In Today's Papers

By Clare Jerrom and Alex Dobson.

Date for moving
A disabled woman who has slept in a wheelchair for 17 months after nurses stopped lifting her in case they were injured, could soon be able to sleep in her own bed again.
Arrangements for moving Lorraine Wolstenholme from Milton Keynes should be made by 19 December, a high court judge ruled.
Source:- The Times Wednesday 19 November page 4
Health bill costs
The NHS Confederation said government plans to reform mental health legislation are unworkable.

A draft bill would give wider rights to detained patients to appeal, and the group claimed that this would mean a 50 per cent increase in hearings and require at least an additional 1,000 staff.
Source:- The Times Wednesday 19 November page 4
Broadmoor damned by health inspectors
Broadmoor hospital has been criticised as “totally unfit for purpose”, lacking in basic standards of dignity and inappropriate for modern care, in a damning report by the Commission for Health Improvement.
Health inspectors found patients were deprived of the minimum entitlement to fresh air, and while measures to protect women patients from sexual abuse by men had improved, it was at the expense of excluding women from education and activities.
The report will back the case for comprehensive redevelopment of Broadmoor as a psychiatric hospital for men, with the women moved to other NHS facilities.
Broadmoor in Berkshire holds around 350 patients including violent offenders, but also non-offenders whose behaviour is too challenging for general mental health services.
Source:- The Guardian Wednesday 19 November page 7
Blunkett’s extra £442m for drive to ‘cure’ drug crime
The home secretary yesterday announced a £442 million expansion of the government’s programme to identify hardcore drug using criminals and get them into treatment.
The criminal justice intervention programme, which targets crack cocaine and heroin users who commit crime to feed their habit, has been running in 30 of the highest crime areas since April.
It is now to be extended to 36 police divisions across England over the next three years.
Source:- The Guardian Wednesday 19 November page 11
Judge attacks asylum system
Britain’s asylum system was branded “chaotic” yesterday by a judge who jailed a solicitor for helping Chinese gangs to smuggle people into Britain.
Titus Miranda ran a “factory of falsehoods” by concocting stories for hundreds of asylum seekers to tell the Home Office.
Miranda and his girlfriend Jessica Jin were both jailed for two years after they were convicted at Middlesex Guildhall crown court of conspiring to defraud the Home Office between January 1999 and March 2002.
Source:- Daily Telegraph Wednesday 19 November page 2
Teenagers in death fall had only just met
The two teenage girls who jumped from a tower block to their deaths last week had only known each other for a few days, a friend said yesterday.
Danielle Waddington and Lisa Utton were both from broken homes and living in lodgings when they struck up a friendship on the streets of Southend, Essex, last week. On Sunday they jumped out of an 11th floor window of a block of flats.
Source:- Daily Telegraph Wednesday 19 November page 6
Blair faces defeat on foundation hospitals
Rebel Labour MPs and Opposition parties vowed to defeat Tony Blair’s plans for foundation hospitals yesterday.
Labour whips mounted an arm-twisting campaign at Westminster telling rebel Labour MPs that a defeat for the government in a vote today would give the Tories a huge boost.
Source:- Daily Telegraph Wednesday 19 November page 6
Hodge should go despite apology, says abuse victim
Margaret Hodge’s lawyers are set to apologise publicly for the minister at the high court today for branding an abuse victim as “extremely disturbed”.
The apology is part of a £20,000 settlement by Hodge who wrote a private letter to Demetrious Panton to explain why she made the comments.
The children’s minister salvaged her ministerial career by agreeing to the courtroom apology, payment of Panton’s legal costs and a substantial donation to Nacro – the charity of Panton’s choice.
Panton yesterday accepted that Hodge had been “remarkably honest”, but said there was still an inadequate explanation for her comments. There was nothing to change his belief that she should resign, he added.
Source:- Daily Telegraph Wednesday 19 November page 12
Support for national ID cards falls sharply
Public support for ID cards has fallen dramatically over the past two years, according to a Mori survey released today.
When asked to name the best way to reduce crime, only 19 per cent of people named ID cards compared to 29 per cent two years ago, according to the poll carried out for Rethinking Crime and Punishment.
The home secretary David Blunkett recently announced that he would be pressing ahead with plans to introduce ID cards.
Source:- The Independent Wednesday 19 November page 8
Disability minister in plea to advertisers
The advertising industry was accused yesterday of ignoring disabled people and treating them like “poor relations” by a government minister yesterday.
Maria Eagle, the minister for disabled people, accused firms of assuming that “disability doesn’t sell” and of ignoring a potential market worth £45 billion.
She said it was “surprising that advertisers haven’t yet woken up properly to the value of the disabled pound”.
Source:- The Independent Wednesday 19 November page 10
Jacko in new child sex probe
Michael Jackson is at the centre of a new child sex inquiry after a young boy has stepped forward and claimed he was molested.
Police raided the singer’s ‘Neverland’ ranch in California along with forensic experts and federal agents yesterday.
Jackson, who was not at the ranch at the time, was said to be “visibly shocked” by the allegations and the raid.

