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WITHDRAWAL OF MILLOM TOWN COUNCIL FROM SOUTH COPELAND GDF COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIP

In their minutes of November 2024 MTC said they had withdrawn from the South Copeland GDF Community Partnership and stated:

“MTC has a responsibility to over 7300 residents in Millom & Haverigg to ensure that they are kept informed on the progress of the project and are educated to the potential risks and economic benefits that hosting a GDF could bring to the town. However Public engagement in Millom & Haverigg is currently non existent.”  

QUESTION ASKED AT MTC COUNCIL MEETING JANUARY 29^TH 2025

On the basis of this I attended their next meeting which was not until January 2025, I reminded the councillors of an excellent forum held in September 2023 organised by the South Copeland GDF Community Partnership which identified potential positives and negatives of the GDF being sited here.  I handed out copies of the potential negative effects identified by many local participants at the event.  

I told the Council we had been promised an Impacts Report that would respond to the concerns.  This has never happened. In fact, residents have heard nothing about the potential negative effects from NWS nor Millom Town Council – EVER!

I noted, Councillor Faulkner stated in their November minutes:  

“MTC has a responsibility to over 7300 residents in Millom & Haverigg to ensure that they are kept informed on the progress of the project and are educated to the potential risks [I will just repeat that, educated to the potential risks] and economic benefits that hosting a GDF could bring to the town.  ….”

I then posed the following question:  

How can MTC ensure the potential risks – as identified by the public in September 2023 – will be addressed?”  

The response was not to answer my question but to blame the Community Partnership for the lack of progress.  During the brief discussion which followed, I responded to one of the questions from a councillor about Nuclear Waste Services, saying that you cannot trust what they say, that they tell lies.  The councillor asked me for an example.  I could not reply (as there are too many).  Instead, I sent the following email, dated 30^th January 2025 and asked the clerk to distribute it to each councillor.   

FIRST EMAIL 30^TH JANUARY TO MTC  

At the last meeting of MTC I asked the Council how they would get NWS to respond to the grave concerns expressed by members of the public from Haverigg and Millom at the CP forum of Sep 2023, given that the CP had not managed this in their three years of existence.  

The response was not to answer the question but to blame the CP for the lack of progress.  

NWS have been asked the same questions identified at the Forum over the past three years by various individuals. Their response has been to say they cannot answer them because at that time there was no area of focus.  

That area of focus was identified in 2020 and made public in the Initial Evaluation Report – see point 40 on South Copeland Against the GDF website https://southcopelandagainstgdf.org.uk This has now been confirmed.  

As part of explaining my question I said NWS had lied about many things, to which one of the councillors asked how had they lied? Well, there are nine lies/misinformation identified on https://southcopelandagainstgdf.org.uk and now that NWS have confirmed what they have known all along, that the site near Haverigg is the focus area, that is lie number ten!  

So, perhaps Millom Town Council, as a whole, would like to consider how they are going to ensure the people they are responsible for in Haverigg and Millom are made aware of the serious potential negative effects of hosting a GDF here?  

Because in order to make an informed decision, should it ever come to a vote, the community need to be aware of both the potential negatives as well as the positives.”  

MTC RESPONSE, 7^TH FEBRUARY 2025  

The town clerk responded with the following email, dated 7^th February 2025:

“In response to your email which has been circulated to all councillors please see below:  Millom Town Council (MTC) does not run the GDF programme and has no responsibility for it, any questions you have regarding the work of the Community Partnership or NWS should be directed to them to answer.  What MTC will do going forward is to help disseminate information supplied to us from NWS and where appropriate address the misinformation being disseminated by individuals via social media with factual information.  MTC are fully aware that misinformation continues to be circulated regarding prison closure. We take a dim view of anyone using social media platforms who supports deliberate, frenzied, misconstrued scenarios without substantial evidence.  

I will therefore be writing to the Minister of State for Prisons for confirmation that HMP Haverigg is not at risk of closure due to the GDF programme. Kind regards”   

DID COUNCILLORS DISCUSS MY EMAIL OF 30^TH JANUARY?  DID THEY AGREE THE RESPONSE OF 7^TH FEBRUARY?  

It would appear the councillors did not agree to this email (I checked with one of them) which begs the question whether they even got my previous email of 30^th January or whether they discussed it (unlikely as there has not been a meeting).  So, who wrote the email?  

Here is the draft minute concerning my question from the January Council meeting, mine is the second paragraph:  

 

This bears no resemblance – or very little – about what I said or my question, or their response.  

