The Spectator has consistently opposed all forms of compulsory incomes policy, including that introduced by Mr Heath in 1972, and elaborated by him thereafter. However, it must...

Time and again The Spectator has urged the introduction of import controls through quotas or tariffs. Now the Home Policy Committee of the Labour Party's National Executive, as...

Hopeful sounds were to be expected from the members of the Labour Government's team negotiating Britain's EEC membership terms in Dublin. The EEC budget, and the problem of New...

The replacement of Mr John Gollan by Mr Gordon McLennan as general secretary of the Communist Party of Great Britain was described in a BBC news programme as a move to the...

its spirited younger members, reflect the heartfelt wishes of the American people, and indeed the world, in resisting the creasing angry demands of Dr Kissinger for 300 million...

Following his reverse in the Berlin elections, West Germany's Chancellor Schmidt has suffered a further setback in state elections in Rhineland-Palatinate. Thus, even under the...

Mr John Stevenson, who is the chief executive of Buckinghamshire County Council, has sent a memorandum to each of the 5,000 employees of the council advising them on how to...

The welfare organisation, Age Concern, has in its latest recommendations to the Government and the public, drawn attention to an important area of potential abuse of a section...

Mrs Thatcher, who has come in for a good deal of unmerited criticism as a result of the changes she has made at Conservative Central Office, need not be greatly disturbed by the...

Sir: The justification in political ethics for so substantial an increase in the amount of the Civil List turns on what view Her Majesty's advisers take, in reflecting public...

Sir: The Arab Boycott Office in Damascus has announced its intention of ending commercial traffic across the Jordan bridges, between the Israel-occupied West Bank and the...

From Lieut. Cmmdr N. Paulley, RN (Rtd) Sir: Bill Jamieson is right in believing (March 8) that the Conservative Party will have no firmity of purpose until it clears its...

Sir: Dr M. B. Akehurst (March 1) describes my previous letter (February 15) as "misleading in suggesting that the EEC Treaty requires the standardisation of laws in all member...

Sir: The 'Small is Beautiful' growth industry is noteworthy for its spurious economics. John Papworth ('Sovereign State' March 1) falls into the common error of failing to...

Sir: Probably the strongest case yet advanced by a motor industry leader for Britain's continued membership of the European Community was made a short time ago by Mr Gilbert...

Sir: Dr Boyson's article, 'Flight from reality' (March 1) makes disturbing reading: disturbing because of the declining standards of literacy of the children in our schools, and...

Sir: There is no point in printing criticism unless it displays standards — unless all discourse is to give way simply to publicity promotion. Flesh Gordon is evidently a piece...

From Dr S. L. Henderson-Smith Sir: Many may think C. M. Fou's weighty diatribe (March 1) is enough to quell the arguments for voluntary euthanasia once and for all. A little...

Sir: Benny Green's delightful tribute to P. G. Wodehouse (March 1) included no mention of a thick paperback published over sixty years ago entitled: The Swoop, or How Clarence...

Labour how deep the divide? Patrick Cosgrave Some months ago I argued in this column that, despite appearances to the contrary, there was less division in the ranks of the...

Strange things are happening in the Conservative Party in other places than Smith Square. The Conservatives of Skipton recently wrote to Mr Wilfred Proudfoot, an active and...

When Tories rudely shouted, "Stop! The social contract is a flop," Some ministers at once replied, • "The contract has another side, And members really should take heart, The...

We are generally so much pleased with any little accomplishments, either of body or mind, which have once made us remarkable in this World, that we endeavour to persuade...

stop THE TIMES coming out tomorrow By ROSS McWHIRTER F OR the last few weeks a group of people, for whom I am the spokesman, has been meeting to discuss what can be done to...

IF a stand is to be made obviously the first thing to do is to obtain the means of maintaining national communication whatever the Trade Unions may do. This can only be done by...

A shameful public affront Hugh Trevor-Roper On February 25 the Congregation, or Parliament, of Oxford University, by a majority vote, enforced the withdrawal of the honorary...

'Welsh' is, I think, a horrid word; A word that never should be heard. That's why this incident occurred, And why I've given you the bird. Of course I know they've too much...

Trading follies Philip Hewland "The folly of an industrial nation putting barriers between itself and the supply of i nexpensive high quality food and raw materials which it...

