1 month ago
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On the eve of the anniversary of the first British atomic bomb test, conducted on 3 October 1952, Manchester City Council unanimously passed a motion calling for justice and compensation for the UK’s nuclear test veterans’ community.
The motion was proposed by Councillor Tommy Judge. Cllr Judge serves as Manchester’s representative to the Nuclear Free Local Authorities Steering Committee and as the NFLA’s Spokesperson on Nuclear Test Veterans issues. As a former army veteran, he is also the Council’s Lead Member for the Armed Forces and as Permanent Representative to Mayors for Peace.
With experience of active service, Cllr Judge spoke of the “shameful” injustice still shown to the nuclear test veterans community, with the vast majority of those involved in the test being “conscripted young men put in danger who are still struggling to get compensation for that danger”. In opposition, Sir Keir Starmer pledged to take action within twelve months of taking office and Cllr Judge added that “now is the time to do just that.”
Seconding the motion, Councillor Richard Fletcher spoke of the “trauma of not knowing”, with veterans and family members still denied access to blood tests and medical records and uncertain whether any of their illnesses can be attributed to participation in the tests.
The Opposition Group Leader Councillor John Leech also indicated his support for the motion and praised Cllr Judge as a “strong advocate for justice for these veterans” as this is an “issue close to his heart”.
The motion was carried unanimously.
In the few days that followed, Councillor Judge received a delayed reply to his letter to the new Veterans’ Minister Colonel Al Carns MC. Unfortunately this had been intercepted by the faceless bureaucrats of the Defence People Secretariat at the Ministry of Defence, and the response contained the usual litany of platitudes and excuses for the failure of the department to take any imaginative action to right the injustice; even Ministry officials conceded it would be a ‘disappointing reply’.
The fight goes on.
Ends://For more information, contact NFLA Secretary Richard Outram by email to richard.outram@manchester.gov.uk
The motion passed by Manchester City Council on 2 Oct 2024:
Notice of Motion – Justice long-overdue: Time to recompense and recognise British Nuclear Test Veterans
Council notes that:
- From 3 October 1952 until 26 November 1991, the United Kingdom conducted 45 atomic and nuclear weapons tests in Australia, in the Pacific and in the United States.
- Approximately 22,000 British military personnel participated in these tests.
- Some of these participants were from the city of Manchester.
- Many of these veterans subsequently suffered (and continue to suffer) repeated periods of severe ill-health, including multiple cancers, or had premature deaths, or became fathers to children with life-changing health conditions or disabilities.
- There are now less than 2,000 surviving nuclear test veterans.
- British veterans attribute their ill-fortune to exposure to the radiation resulting from such testing.
- The Australian McClellan Commission in 1984 described the British Government as displaying an attitude of ‘ignorance, incompetence and cynicism’ towards the safety of military personnel in the tests conducted in South Australia.
Council commends:
- The British Nuclear Test Veterans Association and Labrats International for the emotional and practical support that they provide to nuclear test veterans, family members, and descendants and for their sterling campaigning work which led finally to the issue of a Nuclear Test Medal.
- The Mirror journalist Susie Boniface for steadfastly highlighting the injustice suffered by the nuclear test
veterans’ community and for consistently championing their cause. - The Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer for meeting, as Leader of the Opposition and of the Labour Party, with nuclear test veterans and family members and for making a pledge ‘to do all we can” to win recognition for Britain’s Cold War heroes within a year.’
- The Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham for calling for a public inquiry into the injustice meted out to the British nuclear test veteran community.
Council further notes that:
- The claim by the nuclear test veterans’ community and family members for financial compensation for their suffering, access to medical records and tests, access to specialist medical care, and a real recognition by government of their suffering remains outstanding.
- Whilst other countries which engaged in atmospheric nuclear testing (China, France, Russia and the United States) have made financial provision for veterans and their families, the UK has not.
Council believes that with the election of a new Labour Government, with at its head a Prime Minister who has pledged to ‘do all we can’ to win recognition for Britain’s Cold War heroes within a year’, that now is the time to do just that.
Council therefore resolves to:
(1) Ask the Chief Executive to write to the Prime Minister and the Minister for Veterans Affairs asking them to provide for a scheme of financial compensation, access to medical records and test results, and access to specialist medical care for Britain’s nuclear test veterans, their family members and descendants.
(2) Ask the Labour Government to convene a public inquiry into the injustice meted out to the British nuclear test veteran community.
Proposed by Councillor Judge, seconded by Councillor Fletcher and supported by Councillors Appleby, Hughes, Karney, T Robinson and Taylor
The letter sent to the Veterans Minister on 29 August:
Colonel Alastair ‘Al’ Carns OBE MC MP,
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State
(Minister for Veterans and People),
C/o Office for Veterans Affairs at
The Cabinet Office
Dear Minister,
Congratulations on your appointment in a new Labour Government.
Today is the UN Day against Nuclear Testing (29 August).
A fitting day to write to you on behalf of the UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities as Spokesperson on Nuclear Test Veterans Affairs to ask the new Government to finally end the injustice meted out to Britain’s community of nuclear test veterans, their family members, and descendants which has lasted over more than seven decades and to finally offer proper recognition and recompense for their appalling loss and ongoing suffering.
