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48
Meanwhile all sales of radioisotopes by the Atomic Energy
Authority, and all applications for import licences in respect of
radioactive materials are notified to the Ministry of Housing and
Local Government. This information is not being passed automatically
to local authorities, but any delivery which seems likely to lead
to a waste disposal problem is followed up. the Ministry records
to date show that no hazard from radioactivity arises from sewage
or sewage effluent anywhere in the country.
5 TRAINING. The training of Medical Officers of Health and Public Health
Inspectors is the responsibility of the Ministry of Health, and the
training requirements in the health and safety field are at present being
examined by a Committee which is expected to report in the near future."
Some local authorities were giving serious consideration to the possibility
of setting up their own comprehensive monitoring services for the measurement
of radioactivity. The Minister, in a letter to the Associations ofLocal
Authorities, pointed out that any measurements local authorities might make
would only tend to duplicate the Government's own monitoring programme, and
that money spent on the widespread institution of new and comprehensive local
monitoring systems would not be justified.
With regard to local monitoring in London, the Metropolitan Water Board
does a very complete monitoring of their own water supplies, and I am also
informed that the London County Council have arrangements for monitoring of the
atmosphere, some radio-chemical analysis of food especially milk, examination
of trade effluents from premises where it is known that radioactive substances
are in use and, with the co operation of hospitals, examination in appropriate
cases of hospital effluents Apart from hospitals, there are in this Borough
only two premises known to the Department where radioactive substances are in
use, the one a big chemical manufacturing concern, and the other a workshop
for the manufacture of compasses.