Tuesday 22 March 2005

By Maria Ahmed, Simeon Brody, Derren Hayes and Amy
Taylor

Press officers

Judges in England and Wales are to get their own press officers
when Lord Woolf, the Lord Chief Justice, sets up a communications
office at the Royal Courts of Justice in Central London next
month.

The new department aims to boost public understanding of the
judiciary as well as handling media inquiries.

Source:-The Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 4

Gypsies created camp to escape conflict

Conflict between English Romany Gypsies and Irish travellers
crowding onto illegal sites has been blamed for the spread of
illegal camps. A planning inquiry was told by the head of the
English Romany Council that that was the reason one group of
Gypsies bought a field in the village of Minety in North
Wiltshire.

Source:-The Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 4

MP wants brakes put on Hell’s Grannies

They are nicknamed “Hell’s Grannies” for
recklessly driving their motorised wheelchairs at speeds of up to
8mph on Britain’s pavements and roads.

Now Bob Russell, Lib Dem MP for Colchester, Essex wants the
government to regulate the use of electric vehicles used by
thousands of older and disabled people.

Source:- The Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 11

Plea to save mental health helpline

Mental health charity Sane is making an eleventh-hour appeal for
funds to save its national telephone helpline.

Source:-The Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 22

Police want forced marriage law

Police have demanded extra powers to prevent forced marriages
– citing figures that nearly 500 took place in London in the
past two years. They are urging the creation of a new offence of
conspiracy to cause a forced marriage.

Source:-The Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 22

Tories’ Irish example dismissed as
‘useless’

The Irish legislation that the Tory leader Michael Howard proposes
to replicate has been “utterly useless” in dealing with
large traveller encampments, an Irish lawyer has said.

Instead it has been used to target vulnerable families travelling
on their own, claimed Sinead Lucey, a solicitor and consultant to
the Irish Traveller Movement.

Source:-The Independent Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 5

Ministers forced to drop Bill on religious hatred

Ministers are resigned to abandoning plans to outlaw incitement to
racial hatred after an outcry from civil liberties
campaigners.

Source:- The Independent Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
23

Who needs their head examined?

Whenever people with mental illness commit violent crimes, care in
the community is seen to have failed. But psychiatric patients can
be treated without locking them up and throwing away the key, says
Dr Raj Persaud

Source:-The Independent Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
8-9

Howard denies tabloid politics

Michael Howard’s latest foray into populist electioneering
with a seven-point plan to curb illegal Gypsy and Travellers’
encampments last night triggered claims that he is deliberately
seeking to turn a real rural problem into a racially charged
political controversy.

Today Peter Lilley, the former cabinet minister, will reject claims
that the country benefits from sustained immigration.

Source:- The Guardian Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 1

Antisocial behaviour order on ex-priest

Cornelius Horan, who ran into the path of a Brazilian runner at the
Athens Olympics, has been issued with an antisocial behaviour order
banning him from the London Marathon.

Source:-The Guardian Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 4

Couple on bail in toddler case

A couple arrested after allegedly attempting to sell a toddler to
an undercover newspaper have been released charge on bail, police
said.

Source:- The Guardian Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 9

Call for spending focus on under-5s

The government must lift the £3,000 cap on university tuition
fees and redirect the money to support children under five if it is
to extend opportunity and improve life chances, according to a
reply by the Social Market Foundation published today.

Source:- The Guardian Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 11

How Gypsies and Travellers were left short of land for
campsites

They have been demonised by the tabloids as a threat to every
village in Britain, but the rhetoric frequently obscures the facts
in the debate about Gypsy accommodation.

Source:-The Guardian Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 11

Mini-manifesto for children pledges more cash

More money will be provided for school meals and dinner ladies will
be encouraged to study for a new catering qualification, the
government said yesterday.

Education secretary Ruth Kelly said a third-term Labour government
would spend more than the current 37p on school meals.

Source:- Financial Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
3

Public sector strike called off after climbdown by
ministers

Unions representing more than one million public sector workers
have called off tomorrow’s planned one-day strike following
the government’s climbdown over pensions.

The government has offered new talks on plans to raise public
sector retirement age from 60 to 65.

