from official secrecy about the testing program and the remote locations of the test sites. But as the "Ban the Bomb" movement gathered momentum in Western societies throughout the 1950s, so too did opposition to the British tests in Australia. An opinion poll taken in 1957 showed 49 per cent of the Australian public were opposed to the tests and only 39 per cent in favour. In 1963, Australia was one of the first signatories to a Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. In 1964, very small Peace Marches which featured "Ban the bomb" placards, were held in several Australian capital cities. In 1969, a 500 MW nuclear power plant was proposed for the Jervis Bay Territory, 200 km south of Sydney. A local opposition campaign began, and the South Coast Trades and Labour Council (covering workers in the region) announced that it would refuse to build the reactor. Some environmental studies and site works were completed, and two rounds of tenders were called and evaluated, but in 1971 the Australian government decided not to proceed with the project, citing economic reasons. 1970s The Ranger uranium deposits were first discovered by a joint venture between Peko-Wallsend and Electrolytic Zinc Corporation, by airborne survey radiometric signals in October 1969. Remoteness and difficult terrain set the pace of ground investigation, but by about 1972 there was confidence that the Northern Territory of Australia hosted the largest and richest uranium deposits then known to the world. It was apt that opposition to their mining did not prevail because with each subsequent year it became more apparent that nuclear generation of electricity, that depended on uranium feed, was the superior method for essentially every country. The 1972–73 debate over French nuclear testing in the Pacific mobilised several groups, including some trade unions. In 1972 the International Court of Justice in a case launched by Australia and New Zealand, and advocated by Dr Helen Caldicott, ordered that the French cease atmospheric nuclear testing at Mururoa atoll. In 1973 Australia's concerns saw it as a champion and an early adopter of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, and around this time, the Government ratified the Seabed Arms Control Treaty. Shortly after this, the Government negotiated with the International Atomic Energy Agency to put in safeguards to ensure Australia could mine and export nuclear material but not breach the intent of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. In