The Next meeting of MTC is on Wednesday, 26^th February.  There is nothing on the agenda relating to my email or the question I posed.  The meeting should ratify the draft minutes of the meeting held in January.  

Where the hell do you go from here??????????????????      

In response to an email re above and proposed GDF site, here is their response, dated 17th February 2025:

Yes, possible impact on natterjack toads is a concern.

As this is still at the area of search phase it is difficult to decide what any impacts might be, it very much depends if a firm proposal comes forward and what it might actually look like.

The Haverigg sand dunes as the critical area for natterjacks that looks like it might be affected by this is part of the Duddon Estuary SSSI and Morecambe Bay SAC which are the national and international level conservation designations, so if a firm proposal does come forward, there is likely to be a very large amount of environmental impact assessment work to be done before any decisions are made.

Whilst NWS have excluded Giant’s Grave and Lacra from the focus area,they stand next to, or overlook, it and the whole area is steeped in evidence that people lived here in Prehistoric times.

For further information see gdf.pdf.

Residents of Bank Head Estate, Haverigg, have been invited to meet their local Councillors to share their concerns on Saturday, 22nd February, 2 p.m. at St. Luke’s Institute, Haverigg. Haverigg Councillors Faulkner and Brown will be there as well as Cumberland Councillors Pratt and Kelly.

Whicham Parish Council are organising a public meeting in March, venue, date, time, to be confirmed.

At their meeting on Wednesday, 5th February 2025, Whicham Parish Council agreed to organise a public meeting in March and to invite local MP Michelle Scrogham, the leader of Cumberland Council, Mark Fryer, and Ged McGrath, chair of South Copeland GDF Community Partnership.

Meeting of Whicham Parish Council will be held on Wednesday, 4th February, 7.30 p.m. at Kirksanton Village Hall. GDF is an agenda item. Be good for those who live in Kirksanton to go and air their views on the latest regarding siting the GDF in Haverigg/Kirksanton.

NFLA Press Release 4th February 2025

The latest announcement by Nuclear Waste Services making the site of RAF Millom part of the Area of Focus in South Copeland may lead to the airfield and its rich wartime history being lost to a nuclear waste dump.

RAF Millom became operational on 20 January 1941, only days after two Luftwaffe night raids on the locality. Tragically in the first raid, five Millom residents were killed by bombs which missed their intended target, the Millom Ironworks. The base itself came under attack once, when on August 14, 1942, a Junkers 88 bomber strafed the airfield, but caused no damage.

Initially designated as a Bombing and Gunnery School, the airbase was subsequently transformed into an Observer School.

During the war, the following RAF units were stationed at the base: No 1 Anti-Aircraft Co-operation Unit ‘R’ Flight, No 2 Air Observer School, No 2 Bombing and Gunnery School, No 2 (Observers) Advanced Flying Unit, No 14 Air Crew Holding Unit, No 820 Defence Squadron and Station Flight, Millom, whilst 776 and 822 Naval Air Squadrons from the Fleet Air Arm were at one time based there[i].

Aircraft based at RAF Millom included the Boulton Paul Defiant, Hawker Henley, Avro Anson, Airspeed Oxford and Blackburn Botha.

As the base was involved in training aircrew, there were a significant number of crashes, many sadly involving fatalities amongst British, Polish and American airmen[ii][iii].

One of the victims was Flight Lieutenant David Moore Crook, a Battle of Britain ‘Ace’ who had won the Distinguished Flying Cross for his military conduct as one of ‘The Few’. Flt Lt Crook’s DFC citation appeared in the Gazette on 1 November 1940:
“This officer has led his section with coolness and judgment against the enemy on many occasions. He has destroyed six of their aircraft, besides damaging several more”[iv].

Some of the service personnel that were lost are commemorated in a memorial at St Luke’s Church in Haverigg[v].

In locating crashed aircraft and recovering lost aircrews, RAF personnel based at Millom developed operational techniques which were employed by post-war volunteer mountain rescue teams.

Members of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force based at Millom also engaged in a wide variety of support roles from clerical work to welding.

After the war’s end, the airfield was put under care and maintenance until 1953. In that year, it reopened briefly as the home of the No. 1 Officer Cadet Training Unit, but in September this relocated to RAF Jurby on the Isle of Man. Sadly, two aircrew died in an accident associated with the move[vi].The airfield was then again put in care and maintenance until the 1960s when the army used it for basing various army regiments. HMP Haverigg was established on part of the site in 1967.

