Portrait of the week
In a week almost entirely devoted to news and commiserations about the British weather, it must be supposed that little hap- pened in the rest .of the world. Tempera- tures at Braemar, in the Scottish Highlands, were at – 27°C, said to be six degrees colder than the South Pole. A plague of rats was reported after flooding in York. There was extensive looting in Welsh villages. Con- fidence trickers claimed to be collecting bread for hospitals and old age pensioners, then sold it for double price. Mr Heseltine agreed to help local authorities, up to a point, over extra expenses incurred. But in parts of America the cold snap was much worse, with temperatures of – 109 degrees being recorded in Dakota and Minnesota.
In Poland, censorship of foreign news reporting was relaxed, possibly to improve the international image of General Jaruzelski's regime, but NATO ministers (except Greece) condemned it roundly nevertheless, and made vague threats of sanctions against Russia and Poland unless military rule was lifted. Mr Haig seemed satisfied. It was noted that United States sanctions against Russia fell short of another grain embargo. The Polish Com- munist Party was rumoured to have lost half its three million members.
D eace was declared to have broken out in 1 the Labour. Party when Mr Benn was said to have given an assurance not to challenge the leadership or deputy leader- ship until after the general election. Mr Benn neither confirmed nor denied this. Similarly, peace was said to have broken out between Liberals and. Social Democrats over the allocation of seats, and Mr Jenkins was duly nominated SODPAL candidate for Glasgow Hillhead..
On the Tory side, the Prime Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Attorney General joined together to reassure the public that all the £2 million subscribed would go to the families of eight lifeboatmen drowned off Mousehole, Corn- wall, without deduction of any sort. The Lord Chancellor joined another public out- cry in condemning a judge who had fined a rapist £2,000 rather than sending him to prison. The apparent issue was whether negligence by the victim — a female hitch- hiker travelling alone after dark — rather than provocation could be used in mitiga- tion, but the public outcry went far beyond that, with various MPs demanding statutory jail sentences for rape and the prosecution's right of appeal against sentence.
A rail strike on Wednesday and Thursday was due to be repeated next week, with ag- gressive noises on both sides. Sir Peter
Parker threatened to suspend all 20,000 train drivers on strike. Miners seemed likely to approve a national coal strike. After nearly all the other Ford plants had voted against striking, 10,000 workers at Halewood on Merseyside held a five-day wildcat strike in protest. A third of all unemployment benefit offices in London closed for half a day in protest against over- work and staff cuts. A Department of Employment spokesman pointed out that staff had in fact been increased from 2,400 in January 1981 to 3,200 in January 1982.
president Mitterrand's France agreed to
sell £10 million worth of defence equip- ment to Marxist Nicaragua. In Italy, police arrested ten alleged members of the Red Brigades, including Professor Giovanni Senzani, thought to have been the 'brains' behind various cold-blooded murders, but there was no sign of General James Dozier. The Malaysian Foreign Minister saved himself by jumping out of an aeroplane seconds before it crashed into a mountain, killing his two companions. The less lucky Albanian Prime Minister was now said to have died in a shoot-out with President Enver Hoxha over the dinner table, rather than to have committed suicide, as previously reported.
After Lord Grade's golden handshake of £750,000 to his former managing director had been delayed by High Court action from shareholders in Associated Com- munications Corporation, all share dealings in the company were suspended while the Board considered a take-over from an Australian financier, reputed to be called Mr Robert Holmes a'Court. Lady Hart- well, formerly Lady Pamela Berry, wife of the Editor in Chief of the Daily and Sunday Telegraph, died at 67. Mark Thatcher was lost in the Sahara desert. Among the na- tion's heroes. Sebastian Coe MBE was hired for a reputed £30,000 to advertise Horlicks on television, Mr Harvey Smith was fined £75 for punching a man in Har- rogate who, he claimed, had insulted the Royal Family, and Miss Erika Roe, 24, who bared her breasts at Twickenham, was driven around the country in a Daily Mirror
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