1982_in_the_United_Kingdom

1982 in the United Kingdom

1982 in the United Kingdom

UK-related events during the year of 1982


Events from the year 1982 in the United Kingdom. The year was dominated by the Falklands War.

Quick Facts

Incumbents

Events

January

February

March

April

  • 1 April – A twelve-year-old unnamed Birmingham boy becomes one of the youngest people in England and Wales to be convicted of murder after he admits murdering an eight-year-old boy, and is sentenced to be detained indefinitely.[1]
  • 2 April – Falklands War begins as Argentina invades the Falkland Islands.[2]
  • 4 April – Falklands War: The British Falkland Islands government surrenders, placing the islands in Argentine control.
  • 5 April – Falklands War: Royal Navy task force sets sail to the Falklands from Portsmouth.[18]
  • 7 April – Britain declares a 200-mile "exclusion zone" around the Falklands.
  • 15 April – Actor Arthur Lowe dies suddenly of a stroke aged 66 after collapsing in his dressing room at The Alexandra the previous day.
  • 17 April – By proclamation of the Queen of Canada on Parliament Hill, Canada repatriates its constitution, granting full political independence from the United Kingdom; included is the country's first entrenched bill of rights.
  • 21 April – Walsall F.C.'s hopes of becoming the first Football League club to ground-share are dashed when officials condemn their plans to sell their Fellows Park stadium and become tenants at the Molineux (home of Wolverhampton Wanderers).[19]
  • 24 April
  • 25 April – Falklands War: Royal Marines recapture South Georgia.[18]
  • 29 April – Daniel and Christopher Smith, Britain's first twins conceived through in vitro fertilisatio, are born to Josephine and Stewart Smith at the Royal Free Hospital in London.
  • 30 April – The Conservatives return to the top of the opinion polls for the first time since late-1979, with the latest MORI poll showing that they have 43% of the vote, ahead of the SDP–Liberal Alliance.[21]

May

June

July

August

September

  • 5 September – Air ace and war hero Sir Douglas Bader dies suddenly of heart failure aged 72 whilst being driven through Chiswick, London.
  • 7 September – Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher expresses her concern at the growing number of children living in single-parent families, but says that she is not opposed to divorce.
  • 22 September – An estimated 14% of the workforce is now reported to be unemployed.[36]
  • 23 September – Nigel Lawson announces that no industry should remain in state ownership unless there is an "overwhelming" case.
  • 27 September – General Motors launches the Spanish-built Opel Corsa which will be sold in Britain from April next year as the Vauxhall Nova. The new front-wheel drive range of small hatchbacks and saloons will effectively replace the Chevette. However, the transport workers union has thrown the future of the new car which is expected to sell around 50,000 units a year, into jeopardy by blocking imports to Britain.[37]
  • 30 September
    • Lord Denning delivers his last judgement as Master of the Rolls.
    • After well over 100 years, the UK Inland Telegram service closes. Telegram figures peaked after the First World War with over 100m sent annually; by the time the service closes the annual figure is down to less than 3 million.

October

November

  • November – The Government announces that more than 400,000 council houses have been sold off under the right-to-buy scheme within the last three years.[42]
  • 1 November
    • The Welsh language television station, S4C, launches in Wales.
    • Opinion polls show the Conservatives still firmly in the lead, suggesting that a general election will be held by next summer.
  • 2 November – The fourth terrestrial television channel, Channel 4, begins broadcasting,[2] the first programme broadcast being the game show Countdown, hosted by Richard Whiteley. Another flagship programme is the Liverpool-based soap opera Brookside.[43]
  • 7 November – The Thames Barrier is first publicly demonstrated.
  • 12 November – Express Lift Tower in Northampton officially opened.
  • 15 November – Unemployment remains in excess of 3,000,000 people – 13.8% of the workforce.
  • 16 November – Comedian and actor Arthur Askey dies aged 82 in London only four months after his final performance.
  • 28 November – Opinion polls show the Conservative government with an approval rating of up to 44% and well on course for a second successive electoral victory, 13 points ahead of Labour. Support for the Alliance has halved in the space of a year.[44]

December

Undated

  • Inflation has fallen to a 10-year low of 8.6%, although some 1,500,000 jobs have reportedly been lost largely due to Government policy in attaining this end.[47]
  • Vauxhall drops the Opel symbol from its cars.

