BSS Directive published in the Official Journal of the European Union

News Story from 17th Jan 2014

European Basic Safety Standards (BSS) for protection against ionising radiation have been published in the Official Journal of the European Union, see links here and here .  Council Directive 2013/59/EURATOM lays down basic safety standards for protection against the dangers arising from exposure to ionising radiation, and repeals Directives 89/618/Euratom, 90/641/Euratom, 96/29/Euratom, 97/43/Euratom and 2003/122/Euratom, which underpin UK regulation of ionising radiation, notably through the Ionising Radiation Regulations 1999 and Emergency Preparedness and Public Information Regulations 2001.  Member States are required to bring into force the laws, regulations and administrative provisions necessary to comply with this Directive by 6 February 2018.  HMG policy with regards to how this Directive will be implemented within the UK is still to be agreed and communicated.

The recent SRP Council meeting agreed to the formation of an SRP BSS Implementation Working Group, under the LSTG committee, with Roger Collison as Chairman, George Brownless as Deputy Chair and Chris Perks as Secretary.  It was also agreed that the President would write to HSE and DECC giving SRP’s support to the work ahead in revision of UK legislation and supporting documents such as ACOP and Guidance.  Further updates and requests for views etc will follow in later newsletters.