News round up: Girl found hanged ‘known to social services’

Girl aged eight found hanged in bedroom ‘was known to social services’

The parents of an eight-year-old girl have been questioned by police after she was found hanged in her bedroom.

Charlotte Moody, who was known to social services, was found at 9.15am on Saturday. Her younger brother, Alex, 5, is being looked after by the local authority.
Read more on this story in The Times

Parents protest at Ofsted inspections for children taught at home

Thousands of parents are prepared to go to court over plans to limit home schooling, The Times has learnt.

Parents whose children are educated at home do not have to register with their local authority and are not inspected. But proposals being considered by the Government would change this and threaten parents’ ability to choose the curriculum for their children, campaigners say.
Read more on this story in The Times

Parents ‘shouldn’t overreact to vetting moves’

Proposed vetting procedures for parents who regularly drive groups of children on behalf of sports or social clubs are not intended to create mistrust between adults and children, the chairman of a Home Office agency has said.
Sir Roger Singleton, from the Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA), hit back at critics saying parents should not over-react to the scheme – which will oblige parents to undergo criminal record checks before they can ferry groups of children.

Read more on this story in The Daily Telegraph

Clamour grows for heroin on the NHS

A group of government-appointed drug experts will call for a nationwide network of “shooting galleries” to provide injectable heroin for hardened drug addicts across the country.

A pioneering trial programme prescribing heroin to long-term addicts has shown “major benefits” in cutting crime and reducing street sales of drugs. Results of the programme are to be presented at a conference in London tomorrow.
Read more on this story in The Independent

Ministers ‘must act’ over child internet safety

Millions of children are still at risk online because moves to enhance internet safety have stalled, according to Gordon Brown’s adviser on the issue.

Tanya Byron is so frustrated at the lack of effort to implement her action plan, which was published 18 months ago, that she is taking matters into her own hands and visiting schools to warn pupils and teachers of the dangers directly.

Read more on this story in The Times

Families ‘kept in the dark’ over dying

One in four families are not informed when doctors decide that a patient in hospital is dying under a widely used NHS scheme for palliative care, a national audit has found.

Less than half of terminally ill patients and their relatives are offered religious or spiritual support in their final days and hours, while a quarter of doctors are not being trained within hospitals to deal with dying patients.

Read more on this story in The Times

TUC: Cameron’s plans to slash budget deficit could spark riots

Moves to cut public spending will spark the threat of industrial action by millions of workers and a possible return to the riots last seen in the 1980s, union leaders have warned.

The TUC general secretary, Brendan Barber, used the eve of the TUC conference to warn that public spending cuts would trigger a “double quick, double dip” recession that would push unemployment to more than 4 million.
Read more on this story in The Guardian