The Police Federation Conference on 23rd October 2002 was intended to give a thorough airing to the health concerns surrounding TETRA. The following information was given to me by Barrie Trower, who wrote the Report for the Police Federation on TETRA and has been in on this debate right from the start. He was invited to the Conference to join a panel answering questions.

1. The former Chairman of the Police Federation had declared his intention to thoroughly check out the health concerns. He has been replaced by a new Chairman, who was the first speaker. She spoke of how wonderful TETRA was and how much the Police need it. She also criticised the Fire and Ambulance Services for being indecisive and dropping out.

2. Of the 14 speakers at this Conference, only one was from the ‘health concerns’ lobby (Dr. Gerard Hyland). One other was there to express his concerns about health: Steve Edwards, the Lancashire Police Federation Chairman, who described the health problems that officers there had experienced. They had 25 minutes between them on the health issues.

3. Another of the speakers was Prof. Colin Blakemore, the author of the section in the Stewart Report that warns against use of transmissions that are pulsed at around 16 Hz. Steve Pierce, Chairman of Devon & Cornwall Police Federation, asked him why he had done an about-turn on this, now declaring that TETRA (pulsed at 17.64 Hz) is safe. Blakemore said that on looking back he now realised that he had been over-cautious - so he had changed his mind. This seems to be standing the ‘Precautionary Approach’ on its head, without any solid scientific basis being given for that reversal. To me it sounds like ‘I changed my mind - because I changed my mind’.

4. The ‘pro-TETRA’ industry side had stands all around the place. To the best of my knowledge no groups were invited to provide a stand putting the other point of view - on the health issues the Conference was about.

At the end someone officially thanked them for sponsoring the Conference!

5. When it came to a show of hands in support of TETRA, it appears that a substantial number of hands that went up in the hall were those of the industry representatives there to promote their product, as well as others who were not representatives of police officers, due to be using TETRA.

Barrie also told me that the symptoms listed for police officers in Lancashire included blisters/ulcers on the face and warmed kidneys.

The clear message that was sent out from this Conference was that TETRA will be going out, come what may. Monitoring of health effects on selected trial groups of police officers will continue for 10 years - the length of time that it is expected to take for the full health effects to become known.