Publications

Births

Eddie Redmayne
The Princess of Wales
The Prince of Wales

Deaths

January

Margot Grahame
Stanley Holloway

February

Isobel Wylie Hutchison

March

Ivy Cavendish-Bentinck, Duchess of Portland
Rab Butler

April

May

Barnett Janner

June

Joan Clarkson

July

Kenneth More

August

Cathleen Nesbitt
Ingrid Bergman

September

Douglas Bader
Sarah Churchill

October

Philip Noel-Baker

November

Frank Swinnerton
John Redcliffe-Maud, Baron Redcliffe-Maud

December

Marty Feldman
Colin Chapman

See also


References

  1. "Those were the days". Expressandstar.com. Retrieved 4 April 2011.
  2. Penguin Pocket On This Day. Penguin Reference Library. 2006. ISBN 0-14-102715-0.
  3. "1982: Mark Thatcher missing in Sahara". BBC News. 12 January 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  4. "1982: Mark Thatcher found safe and well". BBC News. 15 January 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  5. Sieder, Joe (2014). "Police (1982)". Screenonline. BFI. Retrieved 25 June 2021.
  6. "1982: UK unemployment tops three million". BBC News. 26 January 2008. Retrieved 16 October 2012.
  7. The Hutchinson Factfinder. Helicon. 1999. p. 665. ISBN 1-85986-000-1.
  8. "Britain Since 1948". www.localhistories.org. 16 May 2021.
  9. "1982: Laker Airways goes bust". BBC News. 5 February 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  10. "Next history". Next PLC. Retrieved 12 October 2010.
  11. "Apostolic Nunciature of Great Britain". GCatholic.org. 2014. Retrieved 29 November 2014.
  12. Skow, John (8 March 1982). "Music: Final Curtain for D'Oyly Carte". Time. Archived from the original on 15 October 2010. Retrieved 7 July 2010.
  13. "1982: Queen opens Barbican Centre". BBC News. 3 March 1982. Archived from the original on 18 October 2007. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  14. "1982: Judge halts 'obscenity' trial". BBC News. 18 March 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  15. Brenton, Howard (28 January 2006). "Look back in anger". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  16. Palmer, Alan; Palmer, Veronica (1992). The Chronology of British History. London: Century Ltd. pp. 446–447. ISBN 0-7126-5616-2.
  17. "Those were the days". Express & Star. Retrieved 4 April 2011.
  18. Kurt Pätzold; Manfred Weissbecker (2002). Schlagwörter und Schlachtrufe: aus zwei Jahrhunderten deutscher Geschichte (in German). Militzke. p. 136. ISBN 978-3-86189-270-0.
  19. "Trend | Voting Intention in Great Britain: 1976–present". Ipsos MORI. Archived from the original on 23 September 2012. Retrieved 4 April 2011.
  20. "The Hacienda Manchester". Manchester District Music Archive. Archived from the original on 26 July 2011. Retrieved 5 March 2011.
  21. "Report of the Board of Inquiry into the Loss of HMS Ardent" (PDF). 6 August 1982. pp. 3–4. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 October 2015. Retrieved 10 September 2021.
  22. Burke, Damien. "25th May 1982". HMS Coventry D118. Retrieved 10 September 2021.
  23. "Board of Inquiry (Report): Loss of SS Atlantic Conveyor" (PDF). 21 July 1982. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 October 2012. Retrieved 10 September 2021.
  24. McCulloch, CS. "The Kielder Water Scheme: the last of its kind?" (PDF). p. 13. Retrieved 10 September 2021.
  25. "1982: Pope makes historic visit to Canterbury". BBC News. 29 May 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  26. "1982: Israeli ambassador shot in London". BBC News. 3 June 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  27. "1982: Fifty die in Argentine air attack". BBC News. 8 June 2008. Retrieved 16 October 2012.
  28. "1982: Welsh miners back health workers". BBC News. 16 June 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  29. "Michael Fagan: 'Her nightie was one of those Liberty prints, down to her knees'". The Independent. 19 February 2012. Archived from the original on 1 May 2022. Retrieved 31 August 2018.
  30. USSR Facts & Figures Annual. Academic International Press. 1983. p. 354. ISBN 978-0-87569-048-3.
  31. Marr, Andrew (2007). A History of Modern Britain. London: Macmillan. p. 438. ISBN 978-1-4050-0538-8.
  32. "Announcement of the christening of Lady Louise Windsor". Royal.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 31 December 2013. Retrieved 4 April 2011.
  33. "Britons mount massive anti-Thatcher demonstration". Record-Journal. Meriden, CT. 23 September 1982. p. 14. Retrieved 19 February 2016.
  34. "Opel gives details of car in union row". Glasgow Herald. 28 September 1982. p. 7. Retrieved 19 February 2016.
  35. "1982: Mary Rose rises after 437 years". BBC News. 11 October 1982. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  36. "1982: Sinn Féin triumph in elections". BBC News. 21 October 1982. Archived from the original on 23 October 2007. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  37. "1982: RUC officers killed by IRA bomb". BBC News. 27 October 1982. Archived from the original on 29 October 2007. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  38. Moffatt, Simon (November 2007). "Brookside". BBC. Liverpool. Retrieved 16 October 2012.
  39. Johnson, Maureen (28 November 1982). "Britons willing to continue with Thatcher's economics". The Gadsden Times. Gadsden, Alabama. p. 2. Retrieved 16 October 2012.
  40. "The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1982". Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  41. "The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1982". Archived from the original on 30 October 2007. Retrieved 30 November 2007.
  42. "Inflation: the Value of the Pound 1750–1998" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 16 February 2010. Retrieved 4 April 2011.
  43. "Prince William of Wales & Catherine". Westminster Abbey. Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  44. Carr, Tim; Dale, Iain; Waller, Robert (7 September 2017). The Politicos Guide to the New House of Commons 2017. ISBN 9781785902789.
  45. The Annual Obituary. St. Martin's. 1982. p. 430. ISBN 978-0-312-03877-9.

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