Preparing for the 'boom'

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done so.

And 75% of those outside the limits are Tory-controlled councils-whose earlier savage cuts had left them with little leeway for further cuts.

Certainly most of the 21 biggest overspenders are Labour controlled London boroughs.

But a question, remains: if 145 Tory councils are standing councils taking a similar stand?

The workers' movement -trade unions and Labour activists-must unite in action to force Labour counciliors to defy the Tory cuts, maintain existing services, reject rate or rent increases, and fight for the defeat of the Thatcher government.

Heseltine New that the government ir itends to spend f45 million on civil defence was greeted with some ridicule pages of the newspapers.

The amount was divided. The government after all has advised the public to whitewash the insides of windows to ward off the effects of nuclear war. For £45 million it would not even be possible to buy enough whitewash.' Britain was compared favourably to America (and to the Soviet Union, which has been building nuclear shelters into the basements of new homes since the war. In the case of the Soviet Union this information was supposed to be further evidence of evil intent).

It was not pointed out of course that the f45m will be spent neither on whitewash nor on fall-out centres for the public.

Instead it will be used to build the skeleton lif that is the right word) of a parallel administration which will wield the baton of bourgeois rule after the holocaust.

Nuclear holocausts are 'acts of war' in the language of insurance companies.

Hurricanes on the other hand are 'acts of God'-(a good description for that savage vortex of wind and rain that blunders blindly in all directions killing indiscriminately).

The population of Central America does not therefore whitewash its windows but flees instead, seeking some building capable of withstanding gusts of 130 mph.

More than 100 people have died in the wake of Hurricane Allen in the United States, Mexico, Jamaica and Cuba.

Tens of thousands have had their homes destroyed.

This did not prevent the Telegraph from having a little fun with the hurricane, ridiculing the naming of hurricanes with male names and asking how anyone could take seriously something called Hurricane Brian.

The London evening papers have been no less parochial.

They saw the real disaster being that of those poor British holidaymakers who had had their holidays ruined. • The horror stories they recounted were of early flights home and half-completed sun tans.

Such insular carlousness is a long known trait of the British press epitomised in the Times headline over a one paragraph story: "Small earthquake in Chile: Few dead".

There is however no level of human misery from which capitalism is too squeamish to make money.

As the constructors and money lenders wait for the hurricane to pass so they can offer their lucrative services towards rebuilding, so do the two-bit companies in Britain which are springing up-even faster than double glazing consultancies-to offer you (for the price of two Carribean holidays) your very own nuclear fall-out shelter.

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Wednesday

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firm against Heseltine's latest cuts, why are not all Labour