On 31st January 2026 the UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLA) ceased to exist after over 45 years of promoting nuclear free zones to people and local authorities throughout the UK and beyond.
It is a sad loss to anti-nuclear campaigners in the north, especially as it is may not be so much due to a lack of support but because of successive national government cuts and austerity measures that have left local governments searching for ways to save money. The NFLA income has always been totally reliant on subscriptions from local and district councils.
It is worth looking back at the key events in Yorkshire and Manchester that initiated the project in the first place.
Leeds was the first city in the UK to formally take an antinuclear position when, on 30 July 1980, Leeds City Council adopted a resolution proposed by Councillor Michael McGowan expressing concern over the buildup of nuclear weapons and committing the city to contacting others to act against the threat that they posed.
Shortly afterwards, on 5 November in Manchester (the city where Ernest Rutherford first split the atom in 1917), the Council also passed a resolution, moved by Councillor Bill Risby, calling on the UK government to refrain from manufacturing or positioning nuclear weapons within city boundaries. It also appealed to other authorities to join them as Nuclear Free Zones. This led to the establishment of the NFLA. Manchester’s Policy Committee on 26th October 1981 formally agreed to support the setting up of the Steering Committee and to act as Secretary to the Committee which it did until its recent demise.
Leeds officially became a Nuclear Free Zone on 24 June 1981 and they formed a relationship with local peace groups, promoted peace education and highlighted the possible local impact of a nuclear war.
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The above images are from a series called ‘Greeting from Nuclear Free Leeds’ by Leeds Postcards.
In October 1981, Bradford Metropolitan Council declared itself to be a nuclear-free zone and founded the Peace Action Group in 1982, to monitor progress made in establishing the zone, link with other nuclear-free zone local authorities and peace groups and generate new ideas in peace education.
South Yorkshire County Council, along with the city of Sheffield, declared the region a Nuclear Free Zone in 1981 and a ‘demilitarised zone’. Road signs were installed to inform visitors of its status and by the end of 1982, over 150 local governments with a total population of over 60% of people in England, Scotland and Wales had declared their areas ‘Nuclear Free Zones’.
On 23 February 1982 Wales was declared a nuclear free zone after Clwyd County Council declared itself ‘nuclear free’.
Also at the end of 1982, the Thatcher government was proposing to hold a national civil defence exercise called “Hard Rock”. CND had built a strong campaign against the exercise, saying that a nuclear war would result in widespread devastation and tens of millions of deaths which could not be dealt with by local councils. They renamed the exercise “Hard Luck” and argued that any preparations were pointless and misled the public about the survivability of nuclear war. The NFLA councils agreed and 20 of them refused to take part with seven more saying they would only participate in a limited way.
As a result “Hard Rock” was postponed indefinitely and effectively cancelled. Rather than waste resources and time on Civil Defence, many councils instead created emergency planning teams to deal with domestic situations like flooding, local evacuations and chemical incidents.
Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield and others created peace officer and peace education officer roles within their councils. They would help provide and distribute information on the effects of nuclear war and nuclear power on the people and the environment and support events held by peace and environment groups. Unfortunately, these posts gradually diminished as government funding and antagonism made them more difficult to sustain.
However, in May 1991 Leeds City Council produced a booklet “Leeds and the Bomb” which outlined the potential effects of a nuclear strike on the city and they also promoted various peace exhibitions. Another publication “Leeds and Bradford Under a Cloud” about what would happen in the case of a radiation leak from a nuclear power station, was produced by Leeds Peace & Emergency Planning Unit in 1995.
Manchester adopted the Peace Dove as the city’s symbol of its nuclear-free status and the dove appears in several locations in the city. It was the first European city to formally support the TPNW, on 28 November 2018 when the council passed a unanimous resolution urging the UK government to sign and ratify this treaty.
In 2021, Leeds City Council passed a resolution proposed by Councillor David Blackburn (then also NFLA Chair) expressing regret at the actions of nuclear-armed states and backing the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which had just come into force. A peace tree was also planted in Park Square in the centre of the city to commemorate the event.
1982 was also an important year for the international anti-nuclear movement. On June 24, at the United Nations in New York, then Mayor Takeshi Araki of Hiroshima called for cities throughout the world to transcend national borders and work together to press for nuclear abolition. The cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki then went on to establish “The World Conference of Mayors for Peace through Inter-city Solidarity” (now known as “Mayors for Peace”), composed of mayors around the world who formally expressed support for this call.
Today there are 8,563 participating cities in 166 countries and regions around the world, 87 of them in the UK. Manchester joined Mayors for Peace in 1984 and was appointed a Mayors for Peace Vice President in 2001 & Lead City in 2013. In 2015 Manchester set up the UK & Ireland Chapter of Mayors for Peace and in October 2024 they hosted the Mayors for Peace Executive Conference. Last November Manchester Council also marked the 45th anniversary of the ‘Manchester Initiative’ and reaffirmed its commitment to a nuclear free world.
Mayors for Peace continue to stand for a peaceful world free from the threat of nuclear weapons today and have representatives across the UK including in Bradford, Kirklees, Leeds and Sheffield.
The past secretaries of NFLA have all contributed an amazing amount of work to educate and inform councils of the dangers of nuclear power and nuclear weapons. They have brought together local and district councils and been involved in international campaigns, including working with Japanese victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to emphasise the humanitarian consequences when cities are targets for nuclear weapons. They have also highlighted the health risks of nuclear power plants and the transport and storage of radioactive waste in the UK. In addition, they have pointed to the dangers associated with the frequent nuclear warhead convoys that travel along motorways from Coulport to Burghfield and back for warhead refurbishment, and they have encouraged councils to take part in ceremonies remembering the horrific bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6/9 August each year.
Thanks are due to Stewart Kemp, Sean Morris (who started as a Leeds City Council Emergency Planning Officer) and Richard Outram (who previously worked part-time for Yorkshire CND) for all their work as NFLA secretaries. Thanks too to all the Councillors who took the time to Chair the NFLA and thanks to NFLA Policy Advisor Pete Roche and to Jamie Woolley who acted as legal adviser to NFLA for many years in the early days.
Although the NFLA may continue in some form in Scotland and Wales, it will take a lot to fill the hole that the end of the NFLA has left in our campaigning for a nuclear free world.