In 1992, the RAF Millom Aviation & Military Museum was opened on site by enthusiastic volunteers in buildings leased from the Prison Service. Some volunteers notably participated in a Time Team dig in 2005 to excavate a site in Lancashire where two United States Army Air Force bombers had crashed in November 1944 after a mid-air collision[vii]. The museum operated until September 2010 when financial difficulties and the expiry of the lease led to its closure[viii]. Some exhibits remain on display in the Millom Discovery Centre.

Ulverston author John Dixon is a former prison officer at Haverigg. Mr Dixon set up the RAF Millom Collection in 1993 and was the museum’s curator until 2006. He has published a book on ‘The History of RAF Millom and the Genesis of RAF Mountain Rescue’, which can be purchased from Amazon and bookshops:

https://pixeltweakspublications.com/history-raf-millom-genesis-raf-mountain-rescue/[ix]

Within the entrance to the prison, a memorial in remembrance and sacrifice of aircrews at RAF Millom was erected. This is a propellor from an Avro Anson aircraft. Outside the prison, the café has recently been relaunched as the Haverigg Aircrew Mess ‘celebrating the heritage of what was RAF Millom’.

No longer in the sights of the Luftwaffe, RAF Millom is now instead threatened by the plans of Nuclear Waste Services.The recent announcement that the airbase may be the eventual site of a nuclear waste dump makes remembering that heritage even more poignant.

For more information, please contact NFLA Secretary Richard Outram by email torichard.outram@manchester.gov.uk

NFLA 3rd February 2025 press release

Residents living in rural villages in West Cumbria and East Lincolnshire will have been shocked to discover that Nuclear Waste Services has its eye on their backyard as the potential location for Britain’s high-level nuclear waste dump.

For contained amidst the detailed announcements made last week by NWS of that organisation’s plans to conduct more intensive investigations in so-called Areas of Focus in the three GDF Search Areas were revelations that several small villages are now potentially threatened by this huge civil-engineering project.

The Geological Disposal Facility will be the final repository for Britain’s historic and future high-level nuclear waste, including redundant nuclear submarine reactors, spent nuclear fuel, and the world’s largest civil stockpile of deadly plutonium. Nuclear Waste Services is charged with finding a forever site for the GDF that combines ‘suitable’ geology and a ‘willing’ community.

The facility will comprise a surface site approximately 1 km square that shall receive regular shipments of nuclear waste. This waste will be transferred downwards along a sub-surface accessway into a network of deep tunnels located between 400 and 1,000 metres below the seabed. Here the waste will be placed in permanent storage with tunnels sealed up as they are filled. The network of tunnels could be between 20 – 50 kms square in area and extend up to 22 kms out from the coast (the UK territorial limit).

Last week, Nuclear Waste Services published three ‘brochures’, which identified specific Areas of Focus within each Search Area that NWS consider may have potential to locate the surface facility, the accessway, and the tunnel network. NWS intends to conduct more intensive investigations in these areas, seeking official approval at a later stage to carry out deep borehole drilling at those sites deemed to be most geologically promising by NWS.

It is in the South Copeland and Theddlethorpe GDF Search Areas that the chosen Areas of Focus will court controversy.

In South Copeland, NWS has now finally conceded – as the NFLAs and many local Cumbrians have long suspected – that their area of choice is West of Haverigg, incorporating the former RAF airfield and surrounding the prison [Figure 1]. Although Nuclear Waste Services have made much of their efforts to avoid Haverigg and Millom, referencing the provision of a ‘buffer zone’, they have given no similar consideration to the poor residents of Kirksanton, who will find that the Area of Focus comes up to their very doorsteps and, in some sorry instances, incorporates their properties. In so doing NWS have provided for direct access to the railway line.

As the Area of Focus incorporates the former RAF airfield and surrounds the prison, it seems inconceivable that HMP Haverigg would remain open if the GDF surface facility were to be located there, and the two wind farms owned by Thrive Renewables and Windcluster might also be lost[i]. The prison’s closure would impact more than two hundred staff, over 100 of them local, as well as local businesses which supply the prison[ii].

There is at least some consolation for the good people of Drigg, living on the other side of the South Copeland Search Area. Although a parcel of land northeast of the village was identified as being of interest, in recognition that the Low Level (Radioactive) Waste Repository is located nearby it was considered that ‘an Area of Focus so close to the LLW Repository site could potentially impact ongoing operation of the site’. Consequently, NWS are ‘not prioritising it at this stage’, but this is one to watch as this may represent a stay, rather than a commutation, of execution.

