A month of unusually mild but stormy weather with hardly any frost but with gales damaging buildings, overturning lorries and killing 45 in the UK and a many again across Europe with global warming being blamed. The US ‘experienced the worst weather States for 50 years’. Apart from some minor problems, I was in good health but Di had been suffering from bouts of depression and seemed unhappy to be left with the children when I was staying to work on the new boat in Horning but we made up in the same old-fashioned way.
The children mostly over their colds this month and enjoyed some outings but there was the normal panic of organising the children's first day back at Kimbolton School after the holidays. Daniel and Debbie are mostly doing well at school, but Daniel's mock "A" level results show that he has still much work to do to get his university entrance grades for U.E.A. and now faces his driving test being delayed until March for lack of practice. Debbie still had time for her riding, was often at the stables and attended the odd event and I took Della horse-riding for the first time for several weeks and she managed to walk and trot. I was dropping in to see that Mum had settled back in Stanton, overcoming some minor problems and I was tending Dad’s grave and settling his estate. My journal needed some special attention, after the end of a decade, I managed some work on my financial affairs and I bought my first transportable cellular telephone could be used in the boat, car or elsewhere.
I had two multi-day trips to Horning to conduct major repairs and enhancements to our new boat, the Rolyat Princess, and undertook a very risky journey to collect our new Zodiac RIB, on the roof-rack, in severe gale conditions before leaving the vessel with its former builder, Barnes Brinkcraft, in Wroxham for repairs to the pump-out tank. This followed a family visit to Earls Court Boat Show and I just needed my radio license to be qualified to start venturing offshore.
I made a significant contribution to the Huntingdonshire District Council meetings, successfully supporting Labour and back-bench moderate Conservatives to ban stubble burning and out-manoeuvred Leader Cllr Holley by using points of order thus dividing his members. I witnessed the Finance Meeting of the District Council one evening where the Tories try to reduce the political impact of the Poll tax by £5 by taking £1/2 million from reserves, against the emphatic advice of the Director of Finance. Together with colleague Michael Pope, to study council finances where we spotted that the County Tories were subsidising the Poll Tax even more to save their skin and our subsequent press release led to many radio and newspaper interviews after I had sent a press release, ‘spilling the beans’. Our FOCUS newsletter campaign was vital and I worked with Michael Pope to discuss our plan for the following year’s FOCUS issues and the whole question of developing branch organisation and membership. I worked all day producing four local editions of FOCUS newsletters, which were well received with special editions for Priory, Paxton, Buckden and Eaton. I was orchestrating an anti-Tory plans for the coming May District Council elections agreeing cooperation with Labour and Greens over targeting election wards but I resisted involvement when attending the AGM of the local S.W.Cambs constituency Liberal Democrat Party.
Kenneth Clarke was presiding over the enormous disruption of the ambulance service and paying his chauffeur £25,000 which is double the £8-10K he is asking the ambulancemen to accept and widow of a man who died for lack of ambulance cover in Crawley did not blame the striking ambulancemen as 30,000 of them demonstrated in Trafalgar Square today! There was 90% public support for the ambulancemen and Tory back-bench M.P.'s were showing signs of anxiety. The Church of England is outspoken in attacks on government taxation and social security policy. The stock exchange is falling sharply (from 2450 to 2291 on the FT100 index) with jitters about inflation again. An epidemic of "Mad Cow Disease", BSE, is another negative factor as the EEC then considers a total 6-month ban for British cattle to Europe. The CBI are now predicting that manufacturing investment is at a long-term low and that we are on the brink of a recession.