Like you, I am a former military veteran. As a soldier, I was proud to serve my country in our nation’s armed forces including in Northern Ireland during ‘the Troubles’. So, in February 2022, as then Lord Mayor of Manchester, I was honoured to be invited to open a conference in our city organised by the nuclear test veterans’ campaign group LABRATS held to renew their fight for justice in advance of the 70th anniversary of the first UK atomic bomb test in October of that year.
In attendance were veterans, wives, and family members whose lives were forever shattered by their experience of participating, directly or indirectly, in Britain’s atomic and nuclear weapons tests.
One after another the veterans on the stage spoke of their experience of participating in these tests without possessing the full knowledge of the likely impact upon their health and without being provided with any protective clothing, they talked of their service mates who had died young and in agonising pain, and they told of their own prolonged and repeated ill-health, with all having suffered multiple cancers; wives told of their sleepless nights with husbands faced with recurring nightmares and their own personal anguish over whether to bear children not knowing if they would be born disabled or with life-changing illnesses; and the children present, now grown up, told of their grief at the early loss of their own fathers and the disabilities and illnesses that they were born with and now live with, one even reported that she had just received a terminal diagnosis.
These testimonies were harrowing. There was not a dry eye at the conference.
And all of those who gave testament had, and have, no doubt that their misfortune was all attributable to the exposure of these veterans to radiation at these tests and in the clean-up operations that followed them.
Around 40,000 British military personnel participated in the testing of atomic and hydrogen bombs in Australia and in the Pacific, and some were also present during a further phase of testing in Nevada. Less than 2,000 remain alive.
Although, after prolonged lobbying by veterans, the outgoing Conservative government finally awarded a Nuclear Test Medal to veterans and their descendants, this was not offered pro-actively, with eligible recipients having to apply, and conditionally with the veterans’ request that Our Sovereign, His Majesty King Charles II make at least some of the presentations having been shamefully and irrationally denied, as seemingly His Majesty was willing to do so.
But frankly, Minister, the award of a medal is not enough.
In the United States, The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) was passed in October 1990. It provides a one-off, no-questions-asked payment of $75,000 to any veteran who has participated in a nuclear test who has subsequently developed one of the cancers specified in the legislation, without any requirement being placed on that veteran to prove that his/her medical condition is the result of participating in the test. President Biden extended the deadline to make a claim by two years until June 2024. It has paid out over $2.3 billion in benefits to over 36,000 claimants.
Contrast this to the UK where relatively few nuclear veterans have been able to secure a service pension because of the requirement to prove absolutely that there is a causal link between their ill-health and exposure to radiation.
Ironically UK servicemen who participated in Operation Dominic with US Forces are eligible for a payment from the American Government if they developed one of the established conditions, but from the UK Government they automatically receive nothing. Instead, they must go through a long- and uncertain process, and many hoops, to seek a medical pension.
Even the Isle of Man and Fiji have taken this ‘bull by the horns’ and made a payment to veterans who participated in British atomic and nuclear weapons tests who are resident in their respective islands.
This disparity in treatment seems manifestly unfair, for surely if Ministers in the Isle of Man and Fiji can do it then so too can Ministers of the Crown?
In June 2021, Mirror journalist Susie Boniface, who has for years courageously championed the cause of the test veterans’ community, wrote an article reporting on a historic meeting between then-Leader of the Opposition Sir Keir Starmer MP and test veterans in which he is reported to have pledged to:
‘“do all we can” to win recognition for Britain’s Cold War heroes within a year.’
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/keir-starmer-vows-help-nuke-24425237
Yet disappointingly, the 2024 Labour Party Manifesto ‘Change’ fails to make any pledges of restitution to veterans (a roll back from 2019 where Labour promised a £50,000 payment to all), though in a further article in June 2024 by Ms Boniface a unnamed party spokesperson is quoted as saying:
“Britain’s nuclear test veterans are national heroes and it’s appalling the way they have been treated.
“Keir Starmer was the first party leader ever to meet NTVs and Labour is fully behind their campaign for recognition, that’s why we wholeheartedly supported their campaign to receive the long overdue recognition and medals they deserve. If elected, we will continue to listen and work with them to deal with their concerns.”
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/labour-pledge-nuclear-test-veterans-33049063
‘Their concerns’ include the nuclear test veteran community being rightly aggrieved about the continued denial of access to medical records, urine and blood samples, the dismissal by certain elements of the medical community of any notion that conditions can be attributed to exposure to radiation in these tests accompanied by an inability to access specialist treatment, and by the denial of compensation to veterans and their family members.
We support the call of the test veteran community for a special tribunal to be established to adjudicate on these matters and we also support the call made recently by Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham for a public inquiry into this scandal.
Minister, if this government’s ‘commitment to the UK’s nuclear deterrent is absolute’, as Labour’s Change Manifesto states, then that commitment should be accompanied by an ‘absolute commitment’ to the men who made the development and deployment of Britain’s nuclear arsenal possible, and by natural justice to their dependants.
These veterans are getting old. They cannot wait any longer for access to medical records, specialist medical treatment, and recompense. The NFLAs believe that Labour Ministers now need to honour the pledge made by Sir Keir Starmer to “do all we can” for veterans within a year – for this is an injustice that has gone on for far too long and at too great a cost.
Thank you for taking time to read this letter. I would welcome your early response. Please reply by email to NFLA Secretary richard.outram@manchester.gov.uk
Thank you. Yours sincerely,
Councillor Tommy Judge,
Spokesperson, Nuclear Test Veterans Affairs,
For the UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities
The reply received from the Ministry of Defence on 7 October 2024:
