Importing radioactive waste to Dounreay would set a dangerous precedent say Orkney's parliamentary representatives.

Orkney MSP Jim Wallace and Alistair Carmichael, MP for Orkney and Shetland, have come out against plans to store the waste from decommissioned nuclear submarines at Dounreay.

One of the companies seeking the contract to scrap the former Royal Navy submarines wants an extension to the Vulcan Naval Reactor Test Establishment site at Dounreay as a storage site for the nuclear waste.

Lord Bach, the Minister for Defence Procurement, wrote to MPs to tell them that Devonport Royal Dockyard Limited plans to approach the Ministry of Defence about the extension.

Jim Wallace said the proposal should be scrapped.

"I strongly believe that the only radioactive waste which should be stored in the north of Scotland should be that produced there,'' he said.

"Importing waste would set a dangerous precedent.''

Mr Carmichael said there had been close to universal opposition across the Highlands and Islands when Nirex, the agency responsible for the disposal of radioactive waste, proposed to use Dounreay as a site for the UK's intermediate radioactive waste repository.

"The justified concern was that the Highlands and Islands could not afford to be seen as the UK's nuclear waste dump as our clean environment is too important to us to risk any taint,'' he said.

"For this reason, the Liberal Democrat position has long been that the only waste which should be stored in the north of Scotland is that produced at Dounreay.

"I fully support this position and therefore oppose any idea that the submarine waste should be imported to the Vulcan site, not just because it would, in itself, be wrong, but also because it could be a Trojan horse for the return of Nirex.''