F-B-F.org -

The Government’s favourable run of good news on the economy continued yesterday with figures showing an unexpected fall in unemployment last month. Whatever the IRA does, Sinn Fein’s electoral mandate cannot be ignored by the British Government.”However, ministers continue to insist that Sinn Fein will not be granted entry to the talks unless there is a new, clearly called ceasefire.. I think we are going to have to spend some time at Westminister over the next few days trying to improve it.”The Rev Ian Paisley has already announced he will be putting down amendments.The SDLP is also seeking changes and will await the final shape of the Bill before deciding whether to stand for the elections.Meanwhile, Gerry Adams demanded that Sinn Fein be admitted to the all- party talks due to start on 10 June, whether or not the IRA calls a new ceasefire, a prospect looking increasingly remote after last night’s bomb attack.Sinn Fein is waiting to see what the SDLP decides about standing at the poll. It would prefer to boycott the event but is almost certain to stand if the SDLP decide to.Mr Adams said: “If Sinn Fein contests the forthcoming election, those who vote for our party should have exactly the same rights as other sections of the electorate. But continuing dissatisfaction with the Government’s plans for elections leading to all-party talks in the province saw the various Northern Ireland parties attempting last night to modify the proposed mechanism for the elections.The Ulster Unionist Party, Democratic Unionists, SDLP and UK Unionist MP, Robert McCartney, all intend putting down amendments to the legislation covering the election and all-party talks.The new Elections Bill was formally introduced in the Commons yesterday and the Government plans to rush it through Parliament and have it on the statute books early next month, in time for the poll to go ahead on the planned date of 30 May.Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble said: “The system is unnecessarily complex and has a number of absurdities in it. Then, a bomb was placed in a rubbish bin outside the gates of Brompton Cemetery, near the Earl’s Court Exhibition Centre.

No one was injured, but there was damage to property and cars.The blast came as politicians on all sides were desperately trying to restore some momentum to the peace process after the IRA’s decision to end its year-long ceasefire. Police cordoned off surrounding streets.Local resident Winnie Gordon Strauss, who was out walking her dog when the bomb went off, said: “I’ve still got glass in my hair.”The anonymous telephone call received by the news agency in London, claiming to be from the IRA, was received about half an hour before the first report of a blast.Last night’s explosion happened less than half a mile from the site of a similar blast on March 8. The explosion occurred just before 10pm last night at an empty house in The Boltons, an expensive residential area of west London. There were no immediate reports of any injuries, police and emergency services said.
However, windows were blown out at the house and in neighbouring buildings. News that the deals would be allowed to go ahead was leaked to the Economist last week, embarrassing the DTI.Power shake-up, page 19City Comment, page 21. The IRA launched another terrorist bomb attack in London last night. An explosion damaged properties in Earl’s Court Road after a warning call using a recognised code word to the Associated Press news agency.

The US company, however, is not thought to have had any formal contact with Ian Lang, President of the Board of Trade.The bid has come at a bad time for Mr Lang, who is widely believed to be about to clear the way for National Power and its main rival, PowerGen, to resurrect respective takeover bids for the regional generators Southern Electric and Midlands Electricity.The bids were put on hold last year after the Monopolies and Mergers Commission launched an investigation into the industry. Politicians and consumer groups have attacked the planned pounds 8bn-plus takeover of National Power, one of the UK’s prime electricity generating companies, by Southern Company of the US. The Consumers’ Association also weighed in heavily, slamming the American firm’s plans as “potentially disastrous” for electricity customers and for competition in the industry.
The row broke yesterday after Southern, which only last year secured a strong position in the UK electricity market by buying SWEB for pounds 1.1bn, confirmed stock market rumours that it was planning to do a deal with National Power.John Battle, shadow Energy Minister, said he doubted whether the Americans’ aspirations were in the public interest or “the long-term interests of consumers.”A spokesman for the Consumers’ Association added that “competition in the marketplace would be diluted rather than increased”, and called for the Monopolies and Mergers Commission to take a “tough line” on electricity mergers to protect the consumers’ interests.While many City analysts are sceptical about the Americans’ chances of success, because of the mountain of regulatory and political hurdles, it is understood that the Government is preparing to use its all-powerful “golden share” in National Power to engineer a dramatic shake-up of the electricity industry as long as Southern agrees to sell several power stations.The formal announcement by Southern fuelled some heavy speculation in National Power’s shares which, following the previous day’s surge, soared 56.5p to pounds 578p – boosting the company’s value by several hundred million pounds to pounds 8.3bn.Southern has been preparing its plans to make a takeover move against National Power, which generates a quarter of the UK’s electricity, for almost a year. I only knew five minutes before.”But Mr Giambrone, who cannot find work as a car mechanic, said that despite their different backgrounds he could draw parallels to his own divorce and that of the Yorks. Like them he has two young children, and he said that he and his wife, like the Yorks, had managed to remain friends.He said: “Children are children, whether they’re royal or not, and you have to think of them and support them.”It must be especially hard because they are in the limelight. But it’s really important for parents to be amicable about splitting up, for the sake of the children.”. While Labour backbenchers support the idea by 56-34 per cent, frontbenchers are opposed by 50-35 per cent.The Labour leader has not yet decided what his attitude to a single currency will be, should he be in government and Germany and France decide, early in 1998, to launch it on the Maastricht target date of 1 January 1999.

Unlike the Tories, most Labour MPs have no objections to a single European army, although they want to retain Britain’s veto in foreign and defence policy.The survey suggests that Labour divisions could have influenced Mr Blair’s decision not to match John Major’s promise of a referendum on a single currency. (The Labour figure falls to 7 per cent among new MPs – those elected in 1987 or 1992 – and to zero among frontbenchers.)Only a quarter of Labour MPs back the extreme Euro-sceptic demand that the European Commission should lose the right to initiate legislation – a position held by 61 per cent of Tories. None of the 1987-1992 intake, for example, wants Britain to withdraw from the EU, against 15 per cent of older MPs.The survey confirms the historic switch between Labour and Tory parties, with the Tories now markedly more hostile to the EU than Labour MPs.While 28 per cent of backbench Labour MPs said the single currency would mean the end of the UK as a sovereign nation, just over 50 per cent of backbench Tories agreed in the survey carried out two years ago.Thirty per cent of Labour MPs agree “sovereignty cannot be pooled”, but 60 per cent of Tories agreed.And only 18 per cent of Labour MPs want an “Act of Supremacy” to assert explicitly the ultimate power of Westminster over EU law – compared with 56 per cent of Tory MPs two years ago. In contrast to the Tories, Labour is becoming more pro-European, as a more EU-minded generation takes over.