No games without the pictures

Press, 16 February 1978, Page 13

No games without the pictures

By

A. K. GRANT

I was sitting obediently in front of my’ television set, waiting to review “The Intelligence Game,” when the man on TVI told us there was not going to be any “Intelligence Game” because

it had not turned up from Britain. As the programme was to be about N.A.T.O. assessment of Soviet Russia, one can only assume that this represents yet another triumph for the K.G.8.; and it certainly demonstrates, does it not, the need for last year’s S.I.S. Amendment Act? If the Russians are going to steal our television programmes, then the least we can do is open people’s letters. Anyway, there I was without a programme to review and a huge public to keep faith with, I mean, with whom to keep faith. What to do? Well I have not reviewed television at Sidi Rezegh, Monte Cassino and Waikuku Beach for nothing. In fact I have not reviewed television at Sidi Rezegh, Monte Cassino and Waikuku Beach at all. So I instantly decided to review the programme which replaced “The Intelligence Game.” That is the sort of decision which comes only from experience. The replacement programme turned out to be a “World in Action” discussion about nuclear power and its place in the British way of life. This ought to have been interesting, since we will have to confront the problem of nuclear power ourselves, once all available farms have been flooded. But the programme largely consisted of people stating their views, which were written out on little cards.

One was not convinced one way or the other by this process of debate, although one M.P. made a good point, namely, that to refuse to develop nuclear energy because terrorists might steal the plutonium would be, in effect, to allow terrorists to dictate to free societies what their policies should be. By and large I think I would rather have watched “The Intelligence Game.” However, any

deficiencies of "World in Action” were more than compensated for by the magnificence of the cricket broadcast between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. As I write this I don't know whether we will win the test or not. But who cares? Watching one’s own side get eight English wickets in two hours is a televisual experience which makes the actual ■winning of a test somehow rather vulgar.