Barnet Residents in Arms over Mast

Added: (Sun Oct 03 2004)

Pressbox (Press Release) - As a resident of Balmoral Avenue, London N11 who home is less than 20 metres from the proposed mast referred to above, I would like to strongly object to the proposed mast being erected in such a confined a residential area.

I appreciate Barnet's urgent need to make GBP5million in cuts, just six months after the second of two well-above inflation council tax increases totalling over 31 percent and mystifyingly despite increased central government funding. I appreciate Barnet council may have financial issues, as a businessman I understand the effects, trials and burdens of balancing budgets with cost demand and the need for additional revenue, however, allowing masts to be added on the fringes of the borough to gain additional monies in the region of 20k at the potential life cost of taxpayers is beyond the pale.

I would seek your attention for a brief moment of your time to mention the following.

The Stewart Report into Mobile Telephone Mast Safety
With regard to siting of antennae, the Stewart Report says that “... the gaps in knowledge are sufficient to justify a precautionary approach.” and recommends that “ in making decisions about the siting of base stations, planning authorities should have the power to ensure that the RF fields to which the public will be exposed will be kept to lowest practical levels that will be commensurate with the telecommunications system operating effectively.” The maximum levels are not shown on the single planning
Notice or on the letter sent to a mere handful of residents.

In most European countries a 300 to 500 metre exclusion zone between base-stations and inhabited properties is observed. Regardless of the proposed power levels intended for the mast it will be too close to our home and many other households, most with very young families. The report also goes on to say [section 1.19] “people can vary in their susceptibility to environmental hazards. It is not possible at present to say that exposure to RF radiation, even at levels below national guidelines, is totally without potential adverse health effects, and that the gaps in knowledge are sufficient to justify a precautionary approach”.

Children
We have a young son and are planning an addition to our family next year. It is their welfare and that of my community' and their children that prompt me to write.

My wife is set to become a childminder in 2005 as the Barnet borough is critically short of this service, indeed the Friern Village community we live in and the surrounding development of Princes Park Manor suffer greatly from this lack of care. It is this lack of a key and basic aspect of any community, highlighted in the next Government Manifesto, that has prompted us to set up in service of our wider community via the offering of childminding services.

I am gravely concerned and fearful that the proposed mast and it's immediate proximity to our and other homes will poses a threat to the health of my family and future additions and that it have a very profound effect on children placed in our care. Indeed, even today when meeting an expectant couple who are considering placing their new born with us in mid 2005, they voiced concern over the planned mast. I am fearful that for a considerable number of other parent's, their choice of child care provider, considering our garden and home will be overlooked by the proposed mast, they will choose other care arrangements or be forced to make do given the current dearth of childcarers in L.B. Barnet.

Politics
From a Conservative led council I also find the stance duplicitous to say the least. Earlier this year the Tory party said “Conservatives will champion the interests of local residents and address the feelings of powerlessness and frustration experienced living under the threat of badly sited masts. Local councillors, answerable to local residents via the ballot box, should have the final say on where they go." The release went on to take a tough stance on siting of masts suggesting resident's wishes be taken with additional weighting.

I would ask if this is the same thinking today, a matter of month's later, within the party or has it been quietly and conveniently ignored by the need to generate revenues for a financially maligned borough. Was the original line more spin than substance to suit a purpose or grab a headline. The Liberal Democrats have taken a similar if not tougher line and to date not retreated, perhaps to the chagrin of phone operators, Labour have at best fudged the issue. We await UKIP's wider policy statements, having come in at a respected third place recently in Hartlepool and holding their first conference proper this weekend, I am sure one wont have to wait long.

Personal
As residents, nay, as people, humans, we listened to Barnet Councillors and Leaders, bravely and flying in the face of threats of suspension of funding from Labour's Ken Livingstone, tell us that road humps delayed ambulances, killing people, killing humans, dictating that they should be cut down. We objected, initially, and were told that as a single entry development, speeders were residents, not borough wide visitors and that besides, this was the way forward.

We heard and read of deeply tragic tales, some involving councillors and their families and friends, of people, humans, with families, with dependants, of humans whose critical journey to hospital, via ambulance over humps, was fatally delayed by said speed humps. As human beings, we sympathised, we feared, we felt.

Our speed humps were removed, without major objection, despite fears of higher speed within our development. Indeed, we feel today for the family of a 17 year old pillion passenger, not resident within the development, killed on 8th Sept whilst speeding though a hump-free Friern Village. We feel for her grieving family and we feel for her, a victim of speed through our development.

