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Wi-fi fear on spy cameras
Alarm at wireless CCTV set-up
THE council is under pressure to dismantle its controversial wireless network after government health chiefs sounded alarm bells over the network it operates off.
Private firm Vertex has bathed great swathes of Westminster in radio waves – claimed to give off three times more radiation than phone masts – to enable a new breed of CCTV spy cameras.
Some of the cameras have the capacity to record conversations at street level and were condemned by campaigning group Liberty – but they remain.
They are part of 40 new wireless CCTV cameras on lamp-posts and monitoring estates in Soho, Lisson Grove and the Churchill Gardens.
But demands for an immediate inquiry into the effects of the wireless network from government adviser and chairman of the Health Protection Agency, Sir William Stewart, may have put the future of the service in jeopardy.
Sir William believes radio waves are three times stronger than those from phone masts.
Campaigners are calling for wireless networks near primary schools to be dismantled because children are much more vulnerable to the radiation.
Soho Parish School was last year revealed as being located near more phone masts than any other school in the country.
But even if they wanted to remove wireless network – as one school in nearby Camden did this week – they cannot.
One governor said: “I don’t think there’s much we can do about it.”
The council’s technical adviser and chief authority on the wireless network said 40 extra digital CCTV cameras had gone up in Westminster, including 20 in Soho.
Andrew Snellgrove said: “These cameras are used for many purposes – for crime, monitoring the housing estate, for parking offences.
“Because there are no wires they are much more flexible and can be moved about easily. They are six feet up on lamp-posts – not in schools. There is no actual evidence that says wi-fi is bad for your health.
“We’ve investigated it and with external consultants and health and safety officials who confirmed we have done everything correctly.
He said: “I’d be more worried about mobile phones next to your ear. If you are worried about wi-fi, you would never make another mobile phone call again.” |
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