IN 1975 the nationalised gas industry took a hands-on approach to customer satisfaction.

The job description of one Swindon employee, Sue Hooper, included helping people who worried that their gas cookers were defective.

Her testing method? Cooking the household a meal - or sometimes just a Victoria sponge.

Sue’s story was unusual even in a week when we reported on everything from the long-awaited flowering of a giant yucca in a Swindon front garden to a scarce bird finding sanctuary at a military base.