Tuesday 10 August 2004

By Clare Jerrom, Amy Taylor and Alex Dobson

Howard
will give heads total power over school thugs

Michael Howard will today propose to give stronger powers to
governors and teachers to expel violent pupils.

Howard, who will make the pledges in a keynote speech in
Middlesbrough, is expected to pay particular attention to the role
fathers play in raising families.

Source:- Daily Mail Tuesday 10 August 10 page 2

Death of 14-year-old boy reignites concern over suicides in
custody

A 14-year-old boy was found hanged at a detention centre
yesterday.

Adam Rickwood, who was on remand at Hassockfield Secure Training
Centre in County Durham, is the youngest ever prisoner to die in
custody.

He was due to have a bail application heard today. He had never
been in custody before.

Source:- The Independent Tuesday 10 August page 4

How racists forced this man to shut up shop

A storekeeper who has suffered up to 4,000 race attacks in 13 years
has finally had enough. Ian Herbert visits the Ryelands estate in
Lancaster to investigate the story of Mal Hussain

Source:- The Independent Tuesday 10 August page 12

Foreign-sounding passengers stopped on tube

The mayor of London has accused immigration officials of harassing
black people after it became clear that they have been stopping
tube passengers speaking non-European languages.

Immigration campaigners and the Liberal Democrats have slammed the
practice as potentially racist

Home Office guidelines prevent police from stopping people due to
their accent or appearance.

Source:- The Guardian Tuesday 10 August page 5

Travellers’ champion hands back her MBE

A pensioner, who spent years travelling the country providing
healthcare to the traveller community, has given back her MBE in
protest at the government’s failure to halt rising
discrimination against gypsies.

Kit Sampson was given the MBE 14 years ago, but decided to give it
back due to the government’s continued failure to reintroduce
a legal duty for councils to provide official sites for
gypsies.

Source:- The Guardian Tuesday 10 August page 9

Scottish
newspapers

Random drug checks net drivers

One in 20 motorists stopped in one of Britain’s first random
roadside drug tests was found to have taken substances that could
have affected their driving.

Eleven per cent of those tested during the checks in Glasgow were
found to have smaller traces of drugs in their bodies, an
international conference in the city was told yesterday.

The substances detected included ecstasy, cannabis and
codeine.

Source:- The Scotsman  Tuesday 10 August

Home schooling on rise

More parents are choosing to teach their children at home,
campaigners claimed yesterday.

Fears over bullying, classroom indiscipline, falling teaching
standards and a lack of support for special needs children were
blamed for the trend.

Scottish executive figures show that 500 children are receiving
education at home, although ministers acknowledge the real total
could be higher.

A spokesperson for the Schoolhouse Home Education Association said
the organisation now received around 100 inquiries a month compared
to around a handful per month in 1996 when the body was set
up.

Source:- The Scotsman  Tuesday 10 August

Sheriff slams ‘sport’ race attacks

A sheriff who jailed six teenagers for an unprovoked attack on a
group of Iranian men has criticised attacks on asylum seekers
claiming they are now being “committed for
sport”.

Sheriff Michael O’Grady QC said the incidents had become
“utterly endemic” as he jailed the group for a total of
eight and a half years at Glasgow Sheriff Court for the vicious and
unprovoked attack in Glasgow last August.

Source:- The Scotsman  Tuesday 10 August

Welsh newspapers

Flexible solution to caring crisis

Problems with childcare are causing difficulties for working
parents and adding to a pensions time-bomb, experts have
warned.

An investigation of the problem is to be launched by the Wales
Commissioner of the Equal Opportunities Commission, Dr Neil
Wooding.

The commission is to use its formal statutory powers to investigate
the issues that prevent many parents and carers taking up
employment opportunities because of difficulties with
childcare.

Source:- Western Mail Tuesday 10 August page 1

Parc falls in prison performance ranks

Wales’ only privately-run prison is the worst performing of
its kind in the country, according to a new report.

The report into HMP Parc in Bridgend highlighted a number of
concerns and said that by the end of February this year, the prison
had fallen to number 132 on the Prison Service’s performance
standard weighted scorecard.

Source:- Western Mail Tuesday 10 August page 5