The Monopolies Commission said last week British Gas should stop selling gas to consumers by the end

The Monopolies Commission said last week British Gas should stop selling gas to consumers by the end of March 1997, and concentrate on the storage and transportation of gas. In the Fifties, Joan Littlewood put local Cockney bums on seats with her blatantly populist Fings Ain't Wot They Used to Be and Sparrers Can't Sing. But the Berkshire decision flies in the face of that.Dr Lawrence Silverman, the Labour leader of the county council, said yesterday: 'Our candidates have withdrawn with the object of maximising non support of the Conservatives in the county council elections.'We did not discuss this with the Liberal Democrats. So yesterday there was too much kicking: when was it any different Too many nerves: it was ever thus. It played an active role for only 45 minutes, but left behind a slippery pitch that made a nonsense of the attempts at close control necessary to Ipswich's delicate game.It was not long before Palace's less cultured approach looked more promising and Ipswich's fifth-minute penalty a match-loser. East Anglia is dotted with earlier examples of windmills, the Industrial Revolution started rolling with water power and Woodbridge has had a tide-mill for centuries.Transatlantic winds and a change in EC farm subsidies have led some farmers in Wales and the West Country to prefer wind farms to sheep.

In a television documentary on Wednesday, Prince Charles is understood to say: 'I happen to believe that the Catholic subjects of the sovereign are as important (as Protestants), not to mention the Islamic, Hindu and Zoroastrian.' Officials say this does not amount to an intention to cut the tie between Crown and Church. However, the Prince also says says he would be happy to be considered 'Defender of Faith' rather than 'Defender of the Faith'.Historians point out that the Windsors' legal claim to the throne rests on their allegiance to the Protestant religion. In the Minehead case the officer was convicted and there was concern that he was being punished for using good, 'old- fashioned' police methods.But these 'old-fashioned' methods - the notion that in the old days a bobby gave a young troublemaker a clip round the ear and that was that - have always been old-fashioned.The late C H Rolph, journalist and former police officer, was bemused by this all his life. He's had a frightful row with his lover and she has left him; he has been beaten up by the police, in the wake of which the lungs, the spinal cord, and the eyes are all giving a spot of bother. The press spent his early England career writing 'should do better' Now they're not so sure that, when the heat is on, he can.

Finally, yesterday, the new 007 was given his orders. Now is the time for the movie- makers to abandon their dalliance with realism and re-explore the fantasy that made Bond big here and across the Atlantic in the Sixties. The cycle is usually sung by a man; Kallisch struck a plausibly 'manly' attitude even in the bitter defiance of 'Ich grolle nicht', where Gage began by underplaying his throbbing accompaniment, perhaps so as not to bully the singer, but also thereby building up the whole song gradually to the denunciation of its final line. This summer marks the first South African visit to England since 1965, when Rhodesia was declaring UDI, national health charges were zero, mods and rockers were throwing pieces of seaside rock (and not the sort with Blackpool written right through them) at each other, and British television, like South Africa itself, was still operating in black and white. The last day's play occurred on 31 August, at the pre-Foster's Oval, and the Test match was drawn. In an attempt to halt the decline, the title Children's Hour had been dropped in 1961 Junior Time was tried, and then For the Young. THE OLDEST human footprints - the only proof that early man walked upright on two legs 3.6 million years ago - are being destroyed through neglect, according to scientists who recently visited a remote archaeological site at Laetoli in northern Tanzania. York is also, according to New Cyclist magazine, Britain's best cycling city.

EFM DRAGON is claiming victory in its pounds 126m bid for Drayton Asia Trust. SUSAN Lowndes Marques was a leading figure in the British community in Lisbon, the author of several books on Portugal, and the guardian of the memory of her mother, the diarist and novelist Marie Belloc Lowndes, and her grandmother Bessie Parkes Belloc, the champion of women's suffrage. My mother was brought up in inter-war literary London and always surrounded by books and writers. In some areas as many as 40 out of every 100 motorcycles on the road were stolen in 1990/1.The companies that do insure motorcycles have very different criteria.NIG Skandia's premium for a Honda 500cc, fully comprehensive, in west London, would be pounds 307 for a 40-year-old with full no- claims bonus.The same insurance for a 17-year-old, with a one-year no-claims benefit, would be pounds 3,762 - nearly twice the cost of the bike. He says the memo proves Iraq pursued a genocidal campaign against the Kurds with biological weapons Baghdad has always denied this. 'He committed himself to untying this knot, but he hasn't and now the crunch has come.'The League is unhappy about the concentration of power in Mr Berlusconi's hands since it agreed to co-operate with his Forza Italia party in March's elections.