Maybe that’s one reason why there was such an outpouring of anger when it was announced that the Scottish regiments were to be amalgamated It was almost like you were closing the pit. The army recruits best, not from the big cities, but from these traditional settled white communities that perhaps don’t best reflect our rosy multicultural ideal of Britain. It’s uncomfortable, but if they lose contact with those communities, the Army would be on a shaky peg.”But Burke is wary of “being too sympathetic towards the soldiers. There’s a danger that an audience will already think the war’s a scandal, but I don’t want them feeling, ‘Oh those poor little soldiers that got exploited.’ They’re big boys, they can look after themselves – that’s their attitude.

Then again, if they’re going to do something, they need to be clear about what they’re doing.”Was Burke reluctant to make a political point? The answer is a conditional “no”. “I’ll be going to the pub with the boys afterwards, so if they want to batter me.. But I think they’ll enjoy it. I’ve just tried to write it as it was for them.” If Iraq is indeed the Black Watch’s final war, “it’s a really rubbish one to end with”.He’s aware of the danger of being pigeon-holed as the “guy who does the male Scottish swearing plays” His next play is “a comedy about relationships. Not me, you might think, but after The Straits and Black Watch, I want to get away from the Army for a while.” He grins. “Before I end up doing Soldier Soldier.” Traverse 4: University of Edinburgh Drill Hall (0131-228 1404; www.edfringe ), 1-27 August.

The early years of the 21st century were tough ones for Argentina, given the country’s first-round knock-out in the 2002 World Cup and a pronounced period of economic collapse. Oddly, though, this coincided with an upsurge of interest in Latin America cinema. Brazil and Mexico made headlines with City of God and Y Tu Mam?ambi?respectively, but Argentina also drew attention with the Oscar-nominated Son of the Bride and Fabi?Bielinsky’s d?t feature, the quick-witted scam caper Nine Queens. Yet it was composed in the dark days of the Second World War: good therapy, but at the same time reflecting sinister undercurrents. Based on Sheridan’s comedy The Duenna, Prokofiev’s opera Betrothal in a Monastery was described by Shostakovich as one of his “most radiant and buoyant” works. “This suggests their causative processes may be similar,” the professor said.The committee was set up in 1985 after a Yorkshire TV documentary, Windscale: The Nuclear Laundry to investigate claims of an excess of leukaemia cases around the nuclear reprocessing plant, which is now known as Sellafield .No link was found but the committee recommended that the clusters at Sellafield and Dounreay should be investigated further..

So it’s theoretically believable that, if there is a viral component, you have less chance of coming across that particular virus.” Childhood cancer was highest in areas with the lowest overcrowding and lowest where overcrowding was worst, lending more support to the viral theory, Professor Elliott said.The study had demonstrated for the first time that, like childhood leukaemia, other childhood cancers, including bone tumours and soft tissue sarcomas, occurred in clusters. Cure rates have improved sharply and eight of 10 affected children now survive.Childhood leukaemia, and possibly other childhood cancers, are thought to be caused by a “double whammy”, a genetic defect in the womb, followed by a “second hit” that precipitates the disease.Children of wealthier families kept apart from others in their early months in hygienic surroundings with little exposure to bacteria, may fail to develop strong immune systems necessary to ward off infections later in childhood, which may trigger cancer in the vulnerable.Professor Elliott said: “If you’re wealthy, you tend to live in a big house with more land around it, and have contact with fewer people. There are about 1,500 cases of cancer in children under 15 each year, including 450 with leukaemia, which are commonest in social classes one and two. “If you believe theories that development of childhood cancer involves multiple steps and one of them is caused by a virus, if you can identify that virus it may be possible to develop a vaccine against it and break that causative chain,” he added. Children from better-off families in rural areas are at higher risk of developing cancer, probably because their isolation makes them more vulnerable to infection, scientists say.

A 25-year search for the causes of childhood cancer has found rates are up to 30 per cent higher in better-off rural counties of Britain than in poorer urban districts and tend to occur in clusters that would not be expected by chance.
The finding from the biggest study of childhood cancers in the world, based on more than 30,000 cases in Britain between 1969 and 1993, runs counter to experience with almost all other diseases, which are commoner in poorer populations.It supports the theory that childhood leukaemia and other childhood cancers may be caused by viruses, and raises the hope that a vaccine against childhood cancer might be developed, the scientists said.The report, by the Committee on Medical Aspects of Radiation in the Environment (Comare), in effect ruled out radiation from nuclear power stations and similar sources as a major cause of childhood cancers, although radiation and other environmental factors such as pollution could still play a small role, it said.Professor Alex Elliott, the chairman, said it was the most important report in the committee’s 20-year history. It’s the fifth-largest supermarket chain in Germany, and came here in 1994. Now has around 400 stores and a 2 per cent market share, up by 12 per cent on this time last year. It has more than 5,000 stores in 17 countries.Buy: waffel-schoko-r?hen (chocolate-filled wafer rolls), 59p; wild berry sorbet, £1.29; Black Forest air-dried smoked ham, £1.39; smoked-trout fillet, £1.29; blackcurrant jam, 64p; vegetable juice, 79p; peppers stuffed with Greek cheese, £1.29; Landgut rye bread, 49p; cheese straws, 79p; Ecuador 70 per cent-cocoa chocolate, 89p.. Keeping the Lidl but dropping the Schwarz – they didn’t want it to be known as the schwarz (black) market – by the 1970s the shops had evolved into the Lidl we know today.