It was very apparent at the time, or at least it felt as such, that adopting our roads (after 8 years of imploring by residents) was conditional on our non-objection to the removal of speed humps. Residents were told they could not be adopted as they were, i.e. humps intact. We felt we had no choice, we felt we had valid reasons for keeping the humps. We felt we were overlooked. I dare say the cost of hump removal and one or two recent policies might have saved a bit of budget today, but what about the cost of a life - however unproven a factor they were?

Perhaps the tragically killed 17 year old girl's parent's will understand, we wanted to save lives, but we were denied our choice by L.B. Barnet and it officers. They knew best, perhaps.


We have a choice now
A close friend of our family whose career, until two decades ago was as a simple fixed line telecommunications engineer moved with the times as one does and became one of those engineers who maintain antennae and masts in our wireless world. After 10+ years of this he fell ill. He spent a year plus in a coma and underwent the removal of a substantial tumour in his brain, he still has cancer of the brain. He still has a family, they will survive, they will lose their father, they will live, his future is far less certain. Theirs will be scarred.

FACT: The rate of death from brain cancer among handheld phone users and those with prolonged exposure to RF environments was higher than the rate of brain cancer death among those who used non-handheld phones that were away from their head

FACT: The risk of acoustic neuroma, a benign tumour of the auditory nerve that is well in range of the radiation coming from an antenna, was fifty percent higher in people who reported using cell phones for six years or more, moreover, that relationship between the amount of cell phone use and this tumour appeared to follow a dose-response curve: A similar effect, though diluted, is suspected in cell operator's antennae.

FACT: The risk of rare neuro epithelial tumours on the outside of the brain was more than doubled, a statistically significant risk increase, in cell phone users as compared to people who did not use cell phones;

FACT: There appeared to be some correlation between brain tumours occurring on the right side of the head and the use of the phone on the right side of the head;

FACT: Laboratory studies looking at the ability of radiation from an mobile antenna to cause functional genetic damage were definitively positive, and were following a dose-response relationship.

We can accept the facts, or we can accept not to. That’s is choice. In making that choice we acknowledge the right to choice, such as the right to a quiet enjoyment of life. In doing a simple act we acknowledge rights, Human Rights. Under the Human Rights Act of 1998 which became law in October 2000 and in particular, under Article 1 of the First Protocol, an individual has the right to the enjoyment of their property. The environmental impact of a planning decision on a neighbouring property brings into play the right for respect for home, privacy and family life (Article 8).

As a voter, a taxpayer, a citizen and on behalf of fellow citizens, living and yet to be, I ask for this right to be upheld.

NiMBYism?
Do I have a mobile phone, yes.
Do I want an antennae in my back garden, NO!
Do I want it in anyone else's back garden, outside their living room, above their ceiling……the answer remains a firm NO!
Would I like the coverage my operator purports to offer in days of increased subscribers? Yes!
Do we need more studies, more research, funded by but undertaken independently of the network operators? ……YES!!! Like Drug companies should not control MMR research but should contribute.
Are there less populated areas to locate masts in?.....YES.
Will I, or you, be prepared to "suffer", in places, a slight degrading of service or connectivity, secure though that it is not endangering lives….…well, what would you say?
Nothing can be more important. They are the future, future tax payers, future consumers, future mobile subscribers.

We deserve to leave them a legacy, not a life sentence.

Your choice
As mobile operators, councillors, MP's, MEP's, unconcerned individuals we all have a choice too - choice after all is diversity and equality in play. Choice should be fair. The operators an councillors and other elected representatives can choose to act or not.
They have choice, you have choice
Choose to cause genuine fear or worse choose to malign generations, possibly or chose to eliminate that risk.

They can chose to see brand as big, state unconcerning, advancement and technology or fiscal income at any cost. They can choose to put what could be as damaging in effect as a neighbourhood "dirty bomb", yards from your garden, metres from your children, feet from an unborn. They can choose fear. They can choose fear of death.

They can also choose not to.

The case of Newport Borough Council v Secretary of State for Wales (1998) refers to “Genuine public fear, even if that fear is irrational and not based on evidence is a material planning consideration”. Remember that you do have rights . We have a right to choice as a law-abiding citizens, we invest that choice in others, they should choose wisely.

Graeme Read
6 Balmoral Avenue
London
N11 3QA
Tel 07703575908