Ban on smokers fostering under-5s

By Mithran Samuel

Ban on smokers fostering under-5s

Smokers will be banned from fostering children under 5 once the smoking ban comes into force on 1 July.

The Fostering Network will change its guidance on the issue to local authorities and fostering agencies to avoid the risk of looked-after children taking legal action.

Source:- The Times Thursday 21 June 2007 page 3

No human rights for old in private homes

The government was under pressure last night to legislate to protect more than 300,000 older people living in independent sector care homes, after a House of Lords ruling determined that they had no recourse to the Human Rights Act 1998.

By a 3-2 majority, the Lords found that a woman placed in a private home by Birmingham Council did not have the protection of the act, despite the government supporting her case, along with several human rights and older people’s bodies.

Source:- The Guardian Thursday 21 June 2007 page 15

Shadow cabinet to tackle the ‘politics of happiness’

David Cameron has asked a number of his younger shadow ministers to examine how the Conservatives can promote a “politics of happiness” in social policy, as part of the ongoing debate within the party on its future.

Source:- The Daily Telegraph Thursday 21 June 2007 page 14

More family cases go behind closed doors

The government has ditched plans to give the media access rights to family courts in the face of the opposition of children involved in care cases and charities representing them.

Instead, justice secretary Lord Falconer promised that more information from family hearings would be provided to parents, children, when they reach 16 or 18, and the public, in cases of genuine public interest.

Source:- The Times Thursday 21 June 2007 page 30

Scottish news

Child porn man’s jail term ‘too lenient’

A council employee caught with more than 1,000 items of child pornography, including some of the most serious images of child abuse ever recovered by a Scottish police force, has been jailed for nine months.

Last night the jail sentence was criticised as being “extremely lenient”.

Tim Dixon, 60, had images of children being tortured and raped, and made to take part in “sadistic” sex.

Source:- The Scotsman, Thursday 21 June 
 
Businesses give pair first ‘civil ASBOs’

Two persistent law-breakers have been banned from almost every pub, club and shop in Dundee city centre in a groundbreaking crackdown by an anti-crime network.

More than 200 business premises in the city have united under the banner of the Dundee Co-ordinated Anticrime Network (DUNCAN) in an effort to improve the safety and security of people in the city centre and other parts of Dundee.

The council-led network has handed out civil banning orders for the first time to a man and a woman for a catalogue of antisocial behaviour, preventing them from going into more than 200 pubs, clubs and retail premises in the city centre area.

Source:- The Scotsman, Thursday 21 June 
 
Electronic tags ‘don’t work and cost more’

Electronic tagging doesn’t work and is dearer than keeping suspects in jail, an official report shows.

Electronic tagging was tested out in a pilot scheme in courts in Glasgow, Kilmarnock and Stirling. A total of 63 suspects were electronically monitored after being released on bail. Of those, 44 failed to comply with their tagging orders and 19 ended up back in court accused of committing more offences.

The report says: “There is no apparent confidence that electronic monitoring bail improves public safety any more than standard bail.”

Source:- The Record, Thursday 21 June