The purpose of the
Protect and Survive scheme was to provide members of the British public with instructions, primarily via broadcast media, on how to protect themselves and survive a
nuclear attack. The broadcasts were to be supplemented by a pamphlet which was to act as an
aide-memoire for householders; despite the pamphlet's later prominence in British culture, the campaign was originally conceived as being broadcast-led, with the pamphlet being confirmed later. The scheme was not intended to be made public during peacetime, and would only have been broadcast if a nuclear attack was deemed likely by the Government during an international crisis. The information detailed a series of steps recommended to be undertaken by British civilians to improve their chances of survival in the event of a nuclear strike on the United Kingdom.
Basic advice The following advice was common to all components of the campaign, but is presented here according to the ordering contained in the pamphlet.
Nuclear weapon effects It was explained that everything within a certain radius of a nuclear explosion would be destroyed, and that the heat and blast effects would be extremely destructive for the first five miles and could still cause severe damage beyond this. The formation of and risk from
radioactive fallout was also explained.
Household shelters The advice on preparing a shelter at home caused much of
Protect and Survive's later infamy. The campaign aimed to convince people of the importance of staying at home instead of self-evacuating elsewhere on the basis that one's local authority would offer the best help. Ideally, a cellar or basement would be used as the fallout room; if not, householders were to use a ground-floor area which was as far away from the roof and outside walls (or at least had the smallest amount of outside wall) as possible. • Using a sufficiently large table or tables, to be surrounded and covered with heavy furniture filled with sand, earth, books, or clothing • Reinforcing the
stair cupboard let alone unofficially. A battery-powered radio would have been essential for receiving
outside messages, and it was recommended to take a spare radio in addition to batteries; aerials were not to be extended until an attack was concluded to avoid
electromagnetic pulse damage. The basic "survival kit" was rounded off with stocks of warm clothing • Sand, cloths, or tissues for wiping down plates and utensils • A notebook and pencils for writing messages • Brushes, shovels, cleaning materials, rubber or plastic gloves, and a dustpan and brush • Toys and magazines • A mechanical clock and a calendar Special toilet arrangements needed to be made in order to conserve water. Toilet articles had already been mentioned in the provisions list (see above), and were mentioned again in relation to sanitation; the buckets or other containers were to be covered and fitted with bag liners, and if possible a chair should be improvised as a toilet seat.
Warnings and actions on warning The various warning signals were explained (and, in the films, were accompanied by recordings of how they would sound). An
attack warning would involve sirens sounding a rising and falling note as well as warnings delivered via radio. A fallout warning would involve three loud bangs (from
maroon rockets), gongs, or whistles in quick succession. When the immediate danger had passed, sirens would sound the all-clear with a steady note. On hearing the attack warning, people who were already at home (or could reach it within "a couple of minutes") were to send any children to the fallout room first, turn off gas, electricity, and oil supplies as described earlier, close stoves and damp down other fires, shut their windows and draw the curtains, and finally go to the fallout room. Those who could not reach their homes were to take cover in nearby buildings if they were not already indoors, or to take any other kind of cover if they could not reach a building in time, including lying flat in a ditch and covering up their hands and head.
Print The
Protect and Survive pamphlet was prepared in 1976, and some 2,000 copies were printed and secretly issued to chief executives of local authorities and senior police officers. Its existence having been brought to public attention by the
Times (see below), a slightly revised edition was printed in 1980 and made available through
Stationery Office bookshops. but it was intended for free distribution to all British households should a crisis period develop. The contents of the pamphlet would also be printed in national newspapers if the risk of nuclear attack increased, with printers' proofs of this version being prepared beforehand. Early drafts featured what Taras Young called "clumsy choices"; the stay-at-home language included a statement that "only fools run away", while drawings for the inner refuge showed it being prepared with cushions and mattresses rather than the bulkier items of the final version. The Central Office of Information expressed concern that the "Deaths" section would be unduly worrying; the heading was thus removed and the information folded into the "Casualties" section. The main pamphlet was complemented in 1981 by two publications regarding the construction of
fallout shelters: an A5 pamphlet called
Domestic Nuclear Shelters with techniques for building a home shelter, and an A4 book called
Domestic Nuclear Shelters – Technical Guidance for the design and construction of long-term and permanent shelters, some of which involved elaborate designs. The A5 pamphlet was later described as "neither flesh nor fowl" in a 1986 memorandum, and as early as 1983 it was felt that the information therein should instead be incorporated into a future revision of
Protect and Survive. One of the shelters described in both
Domestic Nuclear Shelters publications was essentially identical to the Second World War-era
Morrison shelter, with assembly instructions being little changed from those presented in a 1941 pamphlet for the same; another type of shelter was based on the
Anderson shelter, also of Second World War vintage. Like the main
Protect and Survive pamphlet, the A5
Domestic Nuclear Shelters pamphlet was priced at 50 pence; One final pamphlet,
Nuclear Weapons, did not carry
Protect and Survive branding (and, indeed, had been first published in 1956), but an updated version was published in the same year as the main
Protect and Survive pamphlet and has been referred to alongside the other pamphlets. This pamphlet contained a more technical discussion of nuclear weapon effects and countermeasures. This wave of interest had been preceded by numerous letters to
The Times in December 1979 questioning what Civil Defence arrangements were in place in the UK. This was then followed by a
Times leader on 19 January 1980 which noted that: "In Britain, a Home Office booklet "Protect and Survive" remains unavailable." Following this unexpected publicity for
Protect and Survive, The Minister of State at the Home Office,
Leon Brittan, responding on the subject in the House of Commons on 20 February 1980 said that: The Minister then went on to say the Home Office had received over two hundred letters from the public on civil defence. Following the press and parliamentary focus on
Protect and Survive, as well as an episode of the BBC's
Newsnight programme which focused on the campaign, the government chose to publish the pamphlet in May 1980. The films were produced by Richard Taylor Cartoons, who also produced the
Charley Says child safety films and children's animation
Crystal Tipps and Alistair, with rough cuts being screened at the Central Office of Information in November of that year. the subject of outdoor shelters was later covered in the
Domestic Nuclear Shelters series of publications. While it has been speculated that small portions of these recordings is heard in
Threads, such as during the scene where the character of Bill Kemp is discussing removing internal doors to use for their shelter, they are in fact either re-recorded by an actor or extracted from the public information films. ==Political reaction==