- -Portrait of the Week INTO THE LAST TEN OF the
100 days, and under the threat of dynamic action the aircraft industry was lighting for its life. With the Concord almost saved, attention was turned to the TSR-2. Air- craft industrialists were invited to Chequers to meet Mr. Wilson—possibly the same leaders that Mr. Healey, the Defence Minister, referred to when commenting that it was not a government's duty to 'wet-nurse overgrown and mentally re- tarded children in the domestic economy.' In his battle with rising prices Mr. Brown received promises of stability from supermarket chains, wrote letters of inquiry to twenty trade associa- tions, and promptly went off to Austria, where he claimed that there would be no election in the UK until 1967.
*
NEVERTHELESS, THE TORIES continued to speculate about their leader : prominent back-benchers be- gan to speak out in favour of Sir Alec Douglas- Home, and Ladbrokes were offering evens on his becoming the next leader of the party. Mean- while, ex-Postmaster-General Bevins having lost his seat in Cabinet and Commons, is to cast the Pearls of his memories of the last Tory leadership crisis before readers of the Sunday Express. Sir Gerald Nabarro wants to return to politics.
'WARM SEND OFF FOR MARGARET,' commented The Times laconically when the Princess and Lord Snowdon returned home from Ireland where an explosion almost 'blew their house up. Adam Faith finally left South Africa, having taken seventeen concerts to realise that the audiences were segregated. But he may have to return for court proceedings. A Johannesburg store began selling a gun holster that women could wear within their blouse, 'that left the bust line un- altered,' and a major British collectibn of Egyptian mummies, brought to England by Edward VII when Prince of Wales, was described by scientists as an 'archaeological hoax.'
*
MR. WILSON AND MR. KOSYGIN (whatever happened to that other invitation to Mr. Brezhnev?) agreed to exchange visits during the spring. The first volume of the new History of :he Communist Party of the Soviet Union has had to be quickly withdrawn as it praises Mr. Khrushchev. China claimed to have shot down a U-2 aircraft, Indonesia issued 'Confrontation' bonds (at 15 per cent interest) to finance the war against Malaysia, and Herr Strauss, the former German Defence Minister, said Germany was 'not solely to blame for the two world wars.'
*
AFTER AN EARLIER PROMISE to work weekends, London dockers declined to : more gloomy news In the labour world was a threatened steel strike. While many teachers and government typists similarly uttered warning noises. Lord Monckton and Dr. Onions (the doyen of Oxford dictionary Compilers) died. The police appeal for the public to 'have a go' at robbers was a success: police dogs are to be trained to smell out forbidden drugs, and lie detectors are to be used by a firm Of management consultants. Rediffusion hired an ex-prisoner to give technical advice for No Hiding 'lace. 'When my mates see a safe being blown they like to see it blown right,' he commented.
*
Jaktrs has become once more the most popular Christian name for boys, replacing John among Children whose birth was announced in The Times last year. Jane remains tops on the girls' side, With Mary and Elizabeth next. One Elizabeth in the news yet again was Elizabeth Taylor, who has decided to become British. New York papers pro- claimed: 'Bid by Liz to ditch US.'
Previous page
