PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
The Church giving moral guidance
The strike at Ford ended with the management withdrawing its insistence on a three-year pay and practices deal. Work- ers will now receive a seven per cent rise this year and the same next. In other parts of the motor industry pay talks at the Vainthall plant were thrown into confusion and union leaders at Land-Rover sanc- tioned strike action after rejecting a pay deal. The Attorney-General announced that the Government would not prosecute John Walkei for publishing an account of his investigation into the RUC's alleged `shoot-to-kill' policy. The inflation rate fell to a 15-month low of 3.3 per cent for January 1988. A White Paper stated that the number of unfilled job vacancies is three times higher than previous official estimates: it is now thought that there are 700,000 vacancies, the great majority of which are not notified to Jobcentres. It was revealed that Mrs Thatcher had met senior bishops at Chequers in November last year in order to urge them to help in a 'moral revolution'. The Bishop of Durham said he had viewed the meeting with 'modified rapture'. Addressing the General Synod the Home Secretary urged the Church of England to form a partnership with the state of rebuild moral standards, fight crime and revive the inner cities. The Prime Minister intervened in the bitter feud between left- and right-wing factions seeking to control the Young Conserva- tives at their annual conference. Sir Ernst Gombrich, the art historian and Dr Max Perutz, the molecular biologist, have been appointed members of the Order of Merit. A 16-year old British chess player, Michael Adams, beat the World chess champion in a television satellite tournament in which Mr Kasparov took on ten opponents simul- taneously. Prince Edward arrived for his first day at work for the Really Useful Theatre Company clutching a briefcase and a box of teabags.
PLO officials blamed the Israeli secret service for bombing its 'Ship of Return' in harbour at ,Cyprus. The Israeli Defence Minister, Mr Rabin, had previously said that Israel would stop the boat 'in the way it seems suitable'. President Waldheim of Austria, ignoring evidence of his clear recent record of telling less than the truth, rejected growing calls on him to resign, saying that a report on his wartime record by a panel of historians was slanderous. He said 'the belief in our Fatherland is at stake. You can trust me.' At the European Community summit in Brussels Mrs Thatcher accepted a compromise deal over the agricultural issue. In heated debate the French Prime Minister publicly referred to her in obscene language. The British Gov- ernment's White Paper on Hong Kong deferred elections to a Direct Legislative Council until 1991, by which time China will have produced its own constitution for the territory. In the American presidential primaries Mr George Bush surprised pun- dits by winning convincingly in New Hampshire. The US trade gap narrowed to a deficit of $12 billion for December; but the total deficit for 1987 was an unpre- cedented $171 billion. The United States announced that manned flights to Mars were included in its space programme for early next century. The Winter Olympic Games opened in Calgary. Frederick Loewe, the composer, who along with Jay Lerner wrote My Fair Lady and Gigi, died at the age of 86. MStJT
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