THE Minister for the Marine, Dr Woods, said last night he was not perturbed by the announcement in the British House of Commons that an independent inquiry would not be opened into radioactive waste dumped off the west coast of Scotland in the 1950s.
The Scottish Secretary, Mr Donald Dewar, disclosed this in a Commons written reply in which he said he saw no merit in initiating such a move, stressing that levels of radioactivity were so low they posed no danger to human or marine life.
Mr Dewar said the discovery that radioactive waste had been dumped alongside explosives in the 300-metre-deep Beaufort's Dyke trench in the Irish Sea was made when old public record papers were found.
He said the "lack of awareness" of these papers caused the previous government to give misleading answers to MPs' questions.
The Scottish Secretary said the accepted way of dealing with non- hazardous waste in the 1950s was to encase it in concrete in mild steel drums, weight the drums with scrap metal and sink them.
"We cannot be sure of the current condition of the steel drums since it would be extremely difficult to locate them, given the large quantities of debris that are present on the seabed.
"However, the amounts of radioactivity that they contain are so small that release of the contents would be of no significance in terms of either public health or the marine environment. I therefore see no merit in initiating an independent inquiry.
Dr Woods said last night that the Government had not sought an independent inquiry into the issue and was currently working with the British government on getting all the necessary information on the dumping before decisions would be made.
He said that the Ministry of Agriculture and Food official who had discovered the evidence of dumping was on the team currently looking at all the archive material from the period in question. "When that exercise is complete, then we will decide what we want to do," he said.
Dr Woods added that he would be convening a task force in the next few days to examine the full extent of radioactive dumping in the Irish Sea and the implications for the marine environment. The task force would recommend an action plan to preserve and improve the quality of the Irish Sea. A TEENAGE female burglar, whose tragic home life appalled Judge Kevin Ha ugh, is back in custody alter fluffing the chance he gave her.
Judge Haugh said he had shown much sympathy for Laura Kinsella and had dealt particularly leniently with her by suspending the balance of a three- year sentence shortly after imposing it for her role in terrorising a 72- year-old widow.
Kinsella's case was re-entered before Dublin Circuit Criminal Court shortly after she was freed because she breached the bond conditions and was arrested on foot of a bench warrant.
Judge Haugh said he had no option now but to leave her in custody until he reviewed the case on October 13th, when he would require a probation report.
Kinsella (19), the mother of a three-year-old daughter, from Montpelier Hill and North Circular Road, Dublin pleaded guilty to burgling the widow's home on May 20th, 1996, and stealing property worth Pounds 1,500.
When she first appeared before Judge Haugh last January, Kinsella confirmed on oath her father had sexually abused her, threatened her to keep her away from the Probation Service and caused her to leave Coolmine Therapeutic Centre.
She said she had been abusing drugs since aged 13 and was still taking heroin, but agreed she would try to become drug-free for the review of her case on April 15th.
Judge Haugh said he would suspend the three-year sentence he imposed if she did. "This is probably the very last chance you will get. Make a super effort and you will walk out of here. If you don't you will remain in jail. Don't let yourself down", he said.
"The reports showed you had great potential but you jumped out of the frying pan into the fire after your difficult and tragic home life."
Defence counsel, Mr Brendan Mulhall, said Kinsella's father went "berserk" when he heard she was to meet a probation officer on the burglary charge.
"Her father doesn't want her to have anything to do with the probation officers in case she would disclose his abuse of her. He also threatened to 'do her mother in' if Laura continued to go to the Probation Service. She is absolutely terrified of him," said Mr Mulhall.
Det Garda Paul Molloy told Mr Paul McDermott, prosecuting, at the original hearing that the widow was confronted by Kinsella and a male accomplice -
the father of her child - who brandished a hatchet and threatened the widow. Kinsella told her she had a gang which would deal with her if she reported the burglary and theft.
Det Garda Molloy agreed with Mr Mulhall that Kinsella was genuinely sorry for what she did. She refused her accomplice's demand to have the victim tied up or locked in her room. She also helped recover Pounds 300 worth of the property.