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Thanks. I had discounted that 'profession' as thought it had nothing to do with theme!
Every day is a school day.
Now done.

Newbie here- I have an almost complete grid, but am struggling with 15A and 18A.

15A- I have a synonym for "crests", beginning with "R". If that is correct, then I can't parse it.

18A- I have all save the unchecked letters but again cannot parse the clue and I have searched Chambers in vain for a word that will fit.

Help!

The18racer, you’re right about 15ac. Look up your answer without the G (government).

Your 8dn is wrong. Correct that and you’ll find a word to fit 18ac

Many thanks.

#10 gives a good clue to the parsing of 18ac. For 15ac, the ninth definition of your answer in Chambers makes it very clear. You probably have just one letter wrong in 8dn

Very late to the party (too much to do in the new house, a condition which is likely to prevail for some months, but it will be worth it when done). Thanks to Skylark for an enjoyable puzzle.

I was surprised by the debate about highlighting early in the thread. It seemed very straightforward to me, with shared cells meaning that the count balanced out readily. Which no doubt means I’ve got something horribly wrong!

I am sure you have the correct answer Jack. If you use just the left to right and top to bottom examples you get the correct count.
I had an issue in first finding perfectly valid diagonal and bottom to top examples which give different counts and were presumably included to add confusion.