Small dose 
- Termites 'invade' Britain - shock

The timber treatment industry is always on the look-out for a good scare story to promote its chemical products.  Now that most older homes have already been sprayed against woodworm and dry rot, twice or three times in some cases, the timber treaters have had to sniff around for other dragons to slay.  To this end, the idea that Britain might become colonised by termites has always been something of a holy grail; at conferences and in trade magazines, the industry has mused over the lip-smacking prospects of a plague of rampaging sub-tropical house munchers.
    First dreams of a termite invasion focused on the Channel Tunnel-as soon as it was dug, we were told, termites would come scurrying through, hardly stopping for their duty-frees, and gobble up every bit of wood in sight.  Sadly for the industry, the termites-just like all those rabid French foxes - failed to show up at Folkestone, and the story died away.  Then the discovery, in 1994, of a colony of termites in a greenhouse in Barnstable raised hopes, but it turned out that the owners had imported the little critters from their holiday home in Tenerife in a potted palm-the Building Research Establishment found that the insects had only survived because of the heat in the greenhouse; there was no chance of them going out and chomping through the rest of Devon. These particular termites were supposedly exterminated by a local timber treatment company, but a sickly handful seem to have survived, and have now been found cowering in the kitchen of the same property- this is the discovery which has led to the current Termites invade Britain story which you may have seen in the media recently. The tale was spiced up by the suggestion that the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions tried to suppress news of the Barnstable Five for fear of affecting property values in the area, which was pure journalistic make-believe, as the incident has always been widely reported in the trade press.
    But the resurrected story is an absolute gift for the timber treaters, who have been busily rehearsing their own version-climate change, they say, is responsible for the appearance of the termites, and unless every new home is now built with chemically-impregnated timber, it will be chewed to bits before you can say 'global warming'. The fact that global warming may actually result in a colder Britain, due to the diversion of the Gulf Stream, only shows up the simplicity of their logic. Besides which, enquiries to countries where termites are a real pest, such as Australia and the US, reveal that they only eat damp wood in contact with the ground; as with all wood-eating insects, the way to prevent infestation is by attention to correct building practices, like rainwater disposal, surface water drainage and under-floor ventilation. The use of toxic chemicals is an admission that these essentials have not been dealt with.
Jeff Howell is a construction writer and broadcaster.

[This article first appeared in Pesticides News No. 40, June 1998, page 20]