10 September 2015
Week in Brief: UK NEWS
ROYAL RECORD: Yesterday Her Majesty the Queen became the longest ruling British monarch, passing Queen Victoria who ruled from 1837 to 1901.
MIGRANTS: Responding to public pressure, including pressure from the Archbishop of Canterbury and a number of senior Conservative politicians, Mr Cameron has indicated that Britain will accept 20,000 refugees from camps in Lebanon and Jordan over the next five years. This is less than France (which has undertaken to take 24,000 refugees over the next two years) and Germany (which is to take 500,000 people a year). To put that in context, however, France has a far greater land mass than the UK and Germany has a declining and ageing population. The government’s position remains that the real need is to deal with the problem at source rather than accepting large numbers into Europe.
On 2 September migrants in Calais halted the Eurostar and attempted to board it. Although there have been many attempts to get onto freight trains, this is the first time that a passenger train has been attacked.
EUROPEAN REFERENDUM: The government was defeated by twenty-seven votes when it sought to relax the purdah rules for the European referendum. The rules require regulations (to be put in place for months before the poll) preventing public resources being used to campaign for Britain’s continued membership.
EDUCATION: Nick Gibb, the Schools Minister, is to change admissions rules so that the parents of children born between 1 April and 31 August will be able to postpone the start of their schooling until the beginning of the first school year commencing after their fifth birthdays. At present they normally start in the year following their forth birthdays, which can disadvantage them academically.
RUBBISH COLLECTION: According to the Daily Mail, the government has accepted that it cannot fulfil its pledge to restore weekly bin collections throughout the country because of the savings review.
ASSISTED DYING: The Archbishop of Canterbury and Christian, Jewish, Muslim and other religious leaders have written to MPs to try to persuade them to vote against the Assisted Dying Bill. A spokesman for Dignity in Dying said that they were not representative of religious people where four out of every five people supported the proposals.
DRONES: The Prime Minister has revealed that on 21 August an RAF drone controlled from Lincolnshire destroyed a vehicle near Raqqa in Northern Syria, killing three Isis fighters. These include Reyaad Khan from Swansea and Ruhul Amin from Aberdeen. Mr Khan and a Mr Hussein from Birmingham had been planning to attack public commemorations this summer. Mr Hussein was killed by US forces on 24 August. The Primary Minister has answered comments by critics that he should have sought parliamentary authority by saying that the killing was in response to an immediate threat.
MEDICAL RECORDS: Health secretary Jeremy Hunt has announced that by 2018 National Health Service patients will be able to access their full medical records. A similar approach in the US has enabled patients to review their records and to put right any obvious mistakes.
’56, Dean Street’, a National Health Service clinic dealing with sexually transmitted diseases, has inadvertently sent an email to 780 of its patients with an open copy list so that each of them has a list of the others.
POLICING: Stephen Kavanagh, Chief Constable of Essex, has said that his force can only turn out in response to half the calls made to them. Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, says that spending cuts are crippling the service.
BROOKS BACK: Rebekah Brooks is to come back as chief executive of the company which owns the UK titles in the Murdoch group, replacing Mike Darcey who has run the group for three years. Ms Brooks resigned in 2011 following the closure of the News of the World and was subsequently acquitted of involvement in conspiracies to hack phones, to commit misconduct in a public office and to pervert the course of justice.
LABOUR LEADERSHIP: The trade union Unite has denied signing up voters for the Labour leadership without their consent, an investigation into a particular case having shown that it was an isolated administrative error. It is understood that more than 50% of the 148,182 people who have become affiliated in order to vote are Unite members. Unite has endorsed the front runner, Jeremy Corbyn.
Out of the 553,954 eligible voters in the leadership election, 292,973 are members of the party, 148,182 are affiliated members signed up by their the unions and 112,799 paid £3 each for registered membership. The latter are the most likely to vote. The deadline for voting is this Saturday although there are attempts to extend it on the basis that some of those eligible have not yet received their voting papers.
Tory peer Baroness Altmann has been expelled from the Labour Party which she joined in March.
Mr Corbyn has indicated that he will maintain his anti-austerity approach if elected Labour leader. It is understood that John McDonnell, a close colleague of his, is one of the front runners for the office of shadow chancellor.
STORMONT: The departure of the Ulster Unionist party from the Northern Ireland assembly last month has given rise to fears that other Unionist parties could also leave because of allegations that the IRA is still operational following the murder of Barry McGuigan. The Chief Constable of Northern Ireland is understood to support a monitoring group to investigate any ongoing criminal activity.
CANCER: The Cancer Drugs Fund has been criticised for a decision to cease funding a number of therapies in order to reduce its expenditure. The decision has been criticised by Pancreatic Cancer UK and the Rarer Cancers Foundation.
HATTON GARDEN: Four men have pleaded guilty to involvement in the raid on the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company last Easter, three of them being pensioners. Three other men have denied conspiracy and money laundering and will stand trial in due course. Two men have yet to plead.
HEROIN: According to the Office of National Statistics, heroin and morphine deaths rose to 952 last year, a 64% rise from the previous year’s figure of 579. This is, however, still below the peak of 981 reached in 2001. Deaths related to cocaine totalled 247, those linked with Ecstasy rose to 50 and those related to legal highs rose to 67.
FAG BREAKS: Nottinghamshire County Cancel is abolishing cigarette breaks for its staff. Apparently the ban on smoking cigarettes will also apply when workers are travelling to work in uniform.
DRIVERLESS CARS: According to Jonathan Pettit of Security Innovation, driverless cars can be diverted or stopped by using a laser pointer kit which fools the car into thinking that it has come across an obstacle. The kit costs about £40.
RADCLIFFE STATEMENT: Record holding marathon star Paula Radcliffe has issued a statement in response to comments made by Jesse Norman, Chairman of the Culture, Media and Sports Select Committee which she says imply that she had taken illegal substances, something which Mr Norman denies. Ms Radcliffe, who has retired from athletics, denies any involvement with doping.
BURIED DEEP: Escapologist Anthony Britton who was handcuffed and buried in a six foot grave without a coffin had to be dug out unconscious by his support team. His predecessors Harry Houdini an Alan Alan each lost consciousness and had to be rescued while attempting the same feat, which is made particularly difficult by the weight of the soil on the body.
RUGBY TACKLE: Catherine Perrill, a women’s rugby player, was awarded £250 out of public funds for bringing down a jewel thief in the grounds of Gloucester Cathedral and holding him until the police arrived. Mr Taylor, the jeweller, who also pursued the thief, received a similar award.
CRICKET: Australia beat England by fifty-nine runs in the first of five one-day internationals.
RUGBY: England beat Ireland by 21 points to 13 in the final warm-up match before the Rugby World Cup.
RECORD ROONEY: England captain Wayne Rooney scored a goal in Tuesday’s 2-0 win over Switzerland to become England’s leading goalscorer. His tally of 50 goals exceeds the previous record of 49 scored by Sir Bobby Charlton.
