Monday 7 April 2003

By Amy Taylor, Nicola Barry and Alex
Dobson.

Buying a stamp? Sorry, we only serve asylum seekers at
this counter

Post offices are opening a special window just for asylum
seekers for two days a week.

The Royal Mail says it will mean a quicker service for everyone
in areas with large numbers of refugees.

Source:- Daily Mail Saturday 5 April page 10

Flexible hours for working parents

Employers will have to consider requests to work part-time or on
flexi time from parents with children under six or with a disabled
child under 18, under new employment laws coming in this week.

Other measures include women being able to force their bosses to
tell them if they are paid less than their male colleagues.

Source:- Daily Mail Saturday 5 April page 43

One in four young people are so depressed they consider
suicide

Over a quarter of young people, some as young as 10, have
contemplated suicide because of depression, according to new
findings.

The research is published tomorrow, the start of National
Depression Week, which this year focuses on the increasing numbers
of children and teenagers who suffer from depression.

Source:- The Independent on Sunday 6 April page  15

Life imitates art as refugee film boy finds new home in
Britain

The 15-year-old star of Michael Winterbottom’s film about an
Afghan asylum seeker’s journey from a refugee camp to London is
trying to set up home in the capital.

The film’s screenwriter Tony Grisoni, first met Jamal Udin
Torabi, in Shamshatooj, a refugee camp in Afghanistan. The
documentary style film features ‘non-actors’.

Source:- The Observer Sunday 6 April page 11

Livingstone cracks down on child sex
networks

An investigation into the illegal trafficking of young people is
being launched by Ken Livingstone this week based on evidence that
the police and social workers cannot cope with the problem.

A new team will speak to child prostitutes to find out where the
traffickers operate, and form cross borough networks to support
young people deemed at risk.

Source:- The Guardian  Monday 7 April page 13

Lack of care cited in asylum suicide report

The level of care provided by a privately run asylum seeker
detention centre has been heavily criticised in a home office
internal inquiry into the suicide of an asylum seeker with mental
health problems facing deportation.

The report comes two years after the death of Robertus Grabys in
Harmondsworth detention centre, near Heathrow. His family only
received official agreement to it being published after the human
rights group Liberty threatened to challenge the government in the
high court on their behalf.

Source:- The Guardian  Monday 7 April page 13

Scandal of the Babybroker

She failed to qualify as a social worker, and she abandoned her
own three children. Yet this woman helps ‘dubious’
couples – including a man of 79 and a mother of six – to adopt
babies from abroad.

Source:- The Guardian Monday 7 April page 35

Scottish newspapers

Elderly denied life-saving NHS care

Academics from Aberdeen University have discovered evidence that
older patients are being denied life-saving treatment by
under-resourced NHS hospitals.

Researchers have found that young people are five times more
likely to get vital cancer treatment than older people.

The study follows the recent “do not resuscitate”
controversy over older patients.

Source:- Scotland on Sunday 6 April page 10

Labour pledges to jail young offenders’
parents

Parents of persistent young offenders face being sentenced for
the crimes of their children under a hardline policy to be revealed
today in Scottish Labour’s election manifesto.

Jack McConnell, the Labour leader, will unveil plans for
‘parental orders’ in a bid to force parents to accept
responsibility for their troublesome teenagers.

Source:- The Sunday Times 6 April page 32

School breakfast clubs used as free
childcare

Middle class parents have been accused of using school breakfast
clubs, introduced to help poor families, as a source of free
childcare.

The clubs were established by the Scottish executive to provide
a meal for children from deprived backgrounds. A review of the
scheme has uncovered widespread abuse with children arriving, who
have already eaten and by parents trying to avoid childcare
costs.

Source:- The Sunday Times 6 April page 25

Welsh newspapers

Tags to foil baby snatchers fail to
activate

Serious flaws in tagging systems designed to prevent newborn
babies being abducted, have been revealed at a Welsh hospital.

Tags attached to the arms of infants at Prince Charles Hospital,
Merthyr, were found to be faulty according to a report which said
that the maternity unit’s alarm system failed to activate
when mothers were discharged despite their babies arms being
tagged.

Source:- Western Mail Monday 7 April page 1

Hospitals slowest in the UK

Welsh hospitals are among the worst in the UK as they struggle
to treat the thousands of patients on waiting lists.

A new survey for the Sunday Times reveals that Welsh NHS trusts
see an average of only 47 per cent of outpatients within 13 weeks,
and only 64 per cent of inpatients are treated within six months
– the worst record in the UK.

Source:- Western Mail Monday 7 April page 2