Source:- Daily Mail Wednesday 19 November page 1
Dawson fits the bill for new job
Labour MP Hilton Dawson is stepping down at the next general election to return to social work and apply for the post he has been lobbying the government to create.
Dawson, who spent 15 years as a social worker, wants to apply for the role of children’s commissioner, which will be created next year with an appointment expected in 2005.
Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 19 November page 4
Winter of discontent
Youth workers to ballot over strike action on pay and qualifications
Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 19 November page 4
High profile
Drugs minister Caroline Flint is at the centre of a huge government push to tackle drug abuse and improve treatment
Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 19 November page 6
Maximum exposure
An exhibition highlighting Asian domestic violence where the photographers are former victims.
Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 19 November page 7
Desperate times, desperate measures
Proposed changes to the Mental Health Act threaten to increase workload, exacerbate staff shortages and put people off from seeking care
Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 19 November page 10
What else can I do?
Russell, a finance director, has always worked in the private sector but is mulling over a move to the public or voluntary sectors.
Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 19 November page 128
Scottish newspapers
Catholic Church appoints child expert to protect young from abuse
A children’s tsar has been appointed by the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland to protect its estimated 250,000 young people in Scotland.
May Dunsmuir, children’s reporter from Prestwick, will take up the new post of national child protection co-ordinator next month becoming the “eyes and ears of bishops” across the nation.
The post was created following a number of damaging sex abuse cases involving the Catholic Church across the world.
Source:- The Herald Wednesday 19 November
Radical rethink to tackle city’s social work shortage
Glasgow Council’s bid to end its chronic shortage of social workers will cost around £4.5 million a year, it emerged yesterday.
A radical restructuring is proposed to include returning senior social workers to case work instead of managing colleagues.
David Comley, director of social work services, acknowledged that he will be held accountable if the new initiative fails to resolve the city’s recruitment and retention crisis.
Around 27 per cent of frontline posts are unfilled, and there are 34 per cent shortfalls in children and families services.
Source:- The Herald Wednesday 19 November
Woman crushed to death by hospital bed
A 95-year-old woman was crushed to death after falling out of a hospital bed at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, police said last night.
An investigation is underway into the circumstances surrounding the woman’s death.
Source:- The Herald Wednesday 19 November
Tory donor puts £1m into scheme for children in care
A Monaco based businessman announced yesterday he is to put £1 million into a foundation in his name at the same time that Jack McConnell released £3 million of Scottish executive cash for projects aimed at helping young people leaving care.
Laidlaw, a multi-millionaire Tory donor, who has no children of his own, said he wanted to help vulnerable young people. Laidlaw Youth project will ensure that the best services were available to help people from disadvantaged backgrounds adjust successfully to adulthood.
Source:- The Herald  Wednesday 19 November
Addicts say drug agencies are failing
Drug addicts have criticised drug agencies in Aberdeen for a series of fundamental failures.
A report has found that addicts have deep concerns about rehabilitation programmes that have done little or nothing to help them kick their habits.
Addicts, forced to wait 18 months to access substance misuse programmes, have been driven into crime and prostitution before they have gained access to the methadone service.
Source:- The Scotsman Wednesday 19 November page 6
Welsh newspapers
April D-Day for Kosovan teenager
A Kosovan teenager who fled to Wales in the back of a lorry is to have his appeal for leave to stay in the UK heard next April.
Edmund Pone has been living with foster parents in Ebbw Vale, but faced having to return to his former homeland after a decision by the Immigration Appellate Authority.
Now Pone who has gained the support of his local community, politicians and the Archbishop of Canterbury, will get another chance to argue that he should remain in the UK.
Source:- South Wales Argus Tuesday 18 November page 5
Big Issue Cymru critical of plans to move sellers
Swansea city and county council have been criticised by Big Issue Cymru for a decision that will mean moving the magazine’s sellers from large parts of the city centre.
New permits limiting salespeople and buskers to certain parts of the city are believed to be illegal by Big Issue Cymru director Su West.
She said that the plans were an insult and that the magazine had been sold on the streets of Swansea since 1994.
Source:- Western Mail Wednesday 19 November page 2