May 07, 2006

Jason Allardyce

ON the face of it they seem unlikely bedfellows, but the nuclear industry has turned to the Women’s Institute (WI) to help change its image.

Nirex, the nuclear waste management company, is in the middle of an image makeover and believes the WI — better known for its jumble sales and jam making — can help it to gain greater acceptance. The nuclear industry has been engaged in a campaign to reverse its pariah status since Tony Blair announced a review of energy last year.

Documents released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that Nirex has held meetings with the WI aimed at making nuclear energy more appealing to women.

Until now the WI’s most controversial venture has been the infamous nude calendar featuring members of its Rylstone & District branch, immortalised in the film Calendar Girls.

In February the agency paid members’travelling expenses to attend a day-long workshop on radioactive waste management at the WI’s Denham College in Oxfordshire. Among the issues discussed was the safest method of deep storage for radioactive waste and contingencies for a terrorist attack on a nuclear installation.

WI members offered to lodge a series of motions relating to nuclear issues at future AGMs, agreed to give Nirex access to local groups and said that it would write about nuclear waste in Home & Country, its monthly magazine.

An article about nuclear waste appears in the current edition of the publication.

Minutes of the meeting with Nirex reveal that the WI delegates were told about the good aspects of radiation, as well, such as its use in treating cancer. Nirex also sought the advice of WI delegates on the advisability of the agency changing its name.

While it said the acronym, which stands for Nuclear Industry Radioactive Waste Executive, was no longer accurate because it is now an independent company, it accepted that a name change could arouse suspicion and said it was “vital that its audience did not see any change as a whitewash or rebrand”.

The WI, founded in 1915 by Mrs Alfred Watt, has grown to become Britain’s largest organisation of women, with 215,000 members. Tony Blair was memorably slow hand-clapped when he delivered a speech to the institute in 2000, because the audience considered its content too political.

The WI said that its involvement with the nuclear industry was an example of how it was becoming a more serious organisation.

“The WI seems to be saddled with the old-fashioned image of making jam and singing Jerusalem, but these days we are more likely to be debating important political issues,” said Juliet Putnam, a spokeswoman.

“In future we are going to be turning our attention to renewable energy and the waste created by supermarket chains. It is refreshing that people and organisations want to listen to what we have to say.”

The image of the nuclear industry has been tarnished by a series of recent incidents. Last month it was revealed that the British Nuclear Group, the decommissioning arm of British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL), will face negligence charges over a radioactive spill that resulted in the partial shutdown of the Sellafield plant in Cumbria.

In the same month, Scotland’s nuclear watchdog accused the owners of the Dounreay nuclear establishment of misleading the public over the threat posed to public health by radioactive leaks from the plant. And in February it was reported that radioactive waste from Torness power station in East Lothian was thrown out with ordinary rubbish and sent to a dump.

Meanwhile, BNFL, which runs 16 nuclear power stations around the country, is studying the marketing techniques that helped to turn the Atkins diet into a global brand.

Among the techniques it has examined is the use of celebrity endorsements from the likes of Jennifer Aniston and high-profile opinion formers to push its message in the media.

As with nuclear power, critics had called the Atkins diet dangerous but strong marketing techniques ensured that it was widely adopted.

A strategy paper sent to BNFL last August by Strategic Awareness, a public relations consultancy, examined how Atkins had “got experts on his side” and had received “celebrity endorsements” that “appealed to men”.

As yet few celebrities have extolled the virtues of nuclear power, although Sir Bernard Ingham, Margaret Thatcher’s former press secretary, claimed last year that it was needed for a secure and clean future.

A BNFL spokesman said: “This comparison with the Atkins diet may well have been discussed, but as far as I am aware it has made no difference to our policy.”