Portrait of the week | 1 May 2014

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The British economy grew by 0.8 per cent in the first quarter of 2014, disappointing hotheads who’d expected 1 per cent. It was 3.1 per cent bigger than a year earlier, but 0.6 per cent smaller than in 2008. Pfizer, the American pharmaceutical company, said it wanted to take over AstraZeneca, with a £60 billion bid that would make it the biggest ever foreign takeover of a British-based company. The Labour party said it was leaving the Co-op Bank and taking its £1.2 million overdraft elsewhere. UK Financial Investments, which manages the Treasury’s 81 per cent stake in the Royal Bank of Scotland, blocked a plan for 200 per cent bonuses. A film version of Dad’s Army is to be made with Toby Jones as Captain Mainwaring and Bill Nighy as Sergeant Wilson.

Ann Maguire, 61, a Spanish teacher, was stabbed to death in front of her pupils at Corpus Christi Catholic College, Leeds; a 15-year-old boy was arrested. Max Clifford, the publicist, aged 71, was convicted of eight indecent assaults on women and girls aged 15 or more, over two decades. Bernie Ecclestone, the chief executive of Formula 1, went on trial in Germany on charges of fraud arising from payments of £26 million to a bank official. The Metropolitan Police attempted to win the trust of Muslim women by telling them that anyone who went to Syria would be arrested on his return, but in the meantime they should dial 101.

Patrick Mercer resigned as an independent MP before he could be suspended from the Commons for six months for asking questions in Parliament in return for money; Nigel Farage, the leader of Ukip, decided not to stand in the consequent by-election. RMT union workers struck on the London Underground, causing suffering for commuters.