Nerve gas man steps up battle for apology

A PIRBRIGHT man exposed to deadly  sarin  nerve  gas  in secret government experiments will visit Westminster on Tuesday when MPs debate the  use  of  human  volunteers at the Porton Down defence laboratories.

Barry Barnes, 70, of Burners Heath, will travel to Westminster Hall with a dozen other members of the Porton Down Veteran Support Group to observe a private members’ debate on the experiments.

Mr Barnes, just 19 and on national service with the RAF when he volunteered for what he was told was research into the common cold in 1953, is calling for a full public inquiry.

He was one of thousands of human guinea pigs used at the Wiltshire laboratory between 1939 and 1989.

He said: “I am going up there because I would like to see what was done to us recognised. An apology should be given to all the people who took part in these experiments as we were hoodwinked.”

Mr Barnes went temporarily blind after the exposure and has since suffered bouts of neuralgic pain behind his eyes, a legacy, he claims, of  sarin gas exposure. He said: “We were taken into the middle of Salisbury Plain and told to walk around in our clothing with respirators on. Then we were told to remove the respirator and continue walking in a chamber for two minutes. Soon after, we put our respirators on again and  began to feel these awful effects. I lost my eyesight and felt terrible pain behind my eyes.

“All the equipment was then taken off and I could barely see. It was like looking through a thick, black fog.”

Mr Barnes was then driven back to Porton Down where he had to wait three days for an antidote while further tests were carried out.  Despite the ordeal, he said he was one of the lucky ones. “One of the chaps in our group never came back. He was taken to hospital where he had to be resuscitated,” he explained.

The following week the next batch of volunteers arrived which included serviceman Ronald Maddison, who collapsed and died after having sarin dropped on his arm.

Mr Barnes said: “You don’t forget that kind of thing – it was a horrendous experience. I would not want anyone to go through what I went through. It is always with you. You do something thinking you are helping your country, but you really need to think twice about it. At 19, though, you are in no position to do anything.”

An inquest last year into the death of Ronald Maddison returned a verdict of unlawful killing, overturning a ruling 51 years before that his death was the result of misadventure.

Mr Barnes gave a statement to Wiltshire Police in their four-year investigation into Mr Maddison’s death.

The Ministry of Defence is seeking to overturn the unlawful killing verdict, but Mr Barnes and the  veterans support group are demanding a full public inquiry into the systematic use of human guinea pigs at Porton Down.

The ex-RAF serviceman has already been mentioned in the House of Commons after Woking MP Humfrey Malins put his name forward to a fellow MP in an adjournment debate in January.

Mr Malins said: “Mr Barnes made some very valid points to me and I shall do my best to see that they get an airing in the debate on Tuesday. There is a big issue to discuss here.”