§ Mr. WilsonTo ask the Secretary of State for Defence on how many occasions since 1979 the Clyde naval emergency monitoring team has been called out to incidents.
§ Mr. Ian StewartThe Naval Emergency Monitoring Organisation (Scotland) has been called out on three occasions since 1979. In April 1985 it was asked to provide274W assistance to the civil authorities under the national arrangements for incidents involving radioactivity (NAIR scheme) when a suspect package was found on a beach on the outskirts of Helensburgh which subsequently proved not to contain any radioactive material. In October 1985 it was called out when an alarm sounded at the Clyde submarine base. This was subsequently found to be spurious. In May 1986 it was called to the royal naval armaments depot, Coulport, when a slighter higher than normal radioactive reading was detected within a sealed item of equipment. It was quickly established that there was no hazard.