Few sensible people would deny that efficient government depends to some extent on secrecy. It would, for example, be nonsense to suggest that Cabinet discussions on the Budget...

South Africa's worst riots ever continued for six days, with more than 140 deaths. he Police Commissioner in charge said, Next time we will use tougher methods'. Mr Vorster,...

Second-rate second chamber John Grigg About a fortnight ago (on 9 June, to be exact) the House of Lords debated the economic situation. It was a long debate, lasting until...

Commenting recently on a letter to the Times from Mr Eric Levine, a solicitor, in which he defended a judgment given in favour of his client, the then Mr James Goldsmith, we...

Poles apart Auberon Waugh I was prevented from attending the International Cocktail Party of the Association of Polish Students and Graduates in Exile last Wednesday by my work...

Alexander Chancellor Rome On polling day I had lunch in Tuscany with a man who had two party membership cards: one Communist, the other Christian Democrat. My friend, who is...

Richard West Milan In the entrance hall of the Milan Stock Exchange, facing the bust of Cavour, there is a metal plaque in memory of a stockbroker who was killed in 1936 during...

Charles Foley Los Angeles What have Charles Colson, Timothy Leary, the Manson family, Jerry Rubin and Jimmy Carter in common ? Only that they have been, as the title of Mr...

David Boulton The tragi-comic saga of the Yugoslav lawyer Srdja Popovic runs on. He was prosecuted for repeating in court the allegedly anti-state opinions of the client he was...

Patrick Cosgrave On every day that I come into London I am obliged to suffer two minutes of dark depres sion. They arrive as I cross the churchyard of St Mark's, Kennington, on...

Lord Montagu of Beaulieu Recently, seven weary but exhilarated members of the British Bicentennial Heritage Mission arrived back from a three weeks' coast-to-coast tour of the...

Christopher Booker As one totters along, Justice Shallow-like, towards middle age, there is a point where public life begins to take on a particular air of absurdity—and that...

James Hughes-Onslow Undoubtedly the most over-used word at Ascot last week was 'frippery', a term which, until recently, was not widely familiar outside the trade union...

Andrew Alexander For those of us who are, in the current parlance 'monetarists', this ought to be a moment of triumph. Scarcely a speech by the Chancellor is complete without a...

Elisabeth Dunn Once upon a time, everything had its price. Then along came a President of the Board of Trade called Edward Heath who abolished resale price maintenance and...

Recovery and gloom Nicholas Davenport My favourite economic reading is the Bank of England quarterly Bulletin. It is written in Food plain English and avoids the economic...

Sir: Your leading article hopes that Mrs Thatcher 'will take a bold stand in favour of what is one of the essential elements of the British Constitution, a House of Commons...

Sir: The present controversy over immigration—and the accompanying rise in racial tension—again highlights the double standards being operated by Westminster. I refer to the...

Sir: Why does John Grigg advise the Tories to reconcile themselves with Mr Heath (19 June)? In nine years their former leader lost them three elections out of four. Surely the...

Sir : I had been meaning to write and thank you for your courageous and admirable support for Private Eve during our recent and continuing difficulties. As far as I know your...

are too familiar—and the reply to them is too obvious—to justify further imposition on your readers. The only remarkable thing IS that he should have chosen to air them Publicly...

rightly points out what appears to be the unlawfulness of telling the truth in certain circumstances because of the , Rehabilitation of Offenders Act. Might I point out a...

says that it is not true that a significant proportion of immigrants are here illegally. Yet Praful Patel, secretary of the committee on UK citizenship, estimated in October...

Sir : It was predictable that collusion would take place between the Government and Oppoisition parties to ensure that nothing hinders the Private Member's Bill which will...

Sir: Such self-confidence as may remain to us, such lingering respect in which the foreigner may hold us, is hardly fortified by an all-out display of national masochism like...

What is a bulger? I'm collecting up the old songs of girls' schools and women's colleges before co-education means they vanish. I have come across this verse from Westfield...

Girls will be girls Brigid Brophy The Schoolgirl Ethic: The Life and Work of Angela Brazil Gilllan Freeman (Allen Lane £4.50) 'Did girls really ask one another, "Twiggez vous...

Peter Dickinson Charles Ives and His America Frank Rossiter (Gollancz £8.50) A great composer inevitably reveals the character of the society in which he grew up, both by what...

L. Powys EBONY AND IVORY etc.: Stuart-Young s MERELY A NEGRESS etc; Mark Freshfield's STORMY DAWN. Edo Wallace's SANDERS novels. Contact Noble. 18 Downstde Cles., London N.W.3....

Phillip Knightley Exemplary Justice Allen Andrews (Harrap £5.25) The interesting thing about this book is not so much the story it tells but why the author felt he had to tell...

Anthony Clare On the Psychology of Military Incompetence Norman F. Dixon (Jonathan Cape £6.95) Those very characteristics which are demanded of the individual soldier by war...

Elspeth Huxley African Hunter James Mellon (Cassell £15.00) Here is a wild animal book with a difference indeed. Instead of dwelling on their prospects of survival, or on...

Duncan Fallowell The Child John Symonds (Duckworth E3.45) John Symonds's The Child leaves me cold. The whole set-up is designed to make one fall at the feet of an Original in a...

Benny Green On Top Down Under Ray Robinson (Cassell) In Australian Summer, far and away the best account of a cricket tour ever written, Cardus reports a conversation with...

Sweet summer night Bryan Robertson A perfect June evening welcomed Stephane Grappelli last Sunday to his outdoor concert in Regent's Park. From seven o'clock until the music...

The Ram bert Michael Church Outside Sadler's Wells last Friday evening I noticed a familiar tiny figure holding a single tea rose and looking up with unalloyed delight at the...

Placement John McEwen Four Simultaneous Exhibitions at the Tate (till 25 July) is an odd assortment, from the provincial apocalyptics of Samuel Colman's early...

Skin games Ian Cameron Any interest to be found in the new programme at the Jacey, Charing Cross Road, does not come from the quality of its contents. If its title is accurate,...

Dreamhole Kenneth Hurren The Iceman Cometh (Aldwych) Troilus and Cressida (Young Vic) Irene (Adelphi) It has always been hard to say whether the late Eugene O'Neill's The...

Midsummer Jeffrey Bernard Post-Epsom-and-Royal Ascot brain damage now freshly aggravated by television from Wimbledon and Lord's and other bits of green pasture where...