Including headlines from Saturday and Sunday.
By Clare Jerrom, Reg McKay and Alex Dobson.
Damilola case review launched
The crown prosecution service and Metropolitan police launched separate reviews into the Damilola murder case following mounting concern over the handling of the case.
Metropolitan commissioner Sir John Stevens announced that an independent oversight panel, chaired by the Bishop of Stepney John Sentamu, would look at what "lessons may be learned".
The attorney general Lord Goldsmith also asked the director of public prosecutions, David Calvert Smith, to work with the CPS inspectorate to review the conduct of the agency.
The DPP had been asked to make recommendations and consider whether there any implications for future cases.
Both reports will be ready in the summer.
Source:- The Guardian Saturday 27 April page 5
Thirty teenagers ‘should be jailed to protect public’
Thirty teenagers in the area where Damilola Taylor died should be imprisoned immediately to protect the public, according to a senior police officer.
The group, aged between 13 and 16, are prolific persistent young offenders in south London, responsible for much of the increase in street crime.
Superintendent Charles Griggs blamed non-custodial penalties imposed by the courts for the troublemakers.
"These are the top tier of criminals beyond any sort of help," he said. "They have to be locked up to protect the public."
Griggs said Damilola Taylor’s death had been a wake up call for police, social services, courts and the education department, and said several initiatives had been set up as a result.
Source:- Daily Telegraph Saturday 27 April page 9
Le Pen to Blair: ‘I would send all our refugees to you’
The French far right leader said he would send all the 1,400 refugees at the Sangatte camp "to Tony Blair by special train" if he was elected president next week.
Jean Marie Le Pen was responding to an interview earlier this week in which Tony Blair called him a racist.
Le Pen said: "I am no more a racist than Mr Blair who doesn’t want to take the immigrants who turn up at Sangatte."
He said if he were in power he would organise a special train and send them all to England.
Tony Blair’s spokesperson said: "The problem of asylum seekers is a serious problem. Politicians have to decide whether to try and deal with it, or whether to exploit it. We’re dealing with it. Le Pen is exploiting it."
Source:- The Independent Saturday 27 April page 3
Climbie inquiry pledges radical reforms
Britain’s child protection system will reach a "turning point" as a result of the inquiry into the death of eight-year old Victoria Climbie, it was pledged last week.
Lord Laming, who chairs the inquiry, is expected to make "radical recommendations" in a report this autumn.
Victoria died at the hands of her great aunt Marie-Therese Kouao and her boyfriend Carl Manning.
Source:- Independent Saturday 27 April page 9
Blair: parents of tearaways should lose child benefit
Parents of children who persistently commit crimes or play truant will have child benefit withdrawn under plans being driven through the cabinet by Tony Blair.
The sanction would cost a family with one child £15.75 a week in lost benefit, rising to £17.55 for a lone parent with one child, plus £10.55 for each additional child.
Blair said he was "shocked" by figures which showed 80 per cent of truants caught in shopping centres were in the company of an adult, often a parent.
But the plan has alarmed ministers who think it would be unfair to take away benefits from families struggling close to the poverty line. Problems of truancy and teenage crime are highest among single parent and low income households.
Source:- The Sunday Telegraph Sunday 28 April page 1
Jerry Hall tells parents: never smack your children
Texan supermodel Jerry Hall will kick start a campaign for parents to be banned from smacking their children.
The campaign, led by the NSPCC, will target doting mothers who wouldn’t see themselves as child abusers, but often resort to slapping their children occasionally.
The adverts are drawn in the style of the children’s book by Stuart Trotter, illustrator of the Topsy and Tim stories, and feature the slogan "Hitting children must stop. It’s simple enough for a child to understand."
The ads are backed by a number of celebrities including Hall, Claire Rayner and GMTV presenter Fiona Phillips.
The NSPCC will release new research on May 8 on parents’ attitudes to smacking.
Source:- The Observer Sunday 28 April page 7
Mowlam: legalise all drugs
Former cabinet minister Mo Mowlam has called for all drugs to be legalised and taxed, saying prohibition does not work.
Mowlam said: "I am arguing for legalising all drugs because I don’t think there is any other way."
She says she became convinced that cutting supply was not enough on its own on anti-drugs visits to Columbia.
"The thing that hit me was the money that drives it. The money will go where they can make it. That is the problem."
"I don’t think we can stop it, and there are a number of people in other countries who agree with me, and police and social workers who agree with me. We have to face up to the reality," she said.
Source:- The Independent Sunday 28 April page 1
Church to act over sex abuse
Priests must be banned from being alone with children in the future, according to the woman in charge of clamping down on paedophile clerics in the Roman Catholic Church in Britain.
Eileen Shearer says any encounter between a lone man of the cloth and a child must be ruled out not only because of the possibility of abuse, but also to avoid suspicion and allegation.
Shearer, who was appointed last year to head up the newly created Catholic Office for the Protection of Children and Vulnerable Adults, is adamant that the church has to change the way it conducts its pastoral work with children.
"People might find it difficult but things have got to change," she said. "Too much is at stake. It is not safe or appropriate for a priest to be on his own with a child."
Source:- The Independent Sunday 28 April page 7
Trial judge made mistake, says father of Damilola
The judge at the Damilola Taylor murder trial will be criticised by the boy’s father for the way that he directed the jury in his summing up.
In a television interview, Richard Taylor says that Mr Justice Hooper made a "mistake" when he ruled that two brothers accused of murdering his son could not have had time to run from the crime scene to a place where they used mobile phones shortly afterwards.