Source:- Financial Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
3

Twenty town halls to share grant pot of £400m

A group of 20 local councils will be put in charge of spending
£400 million of Whitehall money today on safety, health and
children’s services as part of local area agreements.

The money is usually handed down in more than 100 separate grants
to community groups and public bodies, by-passing local government
altogether.

Source:- Financial Times Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
4

“Gas chambers” row over Tory gypsy law

A Labour backbencher claimed that Tory proposals to curb illegal
gypsy sites had “the whiff of the gas chambers about
them”.

The Conservatives claimed Labour was trying to inflame racial
tensions.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
1

Integration in Wales “easier”

Ethnic minorities may find it easier to integrate into Welsh
communities than they would in England, the head of the Commission
for Racial Equality said.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
8

One in five families “unable to pay
debts”

One in five families with children has debts that it cannot pay,
according to the National Statistics annual social trends
report.

The financial difficulties of parents increases with the number of
children – 31 per cent of parents with four or more children
are having financial difficulties.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Tuesday 22 March 2005 page
10

Jailed, teacher who seduced a pupil aged 14

A female teacher described by police as “a predator”
was jailed yesterday for seducing a 14-year-old boy at a special
needs school.

Mother of four Susan Hogan, from Watton-at-Stone, Hertfordshire,
was jailed for 30 months at St Albans Crown Court.

Source:- Daily Mail Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 9

Care home staff jailed for abuse

Seven staff at a home for adults with disabilities have been jailed
for three to 12 months for abusing residents for
“fun”.

Hull Crown Court heard how one female care worker at Bede’s
View repeatedly kicked a disabled man in the groin with her high
heels and one man was pulled along a corridor by his hair.

Source:- Daily Mail Tuesday 22 March 2005 page 30

Scottish news

Cost may soar as free care bills prove a grey area

The bill for free personal care in Scotland could be higher than
originally thought because the Scottish executive has repeatedly
failed to keep track of costs, MSPs have warned.

Holyrood’s audit committee said the executive’s health department
launched the care plan in ignorance of the true costs because of a
political rush to get it under way, failed to monitor expenditure
afterwards, and failed to get take-up figures from councils in
order to set future budgets.

Source:- The Herald Tuesday 22 March

Thousands of first-time offenders to escape court

Many minor first-time offenders will be fined rather than sent to
court under new proposals to be announced by ministers today.

Procurators-fiscal will be given the power to levy fines of up to
£500, rather than the current £100, and tens of thousands
of offenders are expected to avoid criminal records under the new
guidelines. It will involve those who commit minor offences for the
first time, such as shoplifting or drinking in the street, in the
hope of freeing up the system to bring serious and violent
offenders to justice more quickly.

Source:- The Herald Tuesday 22 March

Badly timed HQ move ‘will paralyse’ welfare body

The Mental Welfare Commission have claimed the decision to relocate
it to Falkirk would “paralyse the organisation at a crucial
point”.

Ian Miller, the chair of the commission, said the disruption of a
move at such a critical time would “seriously jeopardise” its
ability to operate. The Scottish executive has decided to move the
commission, which employs 76 people, from its Edinburgh
headquarters in October – at the same time as the new Mental Health
Act comes into force.

Source:- The Scotsman Tuesday  22 March

Welsh newspapers

Pushy parents can damage your health

Pushy parents who demand care at their child’s bedside in
hospital could be damaging their children’s health, according
to new research.

Researchers at the Institute of Child Health and Great Ormond
Street Hospital for Children said that parents who try to get
doctors to carry out numerous tests on their children could be
putting their child through unnecessary worry.

The in-depth study looked at 23 children who have severe abdominal
pain with no obvious physical causes.

Source:- Western Mail Tuesday 22 March page 7

‘It’s easier to be ethnic and
Welsh’

Ethnic minorities may find it easier to become integrated into
communities in Wales than in England it was claimed
yesterday.

Trevor Phillips, the head of the Commission for Race Equality, said
that it was easier to be Asian or Black in Wales than it was to be
Asian or Black in England.

He made the comments in Cardiff ahead of the launch of the National
Assembly’s new Race Equality Scheme.

Source:- Western Mail Tuesday 22 March page 13