This is all down to government policy and the common agriculture policy. It is absolute desecration of the South Downs."Mr Harmer said that al- though he had not seen any orchids on the grassland that he had ploughed, he would not be ploughing any more of the land."We wrote to English Nature last June telling them we were going to do this and I only heard from them yesterday when we had finished ploughing," he said."It is a Site of Special Scientific interest and I agree that it is crazy, but English Nature needs to bring its subsidies in line with the EU if they are going to stop this happening It is just a matter of economics.". Environmentalists protested yesterday against a "crazy" European Union law which has allowed the destruction of a Site of Special Scientific Interest harbouring 15 types of orchid and the endangered Blue Adonis butterfly. This wholly inadequate allocation may mean that that thousands of students will not be able to train and retrain.".

Chief executive Keith Wymer said: "There is a huge and unmet need for education, training and retraining ... To absorb the cuts, principals faced having to make large-scale redundancies, and some would be forced to close down costly courses such as engineering or construction altogether.Colleges are angry that, after being repeatedly told they play a central role in boosting the skills of Britain's workforce, budget cuts are now preventing them meeting the demand for training they have generated. Further-education leaders yesterday predicted the cuts would prove disastrous for colleges, with those worst-hit facing merger or even closure.Sixth-form colleges, some of which produce league-table-topping A-level results, are among the chief victims of the cuts, with specialist colleges teaching art and design and agriculture also badly affected.John Brennan, further-education development director at the Association of Colleges, said they were being driven near breaking-point. The cutbacks will come as a severe blow to the further-education sector, which has met tough government-imposed targets and expanded student numbers by over 15 per cent since 1993 while slashing costs. Among the victims will be A-level students, whose course hours will be cut, and the unemployed, who will not be able to afford tuition fees colleges could be forced to impose.The cuts represent a reduction of 125,000 part-time student places (or fewer full-time places) compared with this year. Details of grants for the next academic year show the first year-on-year cut in government funding for further education for over a decade. Up to 250,000 students will be denied places at sixth-form and further- education colleges next year as budgets are slashed by pounds 115m.

But in reality it would not work."Gun enthusiasts are slating the commercial as a misrepresentation of the truth, and are even more incensed by the fact that Connery is involved, claiming he made his name playing the gun-toting James Bond.However, Ann Pearston of Snowdrop, defended the former Bond star, saying he had made the James Bond films 25 years ago."He is a voice in Hollywood as is Dustin Hoffman who has spoken out against violence in films," said Mrs Pearston."That is good because we are not going to be able to do that and be heard."A spokesman for the Advertising Standards Authority said no action would be taken over the advert until it had received complaints from people who had actually seen it.. The 40-second advertisement, which was only shown in cinemas for the first time yesterday, features the voice of the former James Bond actor Sean Connery. It was unveiled last month and is designed to win support for an extension to the Government ban on handguns to include .22 pistols.The campaign is being run by the Snowdrop Petition which was set up after Thomas Hamilton gunned down 16 children and their teacher at a primary school in Dunblane in March 1996.The advert shows a man loading a .22-calibre handgun and firing at a human shaped target which is devastated by the shots.The London ad agency which produced the advertisement and is distributing it free of charge has hit back at critical pro-shooting campaigners.Barry Delaney of Delaney Fletcher Bozell said: "The gun lobby started having a go at this before they had even seen it."He rejected the claim by Phil Thomson of Shooting Times that a .22 handgun could not pose a threat or kill people."It is a very feeble argument and an example of their desperation," he said.Mr Thomson said that a ban on .22 handguns was no guarantee against another tragedy such as Dunblane.He said: "If a complete ban on guns would guarantee that this (Dunblane) would never happen again, you wouldn't find a gun owner in the country who would object. An anti-handgun advertising campaign came under attack yesterday from gun lobby enthusiasts who launched a pre-emptive strike by sending more than 50 letters of complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority before the commercials were screened. The pre-war Cup Final programmes are regarded as the penny blacks of football memorabilia.. It grew so large that he kept the programmes in cardboard boxes in rooms all over his house, including the attic and the garage.He collected programmes from every Cup Final from 1920 to 1982, as well as 900 from matches between the wars. The rarest of the 572 lots on sale was the single-sheet programme from England's 8-1 win over Ireland in 1884, which was expected to raise up to pounds 1,000.The collection was accumulated by a fan who began hoarding them in 1947. Nearly 200 people crammed into Bonhams' West Country branch yesterday in the hope of taking home a slice of football history.

They ranged from sports fans to collectors and dealers, united by a common passion: football. Professor Gordon McVie, director general of the Cancer Research Campaign, said: "Skin cancer is the fastest growing cancer in the UK and because it's only April, many people wrongly believe they are not at risk from the sun."Marathon runners and spectators are particularly vulnerable because many of them will be out for most of the day and they won't be covered up."The charity, which is being sponsored by 387 runners in this year's event, said that, where possible, people should seek natural shade, wear cover- up clothing, avoid the midday sun, and use a sunscreen with a protection factor of 15 or above.. There are fears that the practice, which is legal in Britain, could lead to loss of sponsors at future marathons and other sporting events in this country.Even the glorious weather was yesterday denounced as a threat to runners and spectators. More recently, the first vehicle to go down Marsh Wall after the bombing there was ours, putting down the blue line for the marathon."But it is not just a terrorist threat that could take out one of our roads. Water mains go down all the time and if a hole appears in a road you have a major problem." Three years ago a burst gas main at a key point on the course led to major difficulties.This year race organisers are concerned about the commercial threat of "ambush advertising". Such thorough checking would not be possible at the marathon.With more than 26 miles of public highway to monitor, the race is the most difficult major sporting event to protect from such attack.Nick Bitel, the marathon's chief executive, said that during its 17-year history the race had learned to live with the threat of terrorism.He said: "Some years ago, two days before the marathon, there was a bomb at the Baltic Exchange which is virtually on our route. Pity the organisers of tomorrow's Flora London Marathon.