[holding answer 9 July 2009]: The "Managing Radioactive Waste Safely White Paper: A Framework for Implementing Geological Disposal", published in June 2008, outlined the role of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) as the body responsible for planning and implementing geological disposal of higher activity radioactive waste.The White Paper sets out a staged decision-making process to site a geological disposal facility and the NDA are proceeding with early planning. The process is driven by discussions with potential host communities but early assumptions will need to be made for planning purposes on a wide range of technical issues that will not become clear for some time, such as the potential geological characteristics of a site and the amount of waste to be disposed of. The NDA plans to publish a document outlining and explaining its early planning work on this subject later this year.