By Clare Jerrom, Reg McKay and Alex Dobson.
Unions to confront Labour
The TUC agreed to table sweeping new demands for the right to strike and recognition yesterday in the wake of the council workers strike.
As 750,000 council staff stayed away from work, the TUC executive council agreed to table demands for 33 new employment rights.
The demands include the right to strike without dismissal, protection from unfair dismissal from the first day in a job and an end to exemptions for small firms, which employ a total of 4.5 million workers.
The workers are also demanding the scrapping of the threshold requiring 40 per cent of the workforce to back union recognition in a ballot.
Source:- The Guardian Thursday 18 July page 1
Councils refuse to budge in pay row
Schools, libraries and museums were forced to close yesterday when hundreds of thousands of council workers joined the national strike over pay.
The impact of the 24-hour stoppage was patchy and the most disruption was in north east England and Wales.
Union leaders hailed the strike as an overwhelming success and said further action would be taken unless employers bowed to union demands to increase the pay offer from 3 per cent to 6 per cent.
Source:- The Times Thursday 18 July page 8
Crowded jails force sentence overhaul
The record prison population forced a rethink of existing sentencing practices in the criminal justice white paper, which proposes a range of new punishments intended to encourage a greater take up of community penalties.
Courts are to be given a "menu" of different sentences allowing them to fit the punishment to the offender.
These will include: customised community sentences including a mix of unpaid work, skills training, curfews and restorative justice schemes; Custody Plus, a short prison sentence followed by community programme; and Custody Minus, a short suspended prison sentence backed by a community programme.
There are also plans to introduce intermittent custody where offenders will be locked up at weekends. This will allow them to keep family ties and employment.
There are long-term proposals to improve community punishments for juveniles.
The white paper also proposes that dangerous or violent offenders will remain in prison indefinitely.
Source:- Daily Telegraph Thursday 18 July page 6
Young offenders
Action plans under which young offenders must agree to a package of supervision and treatment are to be extended to include options of curfews and intensive fostering.
The plans are to be extended from three to 12 months, according to the changes in the criminal justice white paper.
Young offenders given custodial terms for serious offences will be released after serving half the sentence and will then undergo supervision from the probation service.
Source:- The Times Thursday 18 July page 10
Women to get new protection from violent partners
Women who suffer abuse from former partners are to be given more protection under a major reform of domestic violence law announced yesterday.
Men who intimidate their former wives and partners will face restraining orders imposed by courts, under the proposals from David Blunkett.
The change, which was part of yesterday’s criminal justice white paper, was hailed as the biggest legal step against domestic violence since wife beating was made illegal a century ago.
Every three days a woman is killed by her husband, or former partner.
Source:- The Times Thursday 18 July page 12
Foster parents jailed
A couple who fostered children were given a prison sentence yesterday for abusing two children in their care, along with their three adult children.
Jeffrey Tanner was sentenced to seven years at Kings Lynn Crown Court, and his wife Brenda received a three and a half year term.
The abuse came to light after the couple’s own children Preston, Tammy and Aaron, and a friend Wayne Muffett were accused of assaulting a 40-year-old woman. They were said to have copied their parents’ behaviour.
The boy and girl abused by the Tanners’ came forward during the inquiry. The parents were convicted at an earlier trial of 20 offences including grievous bodily harm, wounding and administering noxious substances.
Source:- The Times Thursday 18 July page 12
Half of Britons will care for their old or sick relatives
More than half of all adults in Britain will care for ageing parents, sick partners or friends at some stage in their lives, a study said yesterday.
Two thirds of women and more than half of men will provide at least 20 hours of informal care per week before they reach 75 years old.
Michael Hirst of the University of York’s social policy research unit says caring responsibilities are growing because disabled, sick and older people are living longer.
"More adults are becoming heavily involved in providing longer episodes of care," he said. "These trends reflect changes in society including: rising numbers of frail old people, increased chances of living with a spouse in old age, higher rate of home ownership…and continuing improvements in the life expectancy of severely disabled children."
Source:- Independent Thursday 18 July page 9
Scottish and Welsh papers
Fugitive teacher arrested
A teacher who fled Scotland in his yacht after facing child abuse charges two years ago has been arrested in Ceuta, Spain and is set to return home to stand trial.
Paul Firth faces 19 child sex abuse charges at the High Court, Dundee. He is alleged to have sexually abused boys, some as young as nine years, between 1974 and 1996 at various locations ranging from Oxfordshire to the north east of Scotland.
Source:- The Daily Record Thursday 18 July page 16
The tragedy of asthma
A full-length feature examines the increase in asthma, its cause, treatment and social implications for families and individuals.
Source:- The Herald Thursday 18 July page 12
Crumbling Wales's cash crisis
Public services in Wales are in a state of crisis with crumbling services, striking workers and a desperate lack of cash.
Yesterday as almost all council workers went on strike in the principality, a damning report from the Audit Commission unveiled a picture of services failing both in cash and quality.
The report says that Wales still lags behind in key areas like health, housing and social services, although education and lower crime rates are areas where Wales is outperforming England.
The controller of the Audit Commission, Sir Andrew Foster, warned that if improvements are not made in housing and social services when its next report is published in three years, it will be up to the people of Wales to make their own judgment.
Source:- Western Mail Thursday 18 July page 1
Hutt passing the buck over care homes, AMs complain
Health minister Jane Hutt was accused last night of washing her hands over the looming crisis in care homes.
Assembly members criticised her for "passing the buck" for the financial investment that is needed to secure their short-term future.
There are warnings that Welsh care homes need a cash injection of £100m or half will be forced to close in the next six months.
Assembly members questioned the health minister about the complicated fee structure that sees the private sector paid up to 25 per cent less than council-run homes.
Hutt said it was the responsibility of local government to fix the fees and that the Assembly did not have the power to interfere.
Source:- Western Mail Thursday 18 July page 1
