PORTRAIT OF A WEEK
Light relief
MICHAEL WYNN JONES
If ever proof was needed that electricity is the life-blood of the nation, this week provided it. Even the relatively short (2-3 hour) cuts caused by the power station workers' over- time ban had the country showing acute withdrawal symptoms, and panting for its next electrical shot in the arm. The tragic effects of the cuts on the old, the hos- pitals and small businesses were widely pub- licised (over-publicised, said Fleet Street's electricians, who all but walked out in pro- test at their newspapers' hostile campaign'), but the minor inconveniences of the past week provided newsmen with a rich tapestry that they wove together with relish. Debates continued in the House of Commons by candlelight, for the first time in living mem- ory. The Prime Minister's generators failed to generate enough power to work his hi-fi stereo equipment. Cars were marooned at the top of automatic car-parks, ladies incarcerated in lifts for hours, and children were spared having their teeth filled for a whole week. A virtual black-market in candles sprang up overnight with flotillas of small boats beetling across to the continent for stocks, and anyone with a bright idea for creating a patch of light getting feted by papers, radio and television. Shoplifters were seen in Bond Street, hanging around waiting for the lights to go out and alarms to be cut off. Arrests increased by 50 per cent, till some shops made customers queue outside and would only allow them in one by one and acccompanied by an assistant.
But it was not only the papers who were hostile to the supply workers. Ordinary con- sumers flooded the switchboards at electricity headquarters with obscene abuse, •kidnap menaces and bomb threats. Some shop- keepers refined to serve strikers' wives and one irrate pig farmer heaved drums of foul- smelling manure over the controls of a power switching station. Almost in self-defence the supply workers called off their work-to-rule on Monday, but refused to withdraw their demands. In their place, strikes have now been threatened by railwaymen and hospital technicians, and by airport workers who have already caused disruption at Heathrow.
The plot thickens as to the whereabouts of the multi-millionaire Howard Hughes, whose Nevada gambling empire is rumoured to be facing a financial crisis. Reports persist that he has been kidnapped, others that he is alive and well in Paradise Island. Las Vegas police continue to raid his ninth-floor pent- house; they had found six suites there they said, but so far had only been able to search five. The fate of the Swiss Ambassador kid- napped by guerrillas in Brazil, too, remains in the balance. Demands for the customary transaction in political prisoners (this time 70) have been received by the Brazilian Government, but the guerrilla's ultimatum also contained some novel requests. They called on the Swiss Government to release the names of wealthy Brazilians who held secret bank accounts in Switzerland; they also insisted that no fares should be charged on Rio's suburban 'central? railway.. In Paris European Ministers of the Council of Europe have urged the setting up of an international agreement to protect diplomats against murder and kidnap attempts, and have drawn up a report which considers, among other things, a reappraisal of extradi- tion rights and the role of countries which set themselves up as refuges for criminals. All of which comes a bit late for Herr Beihl, the German consul held hostage by "Basque separatists for the lives of 16 Basques on trial at Burgos. Inside the court-room there have been outbreaks of pandemonium, with choruses of the Basque battle hymn resound- ing from the public gallery, police drawing their guns to clear the court and officers brandishing their swords to defend the judge. Outside nearly every university has been paralysed by students protesting, and the monastery at Montserrat was occupied by three hundred artists and intellectuals. To deal with the crisis, police were given special (ie virtually unlimited) powers of arrest and detention. The death sentence is expected to be passed on several of the accused.
So, in spite of complaints that it would be a dishonour to France's unnamed warriors, the Place de L'Etoile became Place Charles de Gaulle. To go back on the decision, said President Pompidou, 'would constitute an injury to the memory of the General'.
Busy week for Mr Wedgewood Benn. Fol- lowing up his campaign for a referendum on the Common Market, he has now sub- mitted a motion to his national executive committee which would bind the leadership to holding a full-scale conference before Par- liament decides the issue. And then, up in Birmingham, he sounded off against the examination system claiming that 'Britain is depriving itself of access to the skills of millions of people whose talents are not .recognised because they lack degrees or diplomas'. After such a burst of activity he must surely have been against the moves made this week in the Commons to restrict publication of former Ministers' memoirs. One man who would have a lot to write about his parliamentary career is Dr Horace King. who announced his retirement as Speaker after five years in office. Among the candidates to succeed Mr Selwyn Lloyd nudged decisively ahead of his nearest rival, Mr Boyd-Carpenter, by being particularly acceptable to the Opposition.
Clearly unimpressed that the Bolshoi Ballet had cancelled their visit to the us because of 'provocations perpetrated by Zionist ex- tremists', Mr Heath flew off on Tuesday for his talks with Mssrs Trudeau and Nixon. The latter was in pugnacious mood last week as he gave his first televised press confer- ence for five months and warned the North Vietnamese he would resume bombing if fighting in the South was stepped up while he was pulling out American troops. Down in Oklahoma City, meanwhile, an all-white jury convicted a negro of raping a white telephone company employee and sentenced him to 1,500 years in prison when the pro- secutor said that a 500-year term would be 'just a slap on the wrist'. The defence are appealing: 'We consider it excessive. I think they just got carried away'. But, to show they're not all bad, the us Senate finally awarded the Seminole Indians $12,347,500 compensation for the loss of Florida to Spain in 1783, after a 20 year lawsuit. Which must be good news for the Dutch who bought Manhattan for 24 dollars and had it forcibly taken away from- them.
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