Sellafield fears - Timebomb on our doorstep

Any and every effort by officials attached to British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL) to allay fears here about Sellafield are doomed to futility.

So was the latest one yesterday in which senior BNFL officials met with worried councillors in Louth to try to reassure them about the safety of the site.

Their avowal that Sellafield is robust enough to withstand a terrorist attack has to be taken with more than a considerable degree of scepticism. By their own admission they are ignorant about the extent of one particularly serious hazard on their own doorstep.