Undercover soldiers in civilian clothes shooting three men dead in Ulster during a bank raid when the men were only using replica guns and then pumped further bullets into them whilst they were on the ground in a government shoot-to-kill policy. The Tory government experienced a back-bench revolt by over 30 Tory M.P.'s opposing the Poll Tax and Thatcher had to climb down at last on the matter of Football I.D. cards. Publication took place of the Lord Taylor report into Hillsborough football tragedy with ID cards now ruled out and all-seater stadiums are now considered to be the safer solution Mike Gatting and the rest of the rebel England cricketers started their South African tour but were the subject of huge upsetting demonstrations. Sir Robert Reid was highly critical of government policy towards the railways and called for more capital investment as industrial trouble grew elsewhere with Ford and British Aerospace affected. The Airbus Industrie threatened British Aerospace with damage claims after a dispute cost the Airbus consortium $40m in lost production.
There had been international praise for Gorbachev with even Thatcher calling him "A good partner in Peace" and suggesting that he should take credit for the Eastern European reforms but he had to cancel political visits overseas ‘to have time to deal with his domestic problems’ as rioting took place for three days along 85 miles of the Azerbaijan/Iran border USSR. Unrest in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, turned into racial violence and anarchy with 30 killed. With mobs rampaging in the Soviet republics of Azerbaijan and Armenia, Moscow had to send in 11,000 troops. Mass demonstrations were being planned in Lithuania offering more autonomy and Gorbechev ends the month in Lithuania trying to persuade them out of breaking away and is facing a tide of opinion that could yet overwhelm him.
Russia's Foreign Minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, has backed Rumania's new leaders and offered to supply gas and oil but the post-revolutionary situation in Bucharest is far from a happy one with demonstrations in the streets for faster reforms. a new Vatican envoy, "a Latin American specialist”, has been sent to Panama to help with the negotiations on the future of former President Noriega General Noriega, the deposed Panamanian President, who has given himself up to the U.S. forces. China has ended Martial Law and so the process of resuming international relations begins, despite the atrocities of Tiananmen Square. 43 die in a Spanish discotheque fire, 100 are feared dead in yet another Dhaka Bangladesh ferry sinking. U.S. President Bush announces budget plans intended to halve the deficit and at least three American bases in the UK.
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Another month of very odd and stormy weather with so many gales and the havoc, deaths and injuries caused as a result and the blame is falling on the global warming effect. The storm death toll has now been put at 45 in Britain, with 7 children killed, and 85 for the whole of Europe with human tragedies involved as roofs were ripped off schools and factories and trees and debris crushed cars rushed past overturned lorries. Half a million people are still without electricity and three million trees are down after the gales, with 100 of these at the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. I had a very tricky journey in the wind with a dinghy on my roof rack! I remained worried now about having several large trees capable of doing great damage to the house and conservatory should any of them fall. It was also the first January (at the Honnington weather station in Norfolk) since records began that there has been no air frost at all, and it has been unusually mild with strong south-westerly winds instead of the north-easterly ones that we expect. There were many dull, damp and dingy days and only a few very chilly days. Even so, the US has been ‘experiencing the worst weather in the United States for 50 years’.
Apart from a head cold with a temperature which was rather uncomfortable and some pain due to my scraped and wounded hands (which had been bleeding overnight on my sheets after I was trying to work on plumbing in my new boat) I was in good health this month. After suffering from bouts of depression and disorganisation, Di had at last booked herself on to a health check and beauty programme but was seeing better with new stronger glasses. After being away in Horning for several days, I found Diana, who I had left with the children, unwell and suffering from an injured leg. Once home, I eventually cheered up a grumpy Diana, and had a nice time with her in bed before sleeping. Having also had a row with Diana over taking phone calls as we ate our lunch we also recovered from a restless night in the same old-fashioned way.
The children mostly over their colds this month and I took them to the Pantomime at the Cambridge Arts Theatre to see "Dick Whittington" from one of the two boxes and we set off as a family for the Earls Court Boat Show as well as odd trips to the cinema. We had overnight guests - Gary for Daniel and Helen for Debbie – and there was the normal panic of organising the children's first day back at Kimbolton School after trying unsuccessfully to arrange some family chores and choreography ahead of parties. I was sitting on the Kimbolton School Society's Committee. We attended the parents' evening for Debbie's year to find her doing well and though, their school reports have been quite good, Daniel's mock "A" level results show that he has still much work to do to get his university entrance grades for U.E.A. Daniel had his mock driving test and the instructor only gave him a 65% chance of passing and now faces his delayed driving test until March for lack of practice. Debbie still had time for her riding and was often at the stables and attended the odd event.
