Reservoir drains on hottest day: The week that was: July 18 to 24, 1990.

Thousands of homes in Yorkshire were without water as a burst main drained a reservoir on one of the hottest days of the year. A break in the main pipe from the Riva reservoir near Rawdon caused chaos in villages and towns around the area at a time of peak demand. As the heatwave continued, water chiefs warned that more taps could run dry across the region.
Near Masham, 16th July 1990.

The arid outlook at Leighton Resrvoir.Near Masham, 16th July 1990.

The arid outlook at Leighton Resrvoir.
Near Masham, 16th July 1990. The arid outlook at Leighton Resrvoir.

Leeds was the hottest spot in the country on July 18, with a high of 30C. In the south health warnings were issued over heavy smog contaminated with toxic algae blooms.

Chancellor John Major admitted that government mistakes had led to hikes in inflation and interest rates. But he told a Conservative Association lunch in Horsforth, Leeds, that a “cooling” of the economy should bring inflation down slowly for the rest of the year and more sharply in early 1991. He said it was crucial for this to happen in order for Britain to benefit from the opening of trade barriers across Europe.

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If Britain could achieve the economic stability of its big European rivals France and Germany the prospects for the 90s were “glorious”, he said.

Also this week, Home Secretary David Waddington told Doncaster Tories that moves to set up a separate Islamic parliament in Britain were “thoroughly wrong-headed”. He added that the proposal by Muslim leaders did not deserve to be taken seriously.

Instead he urged them to commit fully to mainstream British life and British laws.

AIDS campaigners floated hundreds of condoms over the wall into Armley Jail in Leeds to highlight the need for Home Office measures to stem the spread of the HIV virus within prisons. A report from the National Association of Probation Officers identified Armley as one of the prisons where drug abuse was prevalent. Around 700 prisoners had already contracted the virus across the country.

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The problem of inmates sharing needles was so acute that they had to sharpen blunt needles on their walls, claimed ACTUP Leeds (AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power). A spokesman said: “People will die from ignorance. Condoms and clean needles must be made available to prisoners immediately.” The government said prison authorities were against issuing needles because it could be seen as condoning drug abuse.

Over on Humberside, Grimsby’s Labour MP Austin Mitchell was warning of ‘shrimp wars’. Mr Mitchell said he feared local fishermen might resort to violence to protect their grounds from interloping boats from Norfolk.

He was calling for prompt government action to avert a war at sea after receiving complaints from Grimsby fishermen who said stocks were being plundered regularly by flotillas of up to 20 boats arriving from the south.

On its foreign pages, The Yorkshire Post reported that up to 150 factory workers, buried when a powerful earthquake hit the northern Philippines, burned to death as fire swept through the wreckage where they lay trapped. There had already been more than 300 deaths.

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And in Canada, authorities ruled out using the army against Mohawk Indians who were fighting plans to turn a tribal burial ground into a golf course.

As more than 200 tribal chiefs from across the country opened an unprecedented emergency summit near Montreal, Quebec premier Robert Bourassa said there would be incalculable risks in using force to dislodge Mohawk militants from barricades in the resort town of Oka – scene of the proposed golf course.