Friday 6 December 2002

By Amy Taylor, Shona Main and Alex Dobson.

Poor areas
to benefit from £40bn funding rise

All English councils will get at least 3 per
cent extra in government grants next year, with some receiving as
much as 13 per cent under a new formula to help the poorest
areas.

However, some of the most deprived areas will
receive less than they had hoped because ministers have decided
that to award all councils with an above-inflation rise.

Shire councils in the South and South east
have received less than poorer areas in the North and the Midlands,
leading to claims that they will have to increase council tax by 15
per cent.

Source:- The Times Friday 6
December page 13

Joy of sanctuary for Sangatte men

The first 40 of
1,200 migrants from the Sangatte refugee camp in France arrived at
a central London hotel yesterday and declared their happiness at
being in Britain.

The group of male
Iraqis and two Afghan families will be offered free full-board in
the hotel for three months.

They said they
were ready to work having received four-year working visas in the
unusual deal the Government brokered to close the French refugee
camp.

Source:- The Times Friday 6
December page 16

Boy stowaways clung together for warmth as they
died

Police have been
unable to identify two African boys, aged 12 to 14, found dead in
the wheel compartment of an aircraft at Heathrow.

The boys are
believed to have climbed up the undercarriage of a DC10 jet at
Accra airport in Ghana.

Source:- The Times Friday 6
December page 16

Gays win same rights as married couples

People in
homosexual relationships are to be offered the same rights as
married couples under government plans to create legally recognised
civil partnerships.

The proposals,
being lead by Barbara Roche, the minister for Social Exclusion and
Equalities, aim to confer property and inheritance rights on
homosexual men and women for the first time.

Under the plans,
to be published in a consultation paper, those who register their
partnership will also gain next-of-kin status.

Source:- The
Independent Friday 6 December page 1 

Recruitment firms offer helping hand to Sangatte migrants arriving
in Britain

Recruitment firms
have already offered to find jobs in catering and hotel companies
for migrants who started arriving in Britain yesterday from the
shut down Sangatte refugee camp in France.

Source:- The Independent Friday 6
December page  2

Race bias asylum seeker gets £9,000

A Palestinian
immigrant who was racially discriminated against while working at a
hostel for asylum seekers has won £9,000 in compensation.

Mohammed
Abu-Zahra, 30, was fired after four days as a night porter,
employed by a company under contract to the Home Office.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Friday
6 December page 8

Cardinal admits to abuse case mistakes

Cardinal Cormac
Murphy O’Connor, the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England
and Wales, has dismissed calls for his resignation last night over
accusations that he failed to act against paedophile priests.

The Cardinal
admitted he had made mistakes but he said that his fellow bishops
and the Catholic community now expected him to implement the
guidelines on child abuse drawn up by Lord Nolan.

The controversy
resurfaced last month when Michael Hill, a convicted paedophile
priest who the Cardinal had allowed to continue practising despite
warnings from medical experts, was found guilty of further offences
against boys.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Friday
6 December page 9

‘Use ex-addicts to lead the fight against heroin’

Rehabilitated drug
addicts should warn young people about the dangers of hard drug
use, such as heroin, a senior Labour backbencher said
yesterday.

Chris Mullin,
chairperson of the home affairs select committee, also called for a
change in the law to allow ecstasy to be reclassified.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Friday
6 December page 14

Scottish Papers

Executive in the dock as poverty traps more
Scots

Nearly a quarter of the Scottish population
and one third of its children live in poverty.

A report for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation
has revealed that 1.2 million people live below the breadline and
that levels have risen by 2 per cent in the last five years.

The figures are sure to cause major concern
for the executive, which claimed to have put tackling poverty and
social exclusion at the heart of its agenda.

Source:- The
Herald Friday 6 December page 11

Refugees are offered Highland
home

Refugees could help “breathe life”
back into the Highlands, a Scottish enterprise leader said
yesterday.

Jim Hunter, chairperson of the Highlands and Islands Enterprise,
called for some of the 1,200 asylum-seekers moving from Sangatte to
be sent north. He claimed that they could help reverse the brain
drain and boost dwindling population levels in the
highlands.

The Home Office said there were no plans to send the refugees to
Scotland.

Source:- The
Scotsman Friday 6 December page
8

Welsh Papers

Refugee council settles in

The new offices of the Welsh Refugee Council
have opened in Cardiff.

Welsh assembly Minister for Open Government
Carwyn Jones said that the new premises would provide essential
facilities needed to help vulnerable people who sought asylum in
south Wales.

The new offices will house the council’s
first drop-in and community centre, where many of Cardiff’s
1,500 asylum seekers can learn English and other skills.

Source:- South Wales Echo Thursday 5
December page 23

Man died of heroin overdose while Christmas shoppers passed
by

The death of a homeless man who took an
overdose in Swansea city centre as Christmas shoppers passed by has
highlighted the hard drug problem in Wales.

A post mortem found that John Milligan, 36,
died following an overdose of illegally produced heroin and
alcoholic poisoning.

Earlier this year, south Wales coroner Philip
Walters expressed his sadness at having to deal with drug-related
deaths on an almost daily basis.

Source:- Western Mail Friday 6 December page 11