PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
At its special conference at Blackpool the Liberal Party voted by six-to-one in favour of merging with the SDP. This was seen as a triumph for Mr David Steel even though almost all the speakers said that they thought he had made a frightful mess of the preceding tortured negotiations. One former Liberal MP, Mr Michael Meadowcroft, an anti-mergerite, had only one message for the proposed new party: 'Goodbye'. Arthur Scargill was re-elected to his position as president of the National Union of Mineworkers; his share of the vote, however, dropped from more than 70 per cent in 1981 to 54 per cent. The Attorney General, Sir Patrick Mayhew, said that it would be against the public interest to prosecute anyone in the RUC following the so-called 'shoot to kill' in- quiry begun in Northern Ireland by the former deputy chief constable of Greater Manchester, Mr John Stalker. The Public Expenditure White Paper was published showing that the Chancellor has consider- able scope for reducing taxation. Nurses in eight London hospitals voted to strike; others held union meetings to decide if they would join the 'day of action' set for 3 February. In a television interview the Prime Minister indicated that the Govern- ment would undertake a speedy and thor- ough review of the NHS. After heated debate Mr David Alton's Bill to reduce the legal limit for abortions from 28 to 18 weeks secured a majority of 45 at its• second reading in the House of Commons. Mr Jeremy Warner, business correspon- dent of the Independent was fined 120,000 in the High Court for contempt in refusing to reveal sources to inspectors investigating City insider dealing. BP upped its offer for shares in Britoil and seems almost certainly to have won control of the company, although what the Government will do with its all-powerful 'golden share' remains uncertain. Buckingham Palace announced that the Duchess of York is expecting a baby in August.
ISRAEL began to ease its curfews on the Gaza Strip as Palestinian unrest seemed to subside. In Washington the Senate began their consideration of the Reagan- Gorbachev arms treaty. Japan decided to impose diplomatic sanctions on North Korea saying that their 'organised terror- ism' was responsible for the bombing of a South Korean airliner two months ago. The Prince and Princess of Wales — accompanying the Ashes — arrived in Australia for the bicentennial celebrations. Mad, bad and dangerous to know: Lord Byron's bicentenary was also celebrated. A British journalist, Mr Brian Milton, com- pleted his record-breaking 36-day journey to Australia in a micro-light aircraft. The former Governor of Texas, Mr John Con- nally, wounded by gunfire when President Kennedy was shot dead in his car in Dallas, was forced by straitened circumstances to auction off all his belongings in a bankrupt- cy sale. The US Air Force concluded that the destruction of one of its $280 million B-1B bombers, designed to fly below Soviet radar, was caused by a collision with a pelican. British Special Branch detectives warned leading Iraqi dissidents living in the United Kingdom about assassination attempts after a leading Iraqi businessman was killed by thallium, a tasteless and odourless rat poison. Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the leader of the Pushtus, and last survivor of Mahatma Gandhi's 'inner cir- cle' during his campaign against the Brit- ish, died, as did Raymond Williams, the Marxist critic.
MStJT
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