The Guardian from London, Greater London, England • 12

20 77 Guardian Monday March 22 1993 Lamont tries to buy of IF VAT revolt Michael Whlto Political Editor Jonathan Ball, aged three, who died in the IRA bombing Erlend Clouston finds Warrington's citizens confused, resentful and wondering why they were chosen to suffer a second IRA atrocity As MPs reported very mixed constituency reaction to the Budget, Mr Lainont told David Frost: "We arc going to make sure we give good help to the poorest pensioners and other poor families." But he ruled out exempting whole groups, like pensioners, from the tax. "There are many people who are poor, there are many people who are noi all pensioners who are going to find this difficult. But I think it would be expensive, I don't think it would be appropriate and 1 think it would be an administrative nightmare to exempt certain people from VAT," he said. Weekend straw polls among MPs suggested that three out of four Tories want "full compensation" for those in income-related schemes eight million people including three million pensioners and those on income support, housing benefit, family credit, community charge and disablement benefit. Those programmes cost about 20 billion a year.

But if the 0.85 per cent addition to the RPI which the two-stage VAT change will bring by 1995-9(5 costs these groups twice that amount, as some officials believe, it points to an eventual bill of about 350 million which Mr Lamont yesterday said would come from the reserves. Labour has calculated that the full rebate would be between 800 million and 1 billion. Ministers reject such talk. "We haven't got that sort of money," said one. Tension between ministers over the VAT "compensation" surfaced when Michael Portillo, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, told MPs it was a "swings and roundabouts" calculation that would include such factors as lower fuel prices in real terms and the continuation of the poll tax benefit (2.80 to a married couple) after the tax dies.

Some Labour MPs believe the new VAT levy is Mr Major's poll tax. Most Tories think it will fade if properly handled. OHM AN Lamont will be forced tonight to buy offa looming Budget revolt over his im position of 2.3 billion of VAT on domestic fuel by promising Tory backbenchers to provide up to 350 million in compensatory payments to the most needy consumers. With ministers privately admitting they have faced a public relations fiasco, Gordon Brown, the Labour shadow, pledged a "nationwide crusade" to obtain full compensation for extra costs, which may be 2 a week for the average family. John Major's embattled allies had been hoping for a boost from the Budget before Maastricht and the pit closure crisis return to haunt them.

But Friday's rejection by Newbury Conservatives of John Maples, a former Treasury minister Mr Major was known to be backing, as their byelection candidate was seen as a slap in the face for the Prime Minister. Instead, 29-year-old Julian Davidson was chosen to brave the rigours of a byelection spotlight. But as the Chancellor demonstrated on BBCl's Breakfast with Frost yesterday, social security ministers are refusing to divulge the exact scale and method of payment until it is announced by Peter Lilley in November unless it faces defeat in tonight's formal vote on the Budget resolutions or, more likely, during the Finance Bill after Easter. The formula will provide for payments before bills start rising after April 1994. But some MPs suspect that the longer its announcement is delayed, the costlier it will have to be to prevent the affair dragging on throughout Mr Lamont's three-year tax plan "three years of attrition.

November to November to November," one senior Labour figure warned. Bomb blasts hole in town's sense of contentment one of the bombs exploded as police experts painstakingly search for clues photograph don mcphee Top judge attacks sentencing reform Flowers mark the spot where Among those caught by the explosions were an engaged couple. Liz Antrobus, aged 21, a waitress in Chester, had come into Warrington to buy some shoes and finished up with a shattered left arm and right leg after running from the first blast directly into the second. Her fiance, 29-year-old tug worker Gordon Edwards, has serious injuries to both legs and his abdomen. A 12-year-old boy, the only 'To be honest, I had a big cry with my mates.

I don't think the troops should be in Ireland, but what kind of sense of fun do they get out of business yesterday in the East Quadrant shopping area, just behind Bridge Street. At the barracks, silver-haired Captain Taylor, in an off-duty dark blue Ricci sweat-shirt, had mused: "We have to assume they've had a look around here and decided we're not as soft a target as some. The tragedy is, they then go and kill people who've got nothing to do with them." "I think there might he some reprisals at the Irish Club," the caretaker sighed. "No, I don't think so," said Captain Taylor. "Some of them wrote lovely letters to the paper after the gas works bombs." Just in case, Cheshire police had stationed a couple of constables outside the lime-green two-storey building in Orford Lane where inside a dozen customers sat miserably watching a group called The Ranchers, from Stoke, set up their gear.

