Plans to build two masts for 5G are set to be approved despite health concerns.
The application from telecommunications company EE seeks to replace two 17.5m towers with larger towers to enable 5G use.
Hundreds of scientists worldwide have raised concerns over the potential health impacts of 5G.
Reading Borough Council’s (RBC) Planning Applications committee will vote on the proposals at Wednesday’s (September 4) 6.30pm meeting.
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Boyd Butler asked the council’s Planning Applications committee in July: “Will RBC follow other cities across the world in delaying the roll-out of hundreds of powerful phased array 5G base stations across the borough because of the thousands of studies proving that 5G is dangerous to the health of residents and living creatures?”
Councillor Emmett McKenna, chairman of the Planning Applications committee, responded: “I do not feel that this committee is the most appropriate place to fully address the context of your question.
“This is a quasi-judicial committee that must act within the rather strict framework of published guidance operating underneath current UK legislation.
“The relevant guidance in this case, amongst a number of others, is the electronic communications code published by Ofcom in December 2017 and the revised National Planning Policy Framework published in February 2019.
“However, I can provide the reassurance that RBC have already escalated our own concerns about 5G delivery, via the Superfast Berkshire Broadband Project.
“This is the body taking a Digital Infrastructure Delivery role collectively across Berkshire on behalf of all six Unitary authorities.
“We have received assurances, that both Broadband Delivery UK and the Department of Culture, Media and Sport are not only aware of these concerns, but that the government has committed, as 5G continues to develop, to working with Public Health England in order to monitor available evidence.”
Public Health England has advised that there is no convincing evidence that radio wave exposures below the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection guideline levels cause adverse health effects.
The guidelines apply to exposures at frequencies up to 300 GHz, well above the maximum few tens of GHz frequencies anticipated for use by 5G systems.
EE want to build a 20m lattice tower on the corner of Acre Road/A33 Terranova site, replacing the monopole that is currently there.
The company also wants to build a new 20m monopole to replace the current 17.5m monopole at Junction 11 on the south side of the M4.
Mr Butler told the Local Democracy Reporting Service “the impending roll-out of 5G in the UK means that people are going to be bathed in a soup of powerful electro-magnetic radiation, the likes of which have never been tested for safety”.
He added: “There are hundreds of scientists worldwide who are calling for testing before any roll-out of 5G, as the implication for human health and environmental damage are mind-blowing.”
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