Environment, in London on Friday last, 17 February, to express the Irish Government's concern about the discharges of radioactive effluent from the Windscale Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing Plant at Sellafield, Cumbria, into the Irish Sea and also about the question of dumping of low-level radioactive waste into the North Atlantic Ocean.
At the meeting, I raised the question of the operations at the Sellafield plant which led to the accidental discharges of radioactive effluent to the Irish Sea in November of last year. Mr. Jenkin said that in order to prevent any repetition of such an accident, both his Department and the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate had informed British Nuclear Fuels Limited of the further measures they required the company to take. Some of these measures have already been taken, such as the engineering changes, governing the discharges of liquid to the sea, to prevent a reoccurance of this accident. Other measures are in hand. I am informed that the quantities discharged did not exceed authorised levels but the question of possible breaches of other licensing conditions are being examined by the UK Authorities.