Every now and then the yellow payphone in the hallway rang: anonymous callers warning they were going to get you bastards, asking if they liked the smell of petrol. At yesterday's press conference, Michael Sanders, chief executive of the council, stressed what a contribution the Irish had made to the town, even supplying a mayor. But in the short term, one Irish mayor does not equal two Irish bombs. On Saturday night the club secretary. Jimmy Murray was expressing his horror at the bombings when two wild-eyed young men burst in the front door.

"There was a lad murdered in our street," one of them bawled before the police could get to him. Outside, they tried to calm him down. "Keep quiet, or they'll all come out," they warned him. "I don't care," he snarled, "let them all come out." A man in a long black coat ran across the road and hurled a lager can at the club, shouting "You effing Fenian bastards." He was hustled away. Later on, after closing time, the police broke up a gang of youths marching purposefully down Orford Lane.

Rubbish stacked by the club's back door was set alight. It was a torrid time for Mr Murray, a genial retired baker, steel erector, and bus conductor who has been based in Warrington for 36 years. Opening the club on this night of all nights had been a calculated decision; if it shut, like the Postern Gate, it might have been interpreted as guilt. "Of course we're just as shocked as anyone," protested Jimmy, crushing another cigarette into the crowded ashtray. "It could have been my grandchild who was killed." There was another fine calculation to make.

He was not sure if he wanted his name used. "I could be a martyr, the next target for the boys," the old man said, making a pistol shape with his right hand. "Ka-pow!" In the end he came down on the side of humanity. "To hell with it. Quote me if you want." A younger Irishman slipped between The Ranchers' amplifiers.

A handsome man with a moustache and a good career, he was still resigned to trouble. "We'll suffer at work and the neighbourhood. The children will get it bad at school." Friends had rung up from Dublin, saying what in the name of God, why Warrington? He stared sadly over the foam of his Murphy's Stout. "We're not political. We love one another.

It's politicians who stir it up, and bang. OT any ID?" The I squat shadow Ruardine the Rates ol Warrington Territorial Army barracks warily studied the plastic card in the magnesium glare of a road called, of all things, O'Leary Street. Was he nervous? The caretaker shrugged. "Now and then," he admitted. Ho was an ex-professional soldier.

He knew a bit about bombs and violence. Haifa mile away, uptown civilian Warrington was in an emotional daze, shaken rigid at the hole punched in the easy-going contentment of a community previously famous only for its breweries, its soap factory and its Rugby League team. A notice on the door of the Postern Gate Tavern, just around the corner from the first Bridge Street bomb, announced in shaky red felt-tip: "In respect for the dead and injured we shall not be opening this evening." Yet Gaffer's Bier Keller, 50 yards nearer the explosion, was packed. "It is a form of defiance, isn't it?" a brunette in a black cocktail dress declared over the blare of disco music. A bit further down Bridge Street, HGV driver Mark James munched a tandoori in a doorway, watching teams of men in white overalls carefully sweep up fragments of flesh.

"To be honest, I had a big cry with my mates," said 34-year-old Mark, don't think the troops should be in Ireland, but what kind of sense of fun do they get out of this? It's an effing atrocity." At the Spicy Chicken takeaway, 17-year-old Dominic Reynolds thought whoever did it should be strapped to a chair that had a bomb tied to it, timed to go off in an hour. "That's too quick," snorted a female colleague. "Bastards. A three-year-old child, just before Mother's Day. Absolutely sick." It was the shopping date, coupled with the defencelessness of the victims, that made the attacks particularly shocking.

In Warrington's Parish Church, Canon James Colling spoke of a feeling of bewilderment in the the town. "Warrington people will not be bullied or browbeaten by these antics," he promised from the pulpit of a church whose origins go back to the simpler world of the 7th century. Not far away, police and anti-terrorist officers were still examining a 250-yard pedestrianised stretch of Bridge Street, sealed off at cither each end by two huge screens of white plastic mounted on scaffolding. from Grappenhall, on the outskirts of the town, would have been four in May and the tributes carried messages of heartbroken farewell. One bunch of chrysanthemums bore the message: "For an innocent little boy who know nothing of the horrors of terrorism.

May you rest in peace. From mothers who care on Mother's Day." Another said: "Our prayers in victim on the danger list, is said to have been so badly injured he had to be identified by his watch. "They're just inhuman callous killers," the boy's distraught father said yesterday. Outside Warrington General Hospital, where 21 victims were detained overnight, a 14-piece Salvation Army brass band played sombre music. "It's a sad day for the town." said Steve Hodson, grimly rattling up the shutters at Curry's, one of the few shops open for for the victims and their families of this barbaric atrocity.

