PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
The police are advised that they should turn a blind eye to men cruising for votes
r Ken Livingstone finally announced his candidature for Mayor of London as an independent; the Labour party machinery immediately began to rubbish him. Mr John Prescott, the Secretary of State for the Envi- ronment, Transport and the Regions, said he wanted 860,000 houses built in the south- east of England in the next 20 years. The Countryside and Rights of Way Bill was published, to give public access to moor, heath and down in private ownership and to create a new offence of 'reckless distur- bance' of wildlife. NTL offered free access to the Internet for people who use its tele- phone facilities; a few hours earlier AltaVista had offered free telephone access for those who subscribe to its Internet ser- vice; and then BT offered unmetered lines for a £1-a-day subscription. Mr Stephen Byers, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, requested talks with banks who are planning not only to charge customers of other banks £1 for using their cash machines but also to charge their own customers £1.50 for using other banks' machines; unlucky customers might thereby have to pay £2.50 to withdraw even a small sum. Twenty-nine Labour MPs voted against a Bill to limit trial by jury. The Metropolitan Police sacked a Sikh sergeant whom a tribunal found guilty of sending racist material to ethnic minority officers including himself. The memoirs of Mr Trevor Rees-Jones, a bodyguard to Dodi Fayed, contradicted the version of events favoured by Mr Mohamed AI Fayed about the last weeks and death of Diana, Princess of Wales. Mr and Mrs Tony Blair took out an injunction against the Mail on Sunday to prevent it publishing reminiscences of a nanny who worked for them from 1994 to 1998. Derek Longmuir, aged 48, a founder member of the Bay City Rollers, pleaded guilty to charges of possessing indecent images of children. Marksmen shot dead all 215 macaque monkeys at Woburn because some had the simian herpes B virus, which can be passed to human beings. A Dutch- man published a book about the A272 from Winchester to Haywards Heath.
MR George W. Bush secured enough sup- port to gain nomination as Republican can- didate for the presidency, after beating Mr John McCain; Mr Al Gore convincingly beat Mr Bill Bradley for the Democratic nomina- tion. The Israeli cabinet voted to withdraw troops from Lebanon by July; Mr Ehud Barak, the Prime Minister, said this would happen even if no peace agreement had been reached with Syria. General Augusto Pinochet flew home to Chile from RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire; he scandalised opinion by walking about in a lively attitude, although his extradition to Spain for trial has been disallowed on the grounds of his unfitness. Hundreds of thousands of Mozambicans continued to suffer from floods; television cameras showed heli- copters plucking some from trees, many con- tracted malaria. In Mongolia 800,000 nomads faced starvation because their cattle were dying at the rate of 250,000 a week through drought followed by icy weather. In Nigeria clashes between Muslims and Chris- tians over the introduction of Sharia law in the north left dozens dead. Squatters over- ran more than 200 white-owned farms and intimidated their owners while the govern- ment of President Robert Mugabe refused to intervene. Serbia imposed a full economic blockade on Montenegro in a move to weak- en the position of its President, Mr Milo Djukanovic, who seeks independence. Mr Robin Cook, the British Foreign Secretary, visited Slovakia amid resentment about Britain's refusal to lift the requirement, imposed after the entry of many gypsies in 1998, for Slovak visitors to Britain to obtain visas. Californians voted against recognising homosexual marriages. In Pakistan, 52 died when a bus on the way to a wedding party at Shandadkot in Sindh province fell into a canal. Twenty elephants and their mahouts were banned from the streets of Bangkok where they had made a living from begging. CSH
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