Portrait of the week | 12 March 2015

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Philip Hammond, the Foreign Secretary, said that ‘a huge burden of responsibility’ lay with those who acted as apologists for those who committed acts of terror. Parliament approved new obligations for passenger carriers to restrict the travel to or from Britain of people named as a terrorist threat. The Charity Commission required the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust and the Roddick Foundation to give unequivocal assurances that they had ceased funding Cage, the advocacy group known for speaking up for Mohammed Emwazi, the British jihadist involved in videos of Islamic State murders. England were knocked out of the Cricket World Cup.

George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, found himself expecting a government surplus of £30 billion by 2019-20, instead of the £23 billion he forecast in the autumn statement. The pound rose against the euro, reaching €1.40 for the first time since December 2007. David Cameron, the Prime Minister, repeated his refusal to take part in more than one televised debate with another party leader. Rona Fairhead was urged to resign as head of the BBC Trust by Margaret Hodge during a session of the Commons public accounts committee which questioned Miss Fairhead’s role as a non-executive chairman of part of HSBC, a bank that has been accused of having aided tax evasion in Switzerland. The BBC suspended Jeremy Clarkson after a ‘fracas’ with a producer. The owner of an Irish setter called Jagger said she was convinced the dog had been killed by poisoned beef fed to it in Birmingham while competing at Crufts.

The army could be cut to 50,000 in the next Parliament, the Daily Telegraph reported. The Department of Work and Pensions could lose 30,000 jobs under Conservative plans, the Financial Times reported, or 20,000 under Labour.