§ Dr. Roger Thomasasked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will consider establishing a major public inquiry into the current search for sites suitable for nuclear waste disposal by terrestrial burial.
§ Mr. HeseltineNormal local planning inquiries will enable all the issues relevant to any applications for drilling exploratory boreholes which go to appeal to be fully explored and discussed. There seems little point in a wider inquiry before the results of research are available to enable an informed debate to be conducted, and before it is known whether the option of deep underground disposal is feasible. If it were decided, to develop a demonstration repository for the disposal underground of high level radioactive waste, this would be subject to fresh planning applications, possibly in about 10 years' time, which would investigate thoroughly the effect of the proposal on the environment. I cannot specify at this stage what form the planning procedures would take.