Wednesday 12 March 2003

By Amy Taylor, Nicola Barry and Alex
Dobson.

Young tearaways may be taken from parents

Compulsive intensive fostering placements for young people who
wreck havoc around their neighbourhoods are expected to be
announced in the government’s white paper on anti-social behaviour
out today.

In a change on previous policies, which have tried to keep
children with their families, the offenders will be removed and
held in a new type of foster home.

This will comprise of paid and trained foster parents, who can
provide a stable family environment and constant supervision.

Source:- The Times Wednesday 12 March page 8

Judge frees truant girl’s mother

A judge yesterday branded the decision to jail a mother for a
daughter’s absence from school as “pointless”.

He said that the mother being jailed had made no difference to
her daughter’s attitude towards school, and criticised the lack of
support given to the family while the mother was imprisoned.

The 53-year-old woman was jailed for a month by Leicester
magistrates for failing to make her 12-year-old daughter attend
school.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Wednesday 12 March page
9

Anti-paedophile patrols

Residents on a housing estate are conducting patrols to prevent
paedophile attacks. Residents, whose actions are supported by
police, on the Cotman estate in Costessey, Norwich, have decided to
conduct the patrols after becoming worried after the abduction of
Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells in Soham.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Wednesday 12 March page
10

Trading Places pupil is sent home over the theft of a
phone

A teenager from a London estate who was given a place at a top
public school as part of a TV documentary, has been suspended for
stealing a mobile phone.

Ryan Bell’s place at the school was paid for by the documentary
team who wanted to prove that a child’s environment can influence
their development.

Bell has been sent home since the theft, but the school’s
headteacher remained sympathetic to his plight.

Source:- Daily Mail Wednesday 12 March page 21

Language tests to uncover bogus asylum
seekers

Language tests are being introduced today in an attempt to
highlight false claims from asylum seekers pretending to be
Iraqis.

Last night’s announcement from the home office explained how
language experts are being enlisted for a month’s trial period,
starting today, to try to work out if asylum seekers are from where
they say they are.

Source:- The Guardian Wednesday 12 March page 9

Guardian Society

Driven to the limits

Coventry’s local authority used to be responsible for a wealth
of services – but, like other councils, it has gradually seen its
powers eroded, and is today under the watchful eye of central
government.

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page 2

Opportunity knock

Despite campaigning against discrimination in the workplace some
of the largest disabled charities employ some of the lowest
proportions of disabled people, according to a new survey.

Only 2 per cent of the workforce at Leonard Cheshire, a charity
for disabled people, are disabled. The organisation ran a campaign
last December on exposing the prejudices that disabled people face
in the workplace.

Meanwhile, the survey found that only 3.1 per cent of employees
at cerebral palsy charity Scope were disabled.

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page 4

Transfer treaty

Regeneration agency told to release new town land to
councils

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page 4

Infamous delivery

Celebrities are no different from the rest of us – at least when
it comes to moaning about the local council.

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page 5

Chains of office

Billed as the concept that would transform local politics and
renew public interest, how have directly elected mayors fared in
reality?

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page
10

A step in the right direction

Profile: Annie Shepperd, new chief executive of struggling
Walsall council

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page
11

Equal Struggle

Guarantees on conditions when jobs switch from council control
have healed one rift- and opened another

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page
12

Staying power

Recruitment problems still dog councils, but there are ways of
keeping social care staff happy.

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page
14

Stuck on the
outside

Call to combat ethnic inequalities in mental health system

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page
14

Tea and vindication

Posthumous victory in guide dog discrimination case

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page
119

Growing pains

Parents of anti-social children face a daunting struggle. Joy
Francis on a charity helping to harmonise family life

Source:- Guardian Society Wednesday 12 March page
120

Scottish newspapers

Huge rise in one parent families

Glasgow has more single parent families than any other city in
Britain with at least 30,000 children being brought up by either
their mother or father.
Figures from the 2001 and 1991 census show single parent households
have risen by 13 per cent in 10 years.

Source:- Scottish Daily Express Wednesday 12 March page
2

Asylum seeker AIDS con

An asylum seeker is selling false AIDS test results to refugees
for £1,500 a time.

Zimbabwean Maggie Sawyer provides immigrants with documents
saying they are HIV positive to help their bid to stay in
Scotland.

Asylum seekers have exceptional grounds to stay in Britain if
they are being treated for HIV or AIDS, and can prove there is no
medical treatment in their own country.

Sawyer and her three children now face deportation for working
illegally.

Source-: Daily Record Wednesday 12 March pages 1, 4 and
5

They must be in every bar, on every street, in every
office, yet where are their voices?

If child abusers are as numerous as many suspect, their victims
must be legion. The writer of a BBC Scotland drama on the subject,
‘Real Men’, Wednesday, 9pm, BBC2, says it is time their
voices were heard.

Source:- The Scotsman Wednesday 12 March (S2) Page
4

Welsh newspapers

Proper service for canal baby

A baby boy, whose body was dumped by a canal five months ago,
will finally be laid to rest.

Caerphilly council which is responsible for the funeral say that
the baby, who has never been named, will be formally called Baby
Newbridge, after the community where he was found. The body was
found wrapped in a plastic bag inside a holdall by the side of a
canal in the valleys town. The mother has never been found.

Source:- South Wales Argus Tuesday 11 March page
4
Vicars were abused as boys – claim

Two vicars are due to tell a court that a Church in Wales canon
sexually abused them when they were boys.

The Rev Lawrence Davies, who is on trial at Cardiff crown court,
denies eight charges of indecent assault and five more serious sex
offences. “Either one priest is a child abuser and a liar, or two
priests are liars and evil conspirators” Christopher Vosper QC told
the court.

Source:- South Wales Echo Tuesday 11 March page 5
Best selling drug should be withdrawn –
coroner

The world’s best selling anti-depressant should be
withdrawn from sale in the UK, says a Welsh coroner after linking
the drug to the death of a retried Welsh teacher. The coroner,
Geraint Williams, is now asking the department of health to carry
out an urgent inquiry. Colin Whitfield killed himself just two
weeks after starting to take the drug, Seroxat. Its makers,
GlaxoSmithKline, say there is no valid scientific evidence that the
drug causes suicidal thoughts or acts.

Source:- Western Mail Wednesday 12 March page 1