Successfully gathering support for the fight
Successfully gathering support for the fight

 

A month of triumph and tragedies as I spend more time filming my family and taking trips back to my origins and I win the anti-IBM/BT standards battle and develop influence for the BMMG as unemployment under Thatcher reaches 3.5million, such that the FT calls for action and the so-called Big Bang in the City of London revolution takes place against forebodings.  Another Bishop attacks Thatcher’s politics of confrontation when she sets the judiciary on Arthur Scargill, sequestrating the miners’ assets and the Brighton IRA Bomb blast kills four and maims others at her Tory Conference. Abroad,  South Africa also make the headlines as the white-only government sends in 7000 troops to the black townships, Polish agents kill the beloved Solidarity priest causing 40,000 attend a church service in Warsaw in defiance and Indira Gandhi is murdered by her own Sikh body guards. This, as more aid is announced for the people starving from the famine in Ethiopia in a sad and divisive world

Thus ends October; my home and family life quietly enjoyable and prosperous, and personal endeavours free of the traumas that face the world of business and commerce in this age of revolution and change. a father drugs and drowns his 6 year old daughter because he cannot bear the thought of her growing up in ‘a terrible world.’ We have helped our family by means of our success and now Freda has accepted a gift of £3,000 and is willing to consider a loan. During the month, I took a trip down memory lane to my childhood haunts in Essex And also made a nostalgic return to Brighton for the weekend and the site of the Grand Hotel bomb damage. My major triumph was of my BMMG lobbying efforts having secured the rejection by the government of the BT/IBM licence threat, and now the the DTI/LAN proposals gains momentum as the IBM/BT proposal falters. This was despite a drive to Manchester for a struggling Federation of Microsystems Centres steering committee only to find the NCC subsequently supporting the IBM/BT plan, which enraged me. I think that the turning point was my decisive meeting in London with Brian Willott, the head of the DTI IT Division and most pessimistic civil servant about the prospects of the British Computer industry that influenced their policy where I won the argument but had to await the decision.

The Sunday press supported my BOC anti IBM/BT campaign and the group membership rises and will be satisfied at the events we have planned for them in November. I was in the City for a meeting with top Barclays banker, Matthew Bullock to talk computer policies and I also attended a NEDO meeting and got a ‘British’ restriction included in their collaboration plans. I now have more time for the children; am helping both with their learning and trying to be close to Daniel during the onset of his adolescence, marked by the arrival of Christine, an American girl, as his first girlfriend! I was supervising Debbie’s writing exercises and Daniel’s homework and I took him to a boat show during the day and then, with his girlfriend Christine, to the Kimbolton Firework display in the evening. My parents visiting so that I could play them our recent family videos of our visits to Woburn’s Animal Kingdom/Safari Park and Alton Towers. My health was fine, other than a chest infection that lingered, and I had hobbies developing to include the keeping of doves to join the ducks. However, family health problems frustrated my plans for a get-together but we did manage to celebrate Diana’s birthday with my parents. Elsewhere, Thatcher sets the judiciary on Arthur Scargill, sequestrating the miners’ assets as unemployment under Thatcher reaches 3.5million! The FT calls for action on unemployment  as another Bishop attacks Thatcher’s politics of confrontation. Sterling dives over the ongoing miners’ dispute and the economic gloom matches the dull and drizzly weather and the Johnson Matthey Bullion bankers goes bust and is rescued by the Bank of England. The Big Bang City of London revolution takes place at Thatcher’s behest which my City contacts feel sure will be a disaster, but she will not listen. OPEC cuts oil production to support the price and protect their own interests. Gina Campbell survives a Bluebird crash very similar to that which killed her father. The Conservative Party Conference Brighton IRA Bomb blast kills four and maims others and political developments in South Africa also make the headlines as the white-only government sends in 7000 troops to the black townships. Polish agents kill the beloved Solidarity priest and 40,000 attend a church service in Warsaw in defiance. Indira Gandhi is murdered by her own Sikh body guards and more aid is announced for the people starving from the famine in Ethiopia.