Unbalancing act Bill Grundy A week or two ago Mr Larry Lamb, Rupert Murdoch's man suggested in a letter to the Editor of The Spectator that I was never a fellow to let a fact...

Liberal bigots Al Capp We, here, are being told that it will strengthen our souls to be deprived of the comforts we have grown accustomed to. Those who tell us that are mainly...

Humphry Berkeley I confess that I do not understand the hysterical reaction which appears to have taken grip of most of those who oppose the referendum on the Common Market....

Changing patterns Reginald Bevins Now that the dust has more or less settled, we can now apply our minds not only to the obvious, but to the far more fascinating crystal...

Sir Geoffrey Keynes on the sad life of a painter Literature concerning Samuel Palmer (1805-1881) has been of slow growth, beginning in 1882 with a short Life by his son,...

Robert Blake The Gladstone Diaries edited by M. R. D. Foot and M. C. G. Matthew Vol III 1840-47 and Vol IV 1847- 54 (Clarendon Press, Oxford, £28.50 for the two volumes) I...

Edward Norman School Worship. An Obituary John M. Hull (SCM £2.00) Theology in an Industrial Society Margaret Kane (SCM £1.95) Here are two short books published by the ,...

Ariann a St assinopoulos The Dream Game Ann Faraday (Temple Smith £3.95) "0 God! I could be bounded in a nut shell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that...

Johnny Speight Point of Arrival A Study of London's East End Chaim Bermant (Eyre Methuen £5.00) East End Jewish Radicals 1875-1914 W. J, Fishman (Duckworth £6.50) • One of the...

Foolish tears Peter Ackroyd The Hour Before Twilight Richard Austin (Secker and Warburg £2.50) Heaven on Earth Janice Elliott (Hodder and Stoughton £2.95) Sinning with Annie...

Secret Ray Benny Green • In 1942, at a farcically anarchic institution called the North London Emergency Secondary School, the members of the fourth form sat at lift-top desks...

The selling of an author Noel Barber "Bloody exaggeration," said my friend. "It's not. It's true," I protested. It is true. In three weeks recently I appeared on fifty-two TV...

Bookend Two more new paperback ventures were launched last week, making five in under two years. Weidenfeld & Nicolson have teamed up with BPC's Futura Paperbacks to form...

Crime and consequences The judges we deserve lain Scarlet It is a truism that society gets the criminals it deserves and it's often enough suggested that we get the police we...

Travel log Bernard Dixon It is (I trust) permissible once every year or so for a fortnightly columnist to abandon his brief and write about something quite different from...

Bed taste Pamela Vandyke Price Other people's dilemmas distract so soothingly from our less pleasing trivia. Remember the Angela Thirkell heroine who, after a domestically...

Citizens of the world Philip Kleinman Another fine old English advertising company has ceased to be entirely English, but far from feeling any patriotic shame the firm in...

Questioning obedience Martin Sullivan One of the paradoxes of Christianity is that it preaches universal subjection and confers universal liberty. While no man is good enough...

OF THE ARTS Peter Cotes on the theatre's wave of murder plays It has been said not without some truth, that everyone loves a nice juicy murder. The popular Sunday press and...

Indelicate balance Evan Anthony There may be the odd picture or two in the Fuseli exhibition where a face or_body is seen in repose, but it easily escapes memory, replaced by...

Kenneth Robinson Le Fantorne de /a Liberte Director: Luis Bunuel. Stars: Monica Vitti,' Adriana Asti, Jean-Claude Brialy, Adolfe Celi, Paul Frankeur, Michel Lonsdale, Michel...

Having drawn attention last week to some National Theatre extravagance over footwear, Waspe feels almost impelled to congratulate the Royal Shakespeare Company on an ostensible...

Dancers of death Robin Young Without Jerome Robbins's The Concert the Royal Ballet's Gala this year would have been an excessively gloomy affair. Mikhail Barishnikov had...

Economic and market critique Nicholas Davenport The FT index of ordinary shares having reached 300, as I predicted, more than doubling itself in the space of two months, which...

Give the workers the facts Bernard Hollowood Mr Benn, in his Industry Bill, maintains that workers have as much right as shareholders to information — financial and commercial...

The perplexed examination of the Stock Exchange continues, to see what has provoked the boom, and all the pundits are analysing the scene with the irrational logic of mediaeval...