Rather hypocritically given the taxpayer £millions being spent on nuclear spin and bribery in Cumbria, the NDA said: "[We have] concluded that in order to ensure that the UK taxpayer does not carry a future financial burden from [Sellafield Mox plant] that the only reasonable course of action is to close [Sellafield Mox plant] at the earliest practical opportunity."

We agree - not before time!

...all jobs, effort expertise and money should now be put into looking after the existing wastes as safely as possible not burying them, dispersing them or as happened with MOX creating ever more liquid high level wastes through reprocessing spent fuel. As usual with all things nuclear the Japanese had to be bribed to burn MOX in their Fukushima power plant. (see below)

MOX should never have started operations- as far back as 2002 government was told

"In view of the substantial threat arising from reprocessing it should be stopped immediately to prevent the further production of liquid high level wastes" Dr Gordon Thompson Submission to House of Commons Defence Committee.

More info - a press release from Radiation Free Lakeland

18th March 2011 PRESS RELEASE - RADIATION FREE LAKELAND -

MOX: FROM JAPAN TO CUMBRIA TO JAPAN (leaving high level liquid wastes here in Cumbria)

In 2002 The Local governor (now ex local governor) in the area of Fukushima REFUSED to allow MOX to be loaded into the reactors because the fuel is much more volatile and the nuclear plant was known to be damaged with cracks to pipes. Japan admitted in 2002 that it has found cracks in the pipes of Fukushima - the plant destined to burn mixed oxide (Mox) fuel made at BNFL's Sellafield Mox Plant in Cumbria in a process known as reprocessing.

Reprocessing makes already dangerous spent fuel, sent from Japan to Cumbria millions of times more dangerous. The high level wastes from reprocessing are left here while dangerous MOX fuel is sent by armed ship back to Fukushima. In 2002 The Independent reported that at Fukushima nuclear plant.. "Details of cracks have been kept secret for more than two years. Tepco has shut down the two reactors at Fukushima Daiichi and Kashiwazaki Kariwa and has delayed restarting them until hundreds of pipes are checked. Both reactors were scheduled to be test sites for the burning of new Mox fuel shipped from either BNFL or the Belgian-French reprocessing company, Cogema. Tepco has now delayed the tests indefinitely. The discovery has led to bitter recriminations, with local governments in Japan vowing not to allow Mox fuel to be loaded into any reactors as part of the central government's ambitious plutonium-burning "pluthermal" programme". (as reported in the Independent)

The local authorities were bribed and groomed by Japanese taxpayer money, in much the same way as we are here in Cumbria. Japan began offering subsidies of $250,000 a year for five years to local governments that agreed to the use of the fuel in the reactors in their regions, according to documents available on the Tokyo-based Citizens' Nuclear Information Center website.

The Fukushima plant recieved Mox in August 2010 despite the warnings of whistleblowers. Following the terrible natural disaster which triggered the manmade catastrophe, the most this has prompted around the world is a "review" of Government policies on nuclear energy.

Radiation Free Lakeland support the call that Governments around the world right now should be:

Closing down all Nuclear facilities immediately (Including ensuring that all the other Japanese reactors are closed down immediately and defuelled as promptly as can be achieved).

Bring in outside expertise to manage this process - it should not be left to the nuclear industry.

The use of Public relations companies should be banned immediately - Cumbria is being groomed to accept risky new build and the insane dumping of high level wastes deep underground in leaky geology.

refs http://www.aolnews.com/2011/03/18/japans-own-erin-brockovich-hitomi-kamanaka-laments-i-wish-i/ http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:QDbIZOgM3sMJ:www.pasthound.com/topics/Fukushima-prefecture+Eisaku+Sato,+the+governor+of+neighbouring+Fukushima+prefecture,+said+he+would+not+allow+its+use+in+a+local+power+plant+MOX&cd=10&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk&client=safari&source=www.google.co.uk http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/new-nuclear-scandal-in-japan-threatens-viability-of-sellafield-641519.html