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Events from the year 1998 in the United Kingdom.
[edit] Incumbents
[edit] Events
- 1 January - The UK takes over the Presidency of the EC's Council of Ministers until 30 June.[1]
- 31 March - Rolls-Royce Motors acquired by the German car manufacturer BMW.[2]
- April - Vauxhall launches its fourth generation Astra small family car range. The initial range consists of hatchbacks and estates, with coupe and saloons due next year and a cabriolet in two years.
- 10 April- The Good Friday Agreement, an agreement between the UK and Irish governments, and the main political parties in Northern Ireland is signed.
- 9 May- Eurovision Song Contest 1998 held in Birmingham at the National Indoor Arena.
- May 23- A referendum on the Good Friday Agreement is held in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland with 95% and 71% support respectively.
- 12 July- 3 young children are killed in a loyalist arson attack in Ballymoney, Northern Ireland.
- 31 July- The government announces a total ban on the use of landmines by the British military.
- 15 August- A car bomb explodes in the Northern Irish market town of Omagh, killing 29 people - the worst terrorist atrocity in the history of the Northern Ireland troubles.
- September - Ford launches its new Focus range of family hatchbacks, saloons and estates, which will eventually replace the long-running Escort.
- 9 September - An East London coroner records a verdict of suicide on former footballer Justin Fashanu, who was found hanged in a lock-up garage four months ago.
- November - Peugeot launches the 206 supermini, which is being built at the Ryton plant near Coventry.
- 16 October- Police place General Augusto Pinochet, the 83-year-old former dictator of Chile, into house arrest during his medical treatment in Britain at the request of Spain.
- 9 November- Human Rights Act 1998 receives Royal Assent.
- 24 November- The Queen's Speech is interrupted by MPs and peers, when the Queen began to outlay the government's plan to abolish the rights of 700 hereditary peers to sit and vote in the House of Lords.
- December
[edit] Undated
[edit] Births
[edit] Deaths
- 8 February - Enoch Powell, politician (b.1912)
- 24 February - Henny Youngman, comedian (b. 1906)
- 16 March - Derek Harold Richard Barton, chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1918)
- 16 April - Fred Davis, snooker and billiards player (b. 1913)
- 10 June - Hammond Innes, author (b. 1914)
- 11 June - Catherine Cookson, author (b. 1906)
- 13 June - Reg Smythe, cartoonist (b. 1917)
- 18 July - Betty Marsden, comedy actress (b. 1919)
- 2 September - Jackie Blanchflower, footballer (b. 1933)
- 3 October - Roddy McDowall, actor (b. 1928)
- 17 October - Joan Hickson, actress (b. 1906)
- 28 October - Ted Hughes, poet and children's writer (b. 1930)
- December - Brian Stonehouse, painter and World War II secret agent (b. 1918)
- 7 December - Michael Craze, actor (b. 1942)
- 20 December - Alan Lloyd Hodgkin, scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1914)
[edit] References
