Friday March 30, 1979

_. The Liberals have won Edge Hill from Labour in yesterday's by-election, but this news is overshadowed by a hideous crime committed outside the Houses of Parliament  this afternoon. Airey Neave, the opposition spokesman for Northern Ireland and one of Mrs Thatcher's closest friends, was assassinated when his car was blown up in the MPs underground car park, at 3pm. He is the first MP to be murdered in the precincts of the Houses of Parliament since prime minister Spencer Perceval was shot there in 1812.

Airey Neave: like a Guy Fawkes dummy.

I was delayed at the YP because of Neave's murder and the shock really hit us all. It is a hideous, brutal crime against a good gentleman and MP. Mrs Thatcher cancelled a BBC broadcast scheduled for this evening and returned to her home broken and shattered. Will the loss of this close influential aide affect Mrs T's electioneering? We shall have to wait and see.

Ursula phoned tonight and said she had been speaking to a reporter at the scene. His description of the dead Mr Neave is almost too hideous to describe. The mans limbs had been torn off and his crumpled remains resembled a Guy Fawkes dummy.

Tonight: Out with Sue and Pete to the Shoulder. Joined by Chippy and Debbie. Went on to the White Cross. It was slightly better here. Met Naomi and Jill. Naomi told me she has bought Mick Orchard's house on Victoria Road. They are out next Thursday to celebrate my birthday.



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Wednesday March 16, 1977

Christine B, 21. Tony B, 30. Brands Hatch trip is settled.  Sarah is to work on Sunday and I'm working tomorrow instead.

My grandfather, John Wilson, would have been 87 today.

Ring Tony at 7pm and say happy birthday. He suggests we go to the Il Trovatore tomorrow for a few birthday drinks. He and Martyn will collect me from the YP at 11.30pm or so. Not a bad idea.

Newspapers and TV are critical about the Viv Nicholson play last night. I spoke to Derek Naylor today and to Fred Willis and both said how true to life the play is. Both have interviewed her over the years.

Judith: great girl.

Do you think I should have contacted Judith after last weekend or is that falling once again into the age old trap? She is a great girl but I am sure neither of us want a relationship and so ringing her for no reason other than to make polite conversation seems a bit pointless.

Mum is embarrassed about Dad's drunken behaviour on Saturday at Pool-in-Wharfedale.

Nothing in the news. Indian general election. If they can have one, why can't we?  I'm just about sick and tired of Jim Callaghan, Wedgwood Benn, Judith Hart, Denis Healey, Eric Varley, Hugh Gaitskell, James Ramsay MacDonald, William Joynson-Hicks, Viscount Goschen, Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, W.H. Smith MP, Nancy Viscountess Astor, Reg Prentice, Barbara Castle, Manny Shinwell, Anthony Crosland, Airey Neave, Mr St John Stevas, Lew Grade, Fortune Duchess of Grafton, the late Louis Armstrong, and many more.

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Saturday February 7, 1976

Up at 8.50am which must be the earliest I've been up on a Saturday since I gave up Saturday mornings at the YP last Jan.

Have a bath and get a bus to Carole's. I catch her with a cigarette. She says she was only smoking because she thought I wasn't going to turn up. If she ever gives up I will eat my right ear.

Go to Otley market and buy a £3.95 waist coat which matches my levi-type jeans, and buy a film for my camera.

We got off the bus at Hawksworth Lane and Carole left her suitcase in the luggage rack and we almost lost it for good, but her presence of mind retrieved it within seconds of us alighting.

Set off for Uncle Harry's at 1pm. Stop for a few drinks in Skipton and arrive at Ravenglass at 4.30 or thereabouts. After roast beef and Yorkshire pudding in his wonderful little cottage we go to a local pub - all nine of us - and stay until after 11pm. Carole doesn't say much and I think she finds it hard to communicate with Uncle Harry, who is perhaps too 'deep' for her.

Back at the cottage Harry puts on a Spanish record and raves about it all night. By 1am everyone - except me - are shagged out, and drifting off to different sleeping spots, but Uncle H and I sit by the fire until 4.30 to solve the problems of the world.

He says he won't be around for much longer and if he's still here in five years it will be a miracle. I tell him he is not an alcoholic, but he says he's seen hundreds of men like him on mortuary slabs and that he most certainly is one. 'You see, Michael' he said 'you can tell an alcoholic not by what he drinks, but by what he doesn't eat.'

I do know that Harry has the apetite of a sparrow with stomach cancer. I fear for him very much. Typical, that out of all my uncles my favourite one has to have suicidal ambitions. He's not too late to be cured, but he hasn't the will to live. Other than this we talk about Margaret Thatcher, Airey Neave (who he says is the real power behind Mrs T), communism in Britain, fascism, King Juan Carlos, holidays in Spain, Mr Jeremy Thorpe, homosexuals, and Harold Macmillan. And throughout we have the Spanish LP banging away in the background keeping a good many of the guests upstairs awake.

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