After a trip to the saddlers for some items for Sundance, we got the new bit for his bridle which Fiona showed her how to fit and, after some problems boxing him, we practised and successfully took him to the Brampton Farm pony cub event. I took Della horse-riding for the first time for several weeks, but I led her, and she managed to walk and trot on board. Della brought two friends home prior to ballet to add to the mayhem on a day when poor Amy stayed with us during the day ill as her parents had to work but then Amy and Katherine Law had come to take Della for her first day back at school. I was pleased that Mum had settled back in Stanton with her doctor and hospital visits going well this month, although she had some back pains and is taking more anti-coagulants to keep her old replacement heart valve working which is not to be regarded as a permanent solution. I was dropping into Stanton to check she was all right when travelling to and from Norfolk, using my new transportable cell-net phone to warn my Mum of my arrival and to book sandwiches from the estate shop. I attended my father’s grave and was sad to see the displays being spoilt by the wind and I was settling his estate and visiting the probate registry in Peterborough.
The additional chore this month to complete my journal entries for the previous day, month and decade and I managed some work on my financial affairs, comparing building society interest rates, paying in high value cheques and transferring cash as needed. I called the A1 Bluefields site owner and rejected the purchase due to their asking price. I spent some time in my conservatory reviewing my mail and papers whilst tending my fish and plants for which I had received some exotic seeds from Freda. I decided to buy my first transportable cellular telephone which was connected to the Cellnet network so that it can used in the boat, car or elsewhere. I managed to make great progress in preparing our new boat for the season's cruising ahead and just need my radio license to be qualified to start venturing off-shore We set off as a family for the Earls Court Boat Show and took the train from St Neots station and then arrived by underground. had a useful day and everything went well, and we found several equipment suppliers that could help us with our new boat equipment. I bought a RIB I ordered ordering a couple of battery chargers to be permanently installed on the boat. Once my new boat battery chargers that arrived, I spent an afternoon learning how to install them and then had commissioning details to hand for my new charging system.
A trip to Harry Kitchener of Bedford where I bought another Diode Splitter and some more terminals for the boat as the new charging system was working well on the boat. I was also in contact with the former owner of the boat and planned to meet up with him over Easter. I spent a further afternoon on the telephone organising my boat parts and service with many items underway but not everything went to plan as I was thwarted by Red Star (British Rail) failings necessitating a long car journey in poor conditions to Daventry to swap out my faulty ReadiLine rotary inverter. I drove back via Northampton and into the Zodiac warehouse to lash the inflatable RIB onto my roof rack and then out into the gales with the Range Rover swaying drunkenly in the open! I had spent the first of several days at Heronshaw in Norfolk, tending to my new boat and working on the outstanding problems on it. After making myself a meal and stowing everything away, I spent two hours finding the wiring fault that prevented my boat’s Port Domestic battery charging. Contractors had made the road near impassable as I carried on working on my new boat, commissioning the battery chargers and remote-control panels in the quiet countryside with just a Robin and Radio Broadland for company.
I then started working on the faulty bilge pump lights and again struggled with the after toilet plumbing until my hands were sore from tackling the boat pipe work and so I stopped for a lunch and a rest at the café in Wroxham reading the EDP. That evening I made a list and transferring unwanted things from the boat to Heronshaw, starting to clean the saloon carpet there. After struggling to conduct the toilet repairs with a full holding tank, I cast off in search of a pump-out. I visited the boatbuilders Barnes Brinkcraft, who were very helpful and so I sorted out my plumbing problems on my own. Then the slow process of packing up and securing Heronshaw and the boat before the journey home, dropping in at the McDonalds Drive Thru for sustenance. My caretaker Jack Edwards had visited me daily and gave me some more advice and addresses of builders for the forthcoming work on Heronshaw.
