People — Birthday gift

Former British Prime Minister John Major is moving house to be near his first love — cricket. Cleaver Square, Kennington, may be one of the most sought after squares in south London, but the clincher for Major was the fact that it was within hailing distance of the Oval, the home of the Surrey Cricket Club, where he is a member.

Major, who once nursed the ambition of being a professional batsman in Surrey’s kit, always found time finds time for cricket, even while he was prime minister asking for the Test match scores on the scrambler whenever he was abroad.

On the day after the general election, he eased the pain by taking his family to the Oval to get away from it all. And when Hong Kong was being over to the Chinese, cricket came first. Major eschewed the ceremony and stayed in Britain to attend the memorial service for Denis Compton.

Letting out secrets

Sarah Netanyahu, wife of the Israeli Pime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has asked an Israeli court to bar publication of audio tapes and letters held by her first husband. In a television interview earlier this month, she accused her first husband, Doron Neuberger, of secretly recording some of their conversations. Neuberger has said he planned to write a book about Sarah.

She has also apologised to Israel’s outgoing Consul-General in New York for reportedly suggesting that she had an affair with the former prime minister Shimon Peres. While taping a television interview last month, she reportedly lost her temper when she was asked whether she used her husband’s admitted infidelity for leverage. Though the angry exchange was edited out of the programme at her insistence, newspaper reports quote her as suggesting that infidelity was rife among politicians and many of them had propositioned her. “Where do you think Shimon Peres spends the night when she is in New York,” she reportedly asked.

Heritage for sale

The former London home of ballerina Anna Pavlova has been put up for sale, prompting fears that the historic building could be closed to public scrutiny forever. The Middlesex University, which ownes the house, hopes to raise £1.6 million by selling the Pavlova estate, so as to relocate and centralise its drama department.

But campaigners claim the decision aims to raise much-needed funds. The Save London’s Theatre campaign said a sell off would be a great public loss and called on the university to raise the money by hiring out the house and its grounds.