Veterans who served at British nuclear testing sites from 1952 to 1991 are asking for justice as newly declassified documents suggest that they were used as ‘lab rats’ to monitor the effects of radiation. The men were ‘deliberately exposed to toxic fallout’ and continuously had blood tests monitoring radiation effects. One veteran told the BBC ‘we were just guinea pigs, lab rats. Nobody told us a word about why we were going there.’ A new documentary which aired this week documents their battle to uncover the ‘hidden truth‘ of what they went through.
In 2019 the Labour party promised the veterans £50,000 each as compensation. However, the offer was no longer present in Labour’s 2024 manifesto. Instead, Keir Starmer has said that Labour will introduce a ‘Hillsborough Law’ to put a legal duty of honesty on public officials. Not yet in place, the new law is planned to be introduced to parliament in 2025. This legislation would force public bodies to co-operate with investigations into major disasters or potentially face criminal sanctions. This legal duty of candour would exist to avoid the cover-ups and ‘culture of defensiveness’ that have characterised past scandals such as Windrush, Grenfell Tower and infected blood.
The veterans, now in their 80’s, still await justice and have received no compensation. Survivors are seeking justice due to the health effects they have experienced since their exposure to radiation in British nuclear bomb test sites. Out of the 22,000 military personnel who were present at the time, an estimated 1,500 remain.