On ITV’s Tonight with Trevor McDonald broadcast tonight, Taylor praises the Metropolitan police for doing a good job. But says the judge made a mistake.
At the Old Bailey last week, two brothers were cleared of murdering Damilola on a housing estate in Peckham, south London, in November 2000.
Source:- The Times Monday 29 April page 2
Cambodia to deport Gary Glitter over child sex fear
Officials are to deport Gary Glitter from Cambodia fearing the convicted paedophile may have set up home there to exploit local children.
The minister of women’s affairs Mu Sochua said she had taken the matter to the prime minister Hun Sen after reports that the rock star had set up home in Pnom Penh. He was photographed by the Sun newspaper with an 11-year-old girl who arrived at his flat with her mother.
"At the moment interior ministry officials are checking his immigration status," Sochua said. "We do not need to prove he has committed an offence here. Once the British Embassy confirms his conviction, he will be blacklisted and deported."
Glitter was convicted in 1999 and sentenced to four months in prison for downloading pornographic images of children from the internet. He was released after two months.
Source:- The Times Monday 29 April page 6
Tories may back Blunkett’s plan for ‘green cards’
David Blunkett’s plans to issue US style green cards to immigrants may be backed by the Tories.
The government is considering relaxing the rules for living in Britain for highly skilled applicants and for those with skills the country lacks.
The shadow home secretary Oliver Letwin said: "I have been terribly careful not to oppose further economic migration where we’re talking about people who can make a contribution."
He said it’s "terribly important" to realise limits are needed on immigration into a "small and crowded island".
Source:- The Independent Monday 29 April page 2
Scottish newspapers
TB scare in nursing home
Over 60 residents and staff at Heather Bank Nursing Home in Balornock, Glasgow, have been screened for tuberculosis after a care worker was diagnosed with the disease.
A spokesperson for Greater Glasgow Health Board confirmed the screening, but said no-one else had shown active signs of TB.
Source:- The Scotsman Saturday 27 April page 4
‘Ghost pupils’ heads lose appeals
Two primary school teachers at the centre of Glasgow’s ‘ghost pupils’ scandal, who were accused of exaggerating the number of children on their rolls, have lost appeals against disciplinary action.
Lesley Dalgleish, former head of Mount Florida Primary, was demoted last year, while Maire Whitehead, head at St Mirin’s Primary, had received a final written warning.
Both were suspended after emergency services expressed concern about inaccurate numbers given in the event of evacuation.
Source:- The Scotsman Saturday 27 April page 4
‘Lives at risk’ if prison closes
Plans to close Peterhead Prison would be disastrous and put public lives put at risk, warns Clive Fairweather, chief inspector of prisons.
The chief inspector’s report describes Peterhead as one of the best prisons in Scotland. Marjorie Simonds-Gooding, an inspector of prisons in England and Wales, was invited to participate in the inspection.
Simonds-Gooding praises the work of the sex offenders unit at Peterhead and the report goes on to warn that the same effective programme (with only six former inmates out of 167 going on to re-offend) is likely to be lost if the prison shuts. The Scottish executive plans to close Peterhead and move sex offenders to existing jails in the central belt where most of them originate. Critics of the executive’s strategy hope that the chief inspector’s report will result in a re-think.
Source:- Sunday Herald Sunday 28 April page 9
Smacking ban could aid abusers
A ban on smacking children could soak up police time on "trivial" cases and allow serious cases of child abuse to escape unchecked, according to the Christian Institute in its published response to the Scottish executive’s proposals.
Simon Calvert, the deputy director of the Christian Institute, said: "These new laws are totally unworkable and dangerously intrusive. Instead of tackling real abuse, resources will be diverted into the lives of ordinary families."
Source:- The Scotsman Monday 29 April page 2
£5 million for children with special needs
Children with special needs are to benefit from a £5 million package of support to be announced by Cathy Jamieson, minister for education and young people, today.
The package will be allocated to 40 projects throughout Scotland and is designed to encourage inclusion in mainstream schooling and access to opportunity.
Source:- The Herald Monday 29 April page 6
Welsh newspapers
Failing to help special needs pupils early enough could cost millions
Education authorities across Wales may have to pay legal bills running into millions of pounds because of failures to provide services for children with special needs.
Teaching unions have warned that local authority support services to deal with pupils with attention deficit disorder, dyslexia and a range of other conditions are under strain in the principality.
Geraint Davies secretary of the National Association of Schoolmasters and Union of Women Teachers Cymru, said that the system was being pushed to the limit and that legal bills would have to be paid for out of the education budget.
A spokesperson for the Welsh Local Government Association admitted that the system was being stretched, but denied that children were not receiving the help they need.
Source:- Western Mail Monday 29 April page 1
Docs’ warning on Ark appeal
A group of senior doctors in Wales have warned that the planned children’s hospital for Wales is likely to be a major drain on resources.
Their warning came as former cricketer, Ian Botham, completed a mammoth fundraising walk that raised £600,000 for the Noah’s Ark appeal that has been formed to raise money for the new hospital.
The three consultants from Swansea are claiming that the project, which will give Wales its first dedicated children’s hospital, will result in no new services and no extra paediatricians. They are concerned that the project, which will be based in Cardiff, will mean centralisation of services that would result in investment being lost for other parts of Wales.
Dr Cathy White, a consultant paediatric neurologist at Swansea’s Singleton hospital, said that she was angry because there were no new services planned and she feared that people were being misled. She added that children would still have to go outside Wales for treatment.
Source:- Welsh Mirror Monday 29 April page 17
