Germaine Greer fury at police over burglary

Germaine Greer has had her house broken into again. The last time round, in 2000, when she was tied up in her kitchen by a 19-year-old student at her home in Essex, she was fairly relaxed about the event. This time, however, the Australian polemicist and author of seminal feminist tract The Female Eunuch, is spitting tacks because the thief or thieves made off with a much-loved and valuable Moncalvo painting as well as some irreplaceable family heirlooms.

"When your home is burgled these days you know your property will never be recovered," the 70-year-old, who was uninsured, told the Daily Telegraph. "I had two women police officers come around who looked like cabaret artistes - all fishnet stockings and deep cleavage - and they did not exactly engender confidence. I subsequently went to a lock-up in Suffolk which was full of the most appalling old rubbish - old shoes, broken tables, you name it - and I religiously went through it all in search of my painting.

She goes on: "The burglar also took my pearls, which the guy who had burgled me the last time in the late 1990s had had the decency to leave behind. This one also took a pair of gold-plated cufflinks with the initials ERG on them that had belonged to my late father and had great sentimental value to me."

Greer, who was in Australia when the break-in took place, says she paid £1,000 for the Moncalvo - a half-length Madonna and Child - 25 years ago. And there will be no Good Boy Chocolates for Greer's dogs - a poodle and a retired greyhound - who failed to raise so much as a bark. ·