Statement by the Representative of the Plaintiffs
at the Hamaoka Nuclear Power Plants Lawsuit Seeking for Injunction

Toshiko Baba
A Mother
Secretary General of the Stop Hamaoka Trial Society

My name is Toshiko Baba, and I live in Shizuoka City. I am very pleased to be at this Court as a mother who has 18 and 13 year-old sons.

If you take a look at the last pages of the Claim you have been distributed, you can see the reason I became one of the plaintiffs of this trial. The document is titled, “Things I Wish in This Trial”.

Since I was a child, I studied so that I can make myself doing useful things for our society. I studied so that people can live happily through what I would have learned. I believe that all of you here share the same thought.

In my parents' neration, there was a war. They spent their childhood being hungry and they couldn’t study even though they wished. Because of their experiences, they made a wish for their own children, and their dream came true on us.

We have come to live in an affluent society. We are fulfilled without getting hungry, and can learn as much as we want. At any time of history, people would wish for happiness on their next generation and make efforts.

Then, what should our generation pass on to the next generation?

I asked this question to myself when I was going to become a mother. I came to think that what we should pass on to our children is a society in which the environment and lives can coexist. These concepts had been started in Europe already 20 years ago. Their concepts are building of “the new society in harmony with the environment” and making “the ideal form of environment and industry”.

However, there was no movement like this in Japan, which was going to move into the Bubble Economy Era in those days. Then, the Chernobyl nuclear accident occurred.

It was my first time I became aware of the nuclear power plant issue. I saw milk for our children was contaminated and a lot of damage was disclosed. Until then, I used to believe that nuclear power was energy of dream. I was told that way in my elementary school.

However, I came to see the problems of nuclear power, as I became more aware after the Chernobyl accident. Nuclear wastes that can yet to be disposed are generated every day even if plants are operated in safe manner. Electricity cannot be produced without daily occupational exposure. Radioactive materials are emitted into water and air. Warm wastewater destroys surrounding ecosystem of the seas. A lot of mothers who have small children realized that nuclear power should be abolished in their children's age.

16 years ago, everybody still believed that we couldn’t generate sufficient electricity without nuclear power plants. However, I thought that Japan would eventually abandon nuclear energy when alternative energy supplies has become stable in Europe and renewable energy generation is spread sufficiently.

Accordingly, to avoid giving negative impact on the environment through my own life, I have been practicing a way of life in which I reconsidered the pattern of consumption. I have stopped buying unnecessary things, tried not to abuse chemical materials, and disseminated this kind of life to people around me for 18 years.

Due to these activities, I was licensed as an environmental counselor by the Ministry of the Environment five years ago, and currently, I have been giving lectures and workshops on life and environment issues at elementary, junior high, high school, and local gatherings.

It was sometime between last summer and fall when a drastic change came. In our group, there are housewives whose husbands are journalists, prefectural assemblymen, and university researchers. From these people, we came to hear that the Tokai Earthquake could occur within this one or two years.

In regard to Tokai Earthquake, the thing that concerns us most is a nuclear power plant accident. Before realizing this, we used to think what we needed for our life and did whatever we could to lead a sound lifestyle by ourselves.

In other words, we did not used to have much chance to talk about nuclear power plants in our group. However, this time, we started to distribute iodine tablets preparing for a postulated nuclear disaster triggered by Tokai Earthquake. There are only 60 people in our group but we distributed iodine tablets for 350 people. After this initiative, we mothers came to talk about various things.

"Aren't there any side effects of iodine tablets?"

"Do the power plant employees who work in contaminate areas taking tablets every day?"

"Why are only nuclear power plants excluded from the earthquake disaster prediction?"

I cannot think that a gigantic structure like Hamaoka nuclear power plants keep its soundness as a whole.

Then, the radioactive water leak from Hamaoka Unit 1 occurred in November 2001. I said to myself, "Gosh, Hamaoka nuclear power plants are already worn out even without any earthquake."

I gave my 17 and 12 year old sons the iodine tablets that I had been reluctant to give, saying,

If there is an earthquake which make buildings collapse, take this tablet even if nobody instructs you. After that, let us make sure that we can see each other within one day…” While I was saying these words, I felt desperate and asked to myself, what am I saying? Who the hell am I, telling such a cruel thing to my own children?”

“Is it really a adults’ responsibility to give iodine tablets? No, we should be able to do something more than just giving tablets…”

My elder son, who saw me being hurt, said like this. Don't worry, Mother. I think there will never be a big earthquake. Because our government is always lying.”

He said these words to console my heart. My younger son stayed silent.

After the turning of the new year (2002), when I heard about the proposal of initiating a lawsuit on Hamaoka, I made a giant step forward myself.

I always feel all the children's eyes staring at us.

”The society where people do anything for money”

Grown-ups who do different things from what they think”

Grown-ups who never initiate actions though they know what is right”

I want to show that we grown-ups give ideas and make actions step by step for the future to children no matter what sorts of problems are existing now. I want to make children believe that the society will be better so that people’s lives will be better if we make efforts and talk about solutions for these problems.

Otherwise, I think children can never find meanings why they are learning or they have to be grown-ups. I want children to believe in their future.

When I was going to join this lawsuit, a woman who has been active for anti-nuclear power plants said to me, “We already know the result in the court. You are wasting your time.

I do not think this way. Justice should be meant to make people happy. Otherwise, there would be no meaning in justice. If it is used only for judging people or calculating for the damage, it means that the people engaging in judicial fields are denying their judicial philosophy and its potentiality.

In my mind, I have inscribed the names of attorneys from Chubu Electric and three judges here in this court, because I cherish you being here and being a part of the trial for our future sharing the same opportunity.

If you would come to a verdict which anybody could write, there would be no meaning of you being here. Therefore, we would like to come up with some realistic ideas to which we can help. We are here today to talk together and to give out ideas to each other.

In Europe, the percentage of renewable energy is increased and people can choose a way of life in harmony with the environment.

Now, we women are talking like this. “If Chubu Electric get a financial losses due to the shutdown of the nuclear power plants, can’t the government, prefecture, municipalities and citizens cover it together?

“If Chubu Electric make plants that generate electricity out of renewable energy not out of nuclear energy, can’t we citizens along with cooperation buy them and make electricity together as our future property?”

For the future of children, please listen to our wish. Winning or losing is not important. Thank you very much.

At the open trial
July 19, 2002