PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
The cheque is in the post John Major announced that Britain would not return to the Exchange Rate Mechanism of the European Community until it had been reformed. Mr Lamont, the Chancellor, did not resign. Since Britain currently holds the Presidency of the EEC, it fell to Mr Major to call a summit of EEC heads of government for next month. Britain's membership of the ERM had been 'suspended' after a rise in interest rates of 5 percentage points had failed to bolster the pound; Parliament was recalled for 24 September, and interest rates were returned to their previous rate of ten per cent, then cut to nine. The pound mean- while slumped to its lowest rate against the deutschmark. Unemployment rose to 2,845,508, a five-year high; the balance of trade deficit in August was £1,085 million, excluding invisibles, against £1,025 million in July. Mona Bauwens' libel case against the People was stymied when the jury was unable to reach a verdict. Dr Nigel Cox was given a 12-month suspended sentence for attempted murder after giving a patient in intense and chronic pain an injection of potassium chloride, which is not a
painkiller but is lethal. The judge said that his act had been not only criminal but also a total betrayal of his unequivocal duty as a physician. The Revd Ian Paisley declined to take part in Anglo-Irish talks in Dublin while the Irish constitution continued to lay claim to the whole island of Ireland. David Cope resigned as Master of Marlborough College after a year of trouble over drugs and discipline in the school; a 15-year-old girl had been prescribed contraceptive pills by the school doctor. The Princess of Wales gave up the lease of her 02,000 red Mer- cedes. Sir Geraint Evans. the baritone, died, aged 70.
FRANCE voted by 51.05 per cent to 48.95 in favour of the Maastricht treaty. Mr Hel- mut Schlesinger, the president of the Bun- desbank, warned Britain that it was up to the other members of the EEC to decide when Britain could rejoin the ERM. Presi- dent Mitterrand met Chancellor Kohl to dis- cuss the French vote. France raised its interest rates to 13 per cent. Denmark demanded substantial changes to the Maas- tricht Treaty before it would hold a new
referendum. Lady Thatcher enjoyed 15 minutes of glory in Washington when she spoke in defence of her pre-ERM policies: 'If you try to buck the market, the market will buck you,' she said. Serbian women blocked the progress of a relief convoy to Muslims in Bosnia, crying: No food for the, Muslim killers of our sons and husbands.' The UN stopped Serbia and Montenegro from taking up the former seat of Yugoslavia. Estonia held its first free elec- tions for 60 years; more than a third of the people living in the country, most of them Russians, were ineligible to vote. The bod- ies of two British women missing since April while holidaying in Australia were found in New South Wales. Mexico and the Vatican re-established diplomatic relations after more than 120 years. Bobby Fischer putted ahead to a 5-2 lead over Boris Spassky in their private championship series. The aboriginal hairy Ainu people of Japan laid claim to the Kurile islands, pos- session of which is disputed between Russia and Japan. More than £353,000-worth of emus have been stolen by rustlers in Texas over the past six months.
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