PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
Neck and neck The general election campaign got under way with some skirmishes between politicians which were personal rather than political. Among many insults traded in the course of the week, Mr Denis Healey, likened the Prime Minister to Joseph Sta- lin. In the opinion polls the Alliance remained firmly in third place, registering a drop in their support. Labour was thought to have had the best of the campaign so far. Mr Neil Kinnock did well on television. The Conservatives and the Alliance made much of Labour's defence policies: Dr Owen said that they would leave Britain as a 'toothless, shorn and neutered lion', protected by a disinterred `Dad's Army'. The Conservatives' new ideas for education ran into choppy waters when their opponents detected contradic- tions in what senior Conservatives, includ- ing the Prime Minister, were saying. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said that he planned to reduce the standard rate of income tax to 25p within months if the Conservatives were re-elected. The Asso- ciation of British Chambers of Commerce published a survey which said 'that the tide of unemployment really has started to turn'. Shares in Rolls. Royce began trading at a considerable premium over the purch- ase price. Over half the 800 million shares changed hands in early trading. A note- book containing nine complete Mozart symphonies in the composer's own hand was sold at auction in London for £2,350,000. A novice monk from Sussex went on trial for taking a 36-ton lorry loaded with bricks and knocking down a traffic bollard. His defence counsel said that the offence had taken place during Lent when rations had been meagre and life had begun to get him down.
THE United States Defence Secretary, Caspar Weinberger, reassured allies that the removal of Euro-missiles under the proposed superpowers' agreement would not jeopardise Nato's nuclear defence nor undermine America's commitment to Europe. President Reagan said that the United States would continue to maintain a naval presence in the Gulf following the Iraqi attack on an American frigate. Mikhail Gorbachev embarked on a three- day visit to Romania, the only Soviet satellite state that he has not yet visited. It was reported that he was not pleased with his over-elaborate welcome from peasants in national costume. The judge at the trial of Klaus Barbie in Lyons said that the defendant, who had withdrawn from the court, would be forced to attend, if neces- sary in chains. In Texas a tornado com- pletely wrecked Saragossa, a small town, destroying all the buildings and killing 28 people. At a New York zoo a young boy was eaten by polar bears while attempting to swim across their pool. In Fiji the power struggle between the deposed prime minis- ter, the governor-general, the leader of the army coup and the Great Council of Chiefs continued. There was rioting in New Delhi as clashes occurred between Hindus and Muslims. In Sri Lanka, government troops began their advance into the territory of the Tamil 'Tigers' in the north of the island. King Mswati of Swaziland, who until recently was a schoolboy at Sher- borne, has arrested a former prime minis- ter, two princes and two princesses, charg- ing them with sedition. MStJT
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