§ 25. Mr. Frank Allaunasked the Minister of Defence if he will make a statement on the decision to station the 47th British Rocket Regiment at Dortmund in the centre of a thickly-populated region.
§ Mr. SandysI would refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. J. Hynd), on 4th February.
§ Mr. AllaunBut is the Minister aware that, whatever he may have said, the people there do not share his complacency and that last week 80,000 Dortmund workers went on token strike against his decision? How should we like it if he did a similar thing in Manchester?
§ Mr. SandysI suppose this is about the same as the people of Swaffham feel. If the hon. Gentleman will study the reply I gave earlier, it might be helpful. He will find that I made it clear that the site of this unit near Dortmund is purely a temporary site, or, rather, I should say it is what we might call a non-operational site. If there were an emergency there is no question of the unit operating from that site. [An HON. MEMBER: "Why is it there then?"] Because it is a convenient place to station the unit. All units are not kept permanently on their operational sites and, if there were an emergency, this unit, like others, would move out of Dortmund quite a number of miles to its operational position. I would add that the unit does not hold on that site the warheads for this weapon.