News round up: Ministers slammed for detaining young immigrants

Ministers under fire for locking up immigrant children

Ministers were facing accusations today that hundreds of children are being held unnecessarily in immigration detention centres as official figures revealed, for the first time, that 470 minors were being detained with their families.

Read more on this story in The Guardian

‘I’ve been treated like the Bulger murderers’: Baby P social worker whines about her sacking

The official at the centre of the Baby P scandal says she has been treated as ‘unfairly’ as the killers of James Bulger.

Sharon Shoesmith claims Ed Balls’s decision to sack her from her £133,000-a-year job has ‘strong parallels’ with the case of Jon Venables and Robert Thompson.

Read more on this story in The Daily Mail

Town hall bans staff from using Facebook after they each waste 572 hours in ONE month

A council has banned its staff from using Facebook after they spent up to 572 hours a month looking at the website instead of working.

Portsmouth City Council blocked access to the social networking site for its 4,500 staff with computers after finding they were logging on up to 270,000 times a month between them.

Read more on this story in The Daily Mail

Lesbian partners to be named on birth certificates

Lesbian couples who have children through fertility treatment can now register both their names on the birth certificate, following a change in the law.

Read more on this story in The Guardian

Samantha Morton backs hard-hitting campaign to recruit social workers

The Oscar-nominated actor Samantha Morton spoke yesterday of the “wonderful” social workers who supported her as a child, as she helped to launch a national campaign aimed at recruiting more people into the profession.

Read more on this story in The Guardian