RENT DODGERS: Bury's Housing Department was taking applications for the post of bailiff in an all-out campaign to stamp on the borough's rent dodgers. With rent arrears totalling a massive £100,000, the bailiff would have the power to take council tenants' goods if dodgers persist in evading rent payments.

MALARIA: A four-year-old girl from Bury was released from hospital following treatment for malaria. The youngster contracted the tropical disease after a trip to Pakistan with her mother. BOMB BLAST: A former Bury Grammar School headboy was recovering in hospital after being badly injured in a bomb blast in Dublin. Brian Crossland Cubbon's secretary and the British Ambassador to Dublin were killed in the explosion. Mr Cubbon, whose family lived in Tottington, was Ulster's top civil servant.

YOUTH PROBLEMS: The green light was given by Bury Council for the £600,000 controversial community home for young people on land near Gigg Lane. Two previous sites at Springside View and at Broad Oak had already been dropped after vigorous campaigns by local residents. A 700 name petition opposed the latest scheme.

MILITARY MAN: Major General George Surtees, CB, CBE, MC, Colonel XX The Lancashire Fusiliers, 1945-55, died at the age of 80. It was he who, as colonel of the Regiment, received the Freedom scroll and presentation casket from the Mayor of Bury when the Freedom of the town was bestowed on the LFs in August 1946.

KUWAIT-BOUND: Two massive articulated lorries left Bury bound for Kuwait with a load of 360 washing machines. The lorries trundled out of Dawnyard Ltd's Oram Street depot at the start of a 8,500 mile round trip. The journey was expected to take 24 days travelling through France, Italy, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Turkey, Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. The run would include a 1,400 mile drive over scorching desert and the vehicles would have an army escort as they made their way through Syria and Jordan due to the civil troubles.