There can be no forgiveness for the perpetrators, and may the Irish people show their revulsion at this latest act of depravity." Revulsion was expressed by the town's two Labour MPs, Doug Hoyle and Mike Hall, and their MEP colleague Brian Simpson, who voiced their horror at a news conference. He Guardian Crossword 19,671 IRA admits responsibility but blames death on police not heeding warning Addressing the annual conference of the Law Society of Scotland, Lord Taylor called for greater freedom for judges in deciding sentences, including wider powers to impose custodial sentences on youngsters. He warned: "It is of prime importance that the sentences passed should not be so far out of touch with the expectations of ordinary law-abiding citizens as to create discontent If that happens, there could be a real risk of aggrieved parties taking the law into their own hands." Lord Taylor said the mandatory life sentence for murder was the best example of how lack of discretion could lead to injustice. "How can it be just to impose the same sentence on a poisoner who slowly and deliberately kills his victim for her money and the caring husband whose wife is suffering agony with cancer and he puts her out of her pain?" WINNERS OF PRIZE PUZZLE 19,664 Winner ol this week's Zenith watch is Mr M. A.

Firth, of Dews-bury. Yorkshire. Runners-up (12,50 book token each) are Hugh Kirkbnde. ol Bristol: Mrs K. Nelson, ol Blandlord Forum.

Dorset; and Betty Proctor, of Market Rasen, Lincolnshire. 5 A flighty creature until admitted to a convent (10). 6 The French bishop's responsibility lor a tenant (6) 8 This point may be put on record (6). 13 Taking the main road back with stulf of little account (10). 16 No rating could be so empty-headed! (8).

18 Legal claim certain to give rise to amusement (8). 19 To acquire a dog, look around (6). 21 In days gone by one ale royally tn rather more elegant fashion (6). 22 A ship loaded with border plants (6). 24 Crockery stall being set up (41 Solution tomorrow Hab a cWJHd if nf I Pit A CIj6F fl I FE ekR 1 UIt1h I OPINE dbE)S Hi 17 i nuMA UOLIN SsflvOW 5 1 I kBT I I BEROR A dTJoIO A PHY yieldsBiytmumm Clare Dyer Legal Correspondent THE Lord Chief Justice, Lord Taylor, yesterday mounted the strongest attack yet by a senior judge on the sentencing reforms that are provoking widespread dissatisfaction among judges and magistrates.

He said the Criminal Justice Act 1991, enforced since October, put judges into an "ill-fitting restricting the sentences they could impose. He made a plea for "sanity to be restored" through an urgent review of the legislation. The act aimed to reduce prison numbers and punish more offenders in the community. However, judges and magistrates have criticised it for preventing them taking into account previous convictions when passing sentence, and some magistrates have resigned in protest. 22 Some really nasty letters calling for a probe (6).

23 Where people have a good time with legitimate reason (10). 24 After a Ob (4). 25 Hold and lie in knots (6). 26 Builders putting a point to university heads (8). Down 1 Turn up.

not (or the first lime, and upset a paperer (81. 2 Piano music a duet (4) 3 The thief who makes coppers most angry (6) 4 Giving a lad beer is not hard to understand (81 continued from page one Jonathan had been dropped off by his father, Wilf, with a teenage friend, Samantha Thompson, to buy a Mother's Day present for his mother, Marie. Samantha needed an operation to remove shrapnel from her body and was still "very poorly" last night. The flowers could not hide the ugly splotches of blood that stained the floor. Jonathan, Tomorrow Thompson wins Set by Crispa Across 7 An account presented by oriental characters (8) 9 The listening device Edward got 16) 10 A boom? Dispute that (4).

11 It might appear no diet acts for him he does like to tell the tale! (10). 12 A red church tower (6). 14 Idontilied the youth pocketing a peach (8). 15 Don't leave a man ol learning in control (6). 17 The minister and a politician are in process ol making up again (6).

20 Trendy attitude for example 18). said: "There cannot be any cause which justifies the taking of life in this way. It is an atrocious and cowardly act." The Archbishop of Canterbury said all decent people should "rise up in horror" against the terrorists. "I do not have enough words to sum up my disgust at the evil perpetrated on these innocent people," he said. Buckingham Palace con John Thaw, who played the cerebral detective, won the best actor award.

Helen Mirren won the best actress award for her performance in Prime Suspect 2. She won the same title last year for the first series. The title for best drama serial went to Anglo-Saxon Attitudes. An Ungentlemanly Act, based around the Argentine invasion of the Falklands, was given best single drama award. Noel's House Party, the mainstay of BBC's early Saturday evening and a programme that LWT has tried to acquire, won best light entertainment award.