In the Theddlethorpe Search Area, a huge bombshell has been dropped on the unsuspecting residents of Great and Little Carlton and Gayton-le-Marsh, as Nuclear Waste Services’ primary focus has moved from the former Theddlethorpe Conoco gas terminal to the fields that lie between these villages [Figure 2]. As the new site is so far inland, NWS are looking at a prospective accessway of considerable length under the King’s National Nature Reserve to the coast [Figure 3].

The current site selection appears worse than the original. Local Theddlethorpe and Withern Ward Councillor Travis Hesketh explains why: “After 4 years NWS have abandoned the 69-acre brownfield former gas terminal site for 250-1000 acres of productive farmland”. The NFLAs look forward to hearing senior Lincolnshire politicians berating the loss of agricultural land to this energy project as they have so readily condemned the encroachment of solar farms and pylons. But we won’t be holding our collective breath!

Also worrying is the illustration used in the accompanying ‘brochure’, a more detailed version of which is used with this media release [Figure 4]. This incorporates a jetty – termed a Marine Off-loading Facility – which suggests that if the Lincolnshire site is chosen, NWS might consider bringing waste shipments to the site by ship from Sellafield as there is no immediate rail station.

This news will have been a tremendous shock to many local people in Cumbria and Lincolnshire for now the threat of a nuclear waste dump suddenly appears writ large. Residents are already up in arms, and doubtless in coming days, there will also be new protest groups formed to represent the people affected.

It is important though to emphasise that the identification of the final site for a GDF is a long way off, is still very uncertain, and that there is still time to organise and fight back! Cllr Hesketh is clear what should happen next: “Residents are well informed and want a vote now. East Lindsey District Council and Lincolnshire County Council promises of a vote by 2027 are worthless as they will be abolished in local government reorganisations.” 

As ever the NFLAs as always stands ready to offer advice and support to these new groups, as we continue to work with existing groups which have long campaigned against the GDF.

For more information, please email the NFLA Secretary, Richard Outram, atrichard.outram@manchester.gov.uk

Link to diagrams and original release: Threat of nuke dump falls on Cumbrian and Lincolnshire rural communities

30th January 2025

Following from Nuclear Wast Services:

Surface Area of Focus

Through the application of the Areas of Focus methodology, a number of potentially suitable and less constrained areas were identified in the South Copeland Search Area. Further consideration of this area, that took into account NWS’ Siting Factors, as well as community and programme considerations, resulted in the identification of a Surface Area of Focus at the Land West of Haverigg, which NWS will prioritise and consider further at this time. 

Land West of Haverigg

This Surface Area of Focus is to the west of Haverigg, between the Lake District National Park (LDNP) and the coast. This land is approximately 3.5km². The area is bounded by the LDNP and Cumbrian Coast Railway Line to the north and east, and the coastline in the west and south. Whilst maintaining the feasibility of the Surface Area of Focus, we have sought to minimise the number of included residential properties. A buffer of approximately 500 metres has been applied from the urban areas of Millom and Haverigg. Kirksanton has also not been included in the Surface Area of Focus. Other considerations mean that HMP Haverigg, Kirksanton Moss Nature Reserve and the Duddon Estuary Site of Special Scientific Interest are not included within the Area of Focus. 

Accessway Area of Focus 

Applying the Areas of Focus methodology, we have identified a potential accessway within which the connection tunnels could be constructed joining the Sub-surface Area of Focus to the Surface Area of Focus. This is significantly wider than will be required to allow for flexibility; it is currently estimated the final accessway will be between 250-500m wide. For the onshore part of the accessway, we have sought to avoid passing directly beneath Haverigg and HMP Haverigg. 

Other areas NWS considered in the Search Area 

One other area was looked at; however, NWS is not prioritising it at this stage for the following reasons: Land Northeast of LLW Repository
This area is approximately 3.5km² and is to the northeast of the LLW Repository site. The LLW Repository is the only national repository of its type and its continued operation is fundamental to supporting the UK nuclear estate. NWS considers that an Area of Focus so close to the LLW Repository site could potentially impact ongoing operation of the site. 

It seems there is to be a press release tomorrow (30th January) at 10 a.m. announcing the areas of focus. Well, where could that possibly be???