FOREST Road resident Ivan Roberts is fuming about the potential risk of emissions from 13 mobile phone aerials outside his house. The 60-year-old electrical engineer wrote letters to Environment expressing his concerns about the application from Guernsey Airtel to erect seven.
The department yesterday announced its approval of that application on the basis of mast sharing.
Mr Roberts, who has lived in his home for more than 20 years, also wrote to planners five years ago opposing the original six aerials on the water tower, which is next to his back garden.
‘We are very upset about the whole thing,’ he said.
‘This is a built-up area and there are lots of young families living in this road which are constantly exposed to the emissions from the aerials.
‘The department say they have consulted on the health risks, but they don’t know what the health risks are and the aerials haven’t been up long enough to prove they are right.
‘In the 1950s, the UK Government told everybody that asbestos was safe and now they are paying out millions in compensation.’
Mr Roberts said there were too many aerials in one area.
‘We are going to have 13 outside our house,’ he said.
‘I have had them independently measured for emissions and they fall within the guidelines, which the island has taken from the UK.
‘But these would be too high for the rest of Europe and would not be allowed.’
Mr Roberts said he would have the emissions checked once the further seven had been erected.
He said Environment had told him in correspondence that its concern was purely with the aesthetics of the aerials.
‘I think that’s ridiculous. If you look at the definition of environment in the dictionary it concerns anything that affects people, but they cannot see that point of view at all.
‘I spent a lot of time writing letters to various people, including Environment, and I just don’t think they take any notice of public concern,’ said Mr Roberts.
Environment member Deputy Mary Lowe, who was asked to leave the meeting when approval for the masts was given as she has been excluded from the planning process for expressing her opposition to new masts, said people should continue the fight.
‘Clearly there are still many concerns from thousands of people who signed the petition against the masts earlier in the year.
‘The States must take notice, I believe, of the apprehension people have of the potential health risks of emissions.
‘Places with that concentration of aerials in the UK have been made to take theirs down.’
The applications approved also cover the harbour, Mignot Plateau and Hubert’s Lane in St Peter Port, St Peter’s telephone exchange, Route de l’Eglise, Castel and at the airport on an existing radar tower.
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