25.
asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, in view of the fact that a private firm is offering fail-out shelters for sale at £550 each, if he will instruct his Department to work out specifications for shelters which would give protection against fall-out, heat and blast, following a nuclear explosion.
I am considering whether it is possible to supplement the advice already available about what householders can do to provide protection against fall-out in or near their homes.
Even if one has no belief in the possibility of protection against H-bomb explosions, which a recent and authoritative American consumers' union report doubts, how can the average family judge the value of these shel-
ber's Bill making its progress through the House at the moment on which these precise issues can best be argued.
Following are the figures for Great Britain:
ter and avoid being misled without independent expert advice?
It is precisely because we are just studying how this advice can be given that I gave the answer I did.
As we have had it on the authority of the Prime Minister himself that there is no defence for the civil population in the event of nuclear war, will the right hon. Gentleman make it perfectly clear that he objects to people trying to make money out of the natural fears and apprehensions of the civil population?
I should want details if I thought that people were attempting to make money out of it. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman can afford me some evidence. In regard to the statement of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, I think it is clear that a great deal can be done through efficient Civil Defence, and that is what we are trying to achieve.