THE health fears of protesters over mobile phone masts were dismissed as irrational yesterday by the head of a government scientific panel after a safety review said that the potential risks were very small.

Professor Lawrie Challis, chairman of the Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research group, said that he was astonished by the scale of public concern about base stations, which exposed people to lower levels of radiation than a mobile phone call of a few seconds.

The siting of the masts near homes and schools has triggered fierce opposition amid worries about possible links to cancer, headaches and sleep disorders.

But the radiation reaching an individual from a base station is at least 1,000 times weaker, and usually 10,000 times weaker, than that from a handset. A misunderstanding of the science, and concerns about the aesthetic appearance of masts and their effects on house prices, underlay popular objections, Professor Challis said.

“In terms of exposure I think it’s rather irrational if you use a mobile phone for more than a few minutes a day to be worried about base stations. I think there’s a general sense of concern because of their size, and because of the effect they may have on the value of property.

“If there are any risks from this technology they’re very much more likely to come from phones than they are from base stations.”

A report from the Government’s Advisory Group on Non-Ionising Radiation concluded that there was no evidence of adverse effects from either phones or base stations.

Yesterday’s report from the group, of which Professor Challis is a member, found that safety concerns about Britain’s base stations have little substance.

“Exposure levels from living near to mobile phone base stations are extremely low, and the overall evidence indicates that they are unlikely to pose a risk to health,” the panel said. Its report also found no evidence of adverse health effects from handsets, although the scientists accepted that it was impossible to rule out all potential risks.

Professor Tony Swerdlow, the group’s chairman, said that further research, including a major international study of thousands of brain tumour patients, “should greatly clarify the position in terms of the remaining uncertainty”.

Campaigners accused government scientists of being “economical with the truth” and vowed to lead a popular revolt against mobile phone masts. Homeowners, who fear the masts are a danger to health, are staging local protests as 3,200 are erected across the country to carry the new police radio network.

The phone company mmO2 has already offered to dismantle one of the new terrestrial trunked radio (Tetra) masts after a protest by villagers in Rogate, West Sussex, because it was erected before planning permission had been granted.

Activists rejected the charge that their opposition to mobile phone masts was irrational and said that the fight against the masts by local communities would become a key issue in the next election.

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