The ITN coverage of the prison camps in Serbia was judged best news and actuality coverage. John Cole, the BBC's former political correspondent, won the Richard Dimbleby award for the most important personal contribution on factual television. A special award for lifetime achievement went to Dame Maggie Smith. Accepting the award, she said: "It seems to be possible to be in films without taking your clothes off or without machine-guns killing people." firmed that that the Queen has sent a message to the Ball family expressing her condolences. Meanwhile, at lunchtime yesterday there was another alert when two suspect cars were seen on a car park close to the main London-Glasgow line at the town's Bank Quay station.

Police sealed off nearby streets and ordered residents away but the cars were later cleared without incident. a Baf ta awardat Host simile drama. An umienuemaniy aci; Host urama series, inspector Morse; licit drama serial, Anglo-Saxon Attitudes; Best tactual series. Pandora's Box; Best light entertainment. Noel's House Best comedy.

Absolutely Fabulous; Best news and actuality coverage, Serbian prison camps discovery (ITN); Best actress, Helen Mirren (Prime Suspect 2); Best actor. John Thaw (Inspector Morse); Best light entertainment performance, Joanna I.umley (Absolutely Fabulous); Best original TV music. France's House; Huw Wheldon award for best arts programme, Angela drier's Curious Room (Omnibus); Best children's programme tactual. Art Attack; Best chii-clrcn's programme, The Borrowers; Flaherty documentary award, The Man Who Loves Gary Linekcr. FUm Best tltm, Howards End (Ismail Merchant and James Ivory): David iican award for best achievement in direction.

The Player (Robert Altman), Best original sceenplay, Husbands and Wives (Woody Allen): Best adapted screenplay. The Player (Michael Tolkln); Best actress. F.mma Thompson (Howards F.ndr, Best actor. Robert Downey inr (Chaplin); Best supporting actress, Miranda Richardson (Damage); Best supporting actor. Gene Hackinan (Unformven); Best original llim music.

Strictly Ballroom (David Hirsch-tickler); Best tllm not in English language. Raise the Red Lantern (Chiu Fu-SUcng Zhang Yimou); Best short film. Omnibus (Anne Bennett and Sam Kannann); Best short animated film. Daumicr's Law (Ginger Gibbons and Geoff Dunbar). Special Awanlaj The Sir Alexander Korder award for best British lllm.

The Crying Gamo (Director: Neil Jordan); Fellowship. Sydney Samualson: Michael Baleoni award. Kenneth Branagli: Richanl Dimbleby award. John Cole: Alan Clarke Award. Kcnitll Trodd; Lifetime achievement.

Dame Maggie Smith; Writers award. Lawrence Marks and Maurice Gran: Most onguial TV programme. Pandora's Ilex; Best foreign TV programme, Tosca. BOOKS Kole Omotoso, a fellow Nigerian writer, praises Songs of Enchantment. Ben Okri's first novel since winning the Booker.

Ian Aitken reviews a collection of interviews and curses the BBC for its spectacular incompetence: banishing Sir Robin Day from Question Time. Julian Evans watches Casablanca for the umpteenth time and reviews a new book on an old favourite, filled with valuable trivia. EDUCATION MAGAZINE Andrew Cult Media correspondent THE lavish 5.6 million costume drama, Howards End. won the best film category in last night's British Academy of Film and Television Awards. Emma Thompson won best actress award for her part in the E.M.

Forster adaptation, while her husband, Kenneth Branagh, won a special award for an outstanding contribution to British cinema. Howards End and The Crying Game, Neil Jordan's tale of Irish terrorism and sexual ambivalence, both did well in the British version of the Oscars foreshadowing their assault on next week's Hollywood Oscars. The Crying Game won a special award for the best British film. The film, which was 67th on Britain's 1992 box-office list, has six Oscar nominations. Howards End has nine.

In the television awards lTV's Inspector Morse carried off the best drama series award at the ceremony at the Grosve-nor House Hotel in London. II only schools taught the difference between right and wrong, then children would not be committing all these evil crimes. But can you actually teach young people to be And as France goes to the polls, the school resource pages explain how the country's political system works with young people's views in French. PARENTS "The telephone's ringing, the baby's bawling and the saucepan's boiling over. Welcome to the world of Shirley Hughes." In Parents on Tuesday, Lynn Hanna finds out how that world has changed since Hughes first started writing and illustrating children's books, 40 years ago..