Gen 75 Committee

The Gen 75 Committee was a subcommittee of the British Cabinet, convened by Prime Minister Clement Attlee on 29 August 1945. The purpose of the committee was to discuss and establish the British government's nuclear policy. Gen 75 was dubbed by Attlee as the "Atom Bomb Committee".

Membership of Gen 75 comprised six ministers including: the Prime Minister (Clement Attlee), the Lord President of the Council (Herbert Morrison), the Foreign Secretary (Ernest Bevin), the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Hugh Dalton), and A.V. Alexander.

On 18 December 1945, the Gen 75 Committee agreed the initial step of building one or more nuclear reactors and the creation of the British nuclear power programme. Attlee appointed Air Marshal Viscount Portal of Hungerford, former Chief of the Air Staff, as Controller of Production, Atomic Energy (CPAE). Portal was aidied by a small staff of civil servants, some with experience of the earlier Tube Alloys project, and enjoyed direct access to the Prime Minister.

The Gen 75 Committee was the successor of the Tube Alloys Consultative Council that met from November 1941 to June 1945, under the chairmanship of Lord President of the Council John Anderson. Almost all details of the Council and its work were kept secret even from the War Cabinet, of which it was a committee. It was replaced by an official ministerial committee in February 1947.