Pay-off ibstit safety
Socialist Press1979 1979-11-21Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 4 →
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The £67,000 damages payment to the widow of a Windscale nuclear plant worker last week has given power stations.
Mr Malcolm Pattinson died of lukaemia at 36 years of age after working in the radiation areas at Windscale for eight years.
But he was only one of a number of casualties of inadequate safety procedures at the plant.
In two out of court settlements in 1977 British Nuclear Fuels paid over smaller amounts of money after the death of former employees: and the GMWU is currently contesting two further cases.
As reports on the Three Mile Island nuclear crisis at Harrisburg Pennsylvania show that the reactor came within minutes of a lethal "melt-down" and it is revealed that 25 out of 26 French nuclear plants have movement to do more than finance court cases for compensation after the deaths of their members.
Trade unions in the plants and in surrounding areas must organise to elect joint committees which will demand full access to all available informa tion on safety precautions, and open the financial books of the nuclear industry and its suppliers.
The strictest workers' control over safety in these plants must be enforced-and where the slightest doubt exists, the plant in question must be forced to close forced to close-with the workforce retained on full pay -until outstanding problems are resolved.
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renewed prominence to the question of safety in nuclear
developed leaks, there is an obvious need for the workers'