Daniel accompanied me for my next trip to spend time working on The Rolyat Princess in Horning and we took the new Zodiac RIB, which was still on the roof-rack. We bought fittings to store it on the boat davits, fixed the toilet macerator leak and installed a new Webasto heating controller. On my second day aboard The Rolyat Princess, I then enjoyed the convenience of the new Webasto heating controls which warmed the boat for me in the morning. There then followed a day working aboard on the wiring and surveying the electrical equipment for safety and security of performance, stopping to enjoy a fine roast lunch in Wroxham and watching Norwich draw an exciting televised football match with Liverpool. Then quite late to bed again on a very cold night, during which I had to get up to get a hot-water bottle to keep warm, before up early receiving the two contractors; to repair my boat fridge and install a replacement Redi-line rotary inverter which then worked fine. These sessions finally ended with a river trip to Barnes Brinkcraft where I left the boat for repairs to the pump-out tank and got a lift back to Horning so that I could drive home.
There were also the regular meetings of Southoe Parish Council, with a number of matters to discuss, and Little Paxton Parish Council and of Little Paxton Village Hall Committee, which were generally going well, in contrast with the St Neots Town Council, which I attended as an observer, which was awful. I went with David Rudd, the St Neots Museum chairman and Derek Eyons, the St Neots Town Clerk, to see the District Council in Huntingdon to try and secure a site for St Neots Museum. as the St Neots Museum meetings considering the problems of finding a site were depressing everyone. My contribution to the Huntingdonshire District Council required reading a post bag of complicated papers and making and receiving many phone calls. This as I still spent time meeting my constituents and worked in the Environmental Services Committee of the District Council, successfully supporting Labour and back-bench moderate Conservatives to ban stubble burning and out-manoeuvred Leader Cllr Holley by using points of order thus dividing his members. A sad tale from Tory reject Cllr Ross McKay as I gave him a lift home.
We had the Tories on the run over local Poll Tax provisions. I witnessed the Finance Meeting of the District Council one evening where the Tories try to reduce the political impact of the Poll tax by £5 by taking £1/2 million from reserves, against the emphatic advice of the Director of Finance. Together with colleague Michael Pope, to study council finances where we spotted that the County Tories were subsidising the Poll Tax even more to save their skin and our subsequent press release led to many radio and newspaper interviews after I had sent a press release, ‘spilling the beans’. I returned calls to the local papers over our LibDem stance on the Tories using council tax reserves to soften the unpopular Poll Tax. Our other campaigns resulted in my new bottle bank arriving at The Anchor car park and I was taking some long phone calls with briefing and training our new councillor, Derek Giles, and Michael Pope on the Town Council standing orders as Percy joined me to plan our forthcoming election campaign. The District Council were still remiss over heating improvements for our Southoe Tenants, District officers and a working party put both the "Friendly" and "Domesday" options for Little Paxton a Monday's special Planning Meeting about village development.
My political work was holding up with preparations for the May elections falling into place, though with much hard work still to be done. Our FOCUS newsletter campaign was vital, and I worked with Michael Pope to discuss our plan for the following years FOCUS issues and the whole question of developing branch organisation and membership, which was the theme of successful Liberal Democrats meeting one evening. I edited the FOCUS copy with Derek Giles and typed up a FOCUS questionnaire to add local Eaton Socon issues. Poor Michael Pope was ill again but Percy Meyer came round and together we planned most of the general stories for our next FOCUS with local ones to follow for each ward, and then I spent the day of copy-writing and planning for the next FOCUS issue with Michael, Pat and Percy Meyer and Sally Guinee to have special editions for Priory, Paxton, Buckden and Eaton. I worked all day producing four local editions of FOCUS newsletters, which were well received. After sorting out my archives and inserting my Little Paxton History Bookmark we canvassed for adverts into these FOCUS's, and arranged delivery rounds.
I was orchestrating an anti-Tory plans for the coming May District Council elections together with Labour and the Greens, agreeing cooperation with them over targeting election wards. With Michael Pope we prepared for our election campaigns in May with budgets and timescales that could see me getting a couple of colleagues on the District Council. Percy and then Joy Standen arrived to discuss Council tactics. Then an afternoon documenting and circulating the plan to activists under confidential cover before attending the AGM of the local S. W. Cambridgeshire constituency Liberal Democrat Party where I resisted involvement on the executive.
The month began with the responsible minister Kenneth Clarke, pronouncing himself "very pessimistic" of any settlement moves in the Ambulance dispute and being criticised by The Association of Chief Ambulance Officers for undervaluing Ambulancemen as being ‘just drivers’. Feelings were exacerbated and Kenneth Clarke was in trouble again when it became known that his chauffeur being paid £25,000 which is double the £8-10K he is asking the ambulancemen to accept! His pessimistic prediction proved accurate and was to haunt him as unions and certain councils started ignoring the bosses and contracting the ambulance service, employing suspended ambulancemen to drive hired vehicles and the strike escalated with many more stations withdrawing coverage and more regions having to be served by army ambulances and some branches going as far as striking to leave no emergency cover at all. Clarke rejected any further talks, even though there was 90% public support for the ambulancemen and Tory back-bench M.P.'s were showing signs of anxiety It became apparent that Thatcher was using the Ambulancemen’s dispute to try and enforce an undeclared incomes policy and the widow of a man who died for lack of ambulance cover in Crawley did not blame the striking ambulancemen as 30,000 of them demonstrated in Trafalgar Square today and were joined by opposition politicians and the TUC are supported the ambulancemen with a 15mins strike on January 30th. Edinburgh ambulancemen are now striking in frustration.
Norman Fowler quietly resigned his cabinet post and got a Knighthood for his discretion and later became Speaker in the House of Lords. The outgoing chairman of British Rail, Sir Robert Reid, was highly critical of government policy towards the railways and called for more capital investment as industrial trouble grew elsewhere with Ford and British Aerospace affected. The Ford motor workers have just rejected more than 10% before settling for an inflationary 10.2% pay rise and the spiral is on. Airbus Industrie threatened British Aerospace with damage claims after a dispute cost the Airbus consortium $40m in lost production. Then news of the TUC and CBI joining forces to appeal to the Chancellor to reduce interest rates and join the EMS despite Thatcher's opposition to both. More job losses in the city and other industrial firms and the stock exchange is falling sharply (from 2450 to 2291 on the FT100 index) with jitters about inflation again. An epidemic of "Mad Cow Disease", BSE, is another negative factor as the EEC is now considering a total 6-month ban for British cattle to Europe in view of the infection. The Church of England is outspoken in attacks on government taxation and social security policy.
Ferranti's Radar Division had been taken over by GEC to secure their supplying radar to the Euro Fighter. Later news that the trade gap was down to an "acceptable” £1.16 Billion led to the stock exchange recovering 30 points after recent falls but the CBI are now predicting that manufacturing investment is at a long-term low and that we are on the brink of a recession. The BBC was having to make cuts of £75million to survive the limitation of licence fee increases with the BBC Radio Orchestra having to close. The first IRA attack of 1990 in which an extreme Protestant taxi-driver was killed by a car-bomb in his taxi as his 16 year-old daughter sitting beside him escaped with minor injuries, The news is of undercover soldiers in civilian clothes shooting three men dead in Ulster during a bank raid when they were using replica guns and then pumping further bullets into them whilst they were on the ground in a government shoot-to-kill policy The as back home Northern Ireland Minister, Brian Mawhinney, denies there is a Shoot-to-Kill policy A 1970’s disinformation campaign to discredit not only the IRA but also ex-Prime Ministers Wilson, Callaghan and Heath is revealed.
The Tory government experienced a back-bench revolt by over 30 Tory M.P.'s opposing the Poll Tax and one of British Navy's top secrets is exposed as the existence on board our battleship HMS Coventry of a laser weapon was revealed when a cover was left off and Two RAF jet fighters collided in mid-air over Northumberland, with a Tornado crashing and injuring its two pilots. A year after the London to Belfast Boing 737 crashed on the A1 at Kegworth, the report is awaited on why the wrong engine was shut down and an airliner, Avianca Flight 52, crashed recently was left circling until it ran out of fuel. Thatcher has had to climb down at last on the matter of Football I.D. cards The publication took place of the Lord Taylor report into Hillsborough football tragedy with ID cards now ruled out and all-seater stadiums are now considered to be the safer solution but at some cost to the clubs. Mike Gatting and the rest of the rebel England cricketers started their South African tour but have been the subject of huge upsetting demonstrations greeting the rebel "Test Cricket Team" and thousands go on a rampage over the rebel cricket tour. This, as a Welsh weightlifter is found guilty of taking drugs at the Commonwealth Games.
This month Eastern Europe had been dominating the news. There had been international praise for Gorbachev with even Thatcher calling him "A good partner in Peace" and suggesting that he should take credit for the Eastern European reforms but he had to cancel political visits overseas ‘to have time to deal with his domestic problems’ as rioting took place for three days by many of their citizens along 85 miles of the Azerbaijan/Iran border USSR. Thousands of demonstrators had been attacking the border fences and installations in the southern republic of Azerbaijan. Unrest in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, turned into racial violence and anarchy with 30 killed. With mobs rampaging in the Soviet republics of Azerbaijan and Armenia, Moscow had to send in 11,000 troops and this news sent shock waves through the Tokyo and Wall Street stock exchanges. Later, at least the warring nationalist groups in Armenia and Azerbaijan were meeting for peace talks. Lithuania is now wanting to break away from the Soviet Communist party, providing Gorbachev with his biggest political crisis yet. Mass demonstrations were being planned in Lithuania offering more autonomy and Gorbachev ends the month in Lithuania trying to persuade them out of breaking away and is facing a tide of opinion that could yet overwhelm him.
Russia's Foreign Minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, has backed Rumania's new leaders and offered to supply gas and oil but the post-revolutionary situation in Bucharest is far from a happy one with demonstrations in the streets for faster reforms. whilst ensuring the integrity of the Soviet bloc. Confusion follows in Rumania as first the provisional government ban the death penalty and then say it will be decided by a referendum. Then they say that the communist party is to be banned and then it is not; and nobody knows where these revolutions will end. Trouble continues in Bucharest where thousands of pro-government factory workers attacked the offices of the opposition leaders. The lessons of democracy are hard to learn. East German demonstrators who are unhappy with the slow progress towards democracy and Gorbachev turns on his critics. Czech President, Vaclav Havel announced an amnesty for 30,000 prisoners guilty of non-violent crimes as the fighting.
In other news, a new Vatican envoy, "a Latin American specialist”, has been sent to Panama to help with the negotiations on the future of former President Noriega General Noriega, the deposed Panamanian President, who has given himself up to the U.S. forces. The huge oil slick off the Moroccan coast is causing extreme environmental concern. The worst ever train crash in Pakistan has killed 307 and injured 430 others. China has ended Martial Law and so the process of resuming international relations begins, despite the atrocities of Tiananmen Square. 43 die in a Spanish discotheque fire, 100 are feared dead in yet another Dhaka Bangladesh ferry sinking. U.S. President Bush announces budget plans intended to halve the deficit and arguments through Congress will centre on whether defence or welfare will be the main casualty and at least three American bases in the UK will close.