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21 December, 2009

Doctors as cleaners? Only in Britain

Doctors and nurses at one of the country's top children's hospitals have been asked to help clean wards in their free time, according to the British Medical Association. Staff, including consultants and managers at Alder Hey Children's Hospital in Liverpool, were reportedly asked to do the work outside normal working hours. It is thought the suggestion was made to ensure the hospital impressed inspectors from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) who visited Alder Hey. They had previously criticised the hospital's hygiene standards in April.

Unions criticised the move and said cleanliness should be sufficiently resourced without seeking volunteers. Dr Jaswinder Bamrah, of the British Medical Association, said: "Doctors and nurses have been asked to volunteer to clean the hospital and I just do not think it is right. "They are over-using a highly skilled workforce to do what they are not trained to do. "They need to look at the issue of who is paid to do the cleaning and sort it out. "This step takes doctors and nurses away from patient care - the time spent cleaning would be better spent providing care for patients.

"This has been an ongoing problem for Alder Hey and it is very important to make sure the hospital is cleaned properly by those paid to do it - otherwise all sorts of problems car arise, like MRSA or C difficile spreading."

Paul Summers, Unison's regional organiser, said although it was a voluntary request some employees felt pressure to comply. "It was not compulsory but I have heard some people did feel bullied into helping out," he said. "I understand some staff were offered time in lieu if they did volunteer, but this isn't really the point. "There should be enough cleaning staff employed to do this job. "It raises questions about cleaning standards and about current cleaning staff levels."

Louise Shepherd, chief executive at Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust said CQC inspectors were impressed by the way staff rallied round after the unannounced visit. She said: "We believe, along with all our staff, that maintaining high standards of cleanliness in a healthcare environment is everyone's responsibility and have very much welcomed those many staff who have volunteered from every service and department to support this initiative. "Throughout this campaign, our patients have remained our top priority and we are confident that patient care has at no time been compromised. Indeed, we have received huge support from our parents and families for this initiative.

"We would also like to reiterate that this campaign was categorically not a response to inadequate levels of resources available. Indeed, Alder Hey has increased resources put in to hygiene yet again during the last year and the entire Organisation is committed to ensuring cleanliness remains a top priority at all times.

"Finally, we were delighted to receive glowing feedback about the high standards of cleanliness and hygiene achieved across the trust from the Care Quality Commission Inspection Team who visited our trust unannounced yesterday. "They were particularly complimentary about the initiative undertaken by staff and felt it was an exemplary demonstration of the passion and commitment they have to maintaining the highest standards of care and keeping our children safe at all times."

SOURCE



How hundreds of "asylum seekers" in Britain get luxury homes far beyond the means of most working people

Their magnificent townhouse overlooks a courtyard and is in one of the most expensive areas of London. It has four storeys, six bedrooms (some with balconies), three sitting rooms and four bathrooms - as well as a concierge service. The property is worth a cool £1.8 million and would cost you or me nearly £1,600 a week to rent.

So who do you think lives here. Is it: (a) a banker; (b) an MP fiddling expenses; or (c) an unemployed former asylum seeker and her family? The last answer is the correct one. In other words, taxpayers are picking up the £6,400-a-month bill to keep Nasra Warsame, seven of her brood and her elderly mother in the lap of luxury.

Mrs Warsame's husband and their eighth child, by the way, have been provided with a two-bedroom council flat nearby. His wife's palatial residence isn't big enough, apparently, to accommodate them all.

So how is Mrs Warsame enjoying her publicly-funded mansion? There was no response when we 'buzzed' her state-of-the art video intercom which allows her to screen visitors. No one could blame her for keeping a low profile (if that's possible in such a grand home), considering that her case, among others, prompted the Government's announcement this week that benefit rules are to be changed.

For the Warsames are one of a number of families enjoying life on Millionaires' Row, courtesy of our welfare state system. Let's take a quick tour. First stop, David Cameron's trendy neighbourhood of Notting Hill and a £2.6million villa with wooden floors, granite work tops and roof terrace - home to single mother-of-eight Francesca Walker. Francesca, whose mother is Jamaican, spent many years in a succession of council flats, which she claimed were virtually uninhabitable. As a result, the council was forced to consider her as 'technically homeless'.

Her eight children are fathered by two different men and she was housed in a privately-owned villa because the council had no suitable accommodation of its own.

Next is a detached, double-fronted £1.2million house in Acton, West London, with three shower rooms and 'accessories' including a 50-in plasma TV, laptops, Wii, iPhone and PlayStation - home to the seven-strong Saiedi family from Afghanistan.

Then there is the £1million mock-Tudor property, comprising two sitting rooms, conservatory and double garage, in Edgware (home to single mother-of-five Omowunmi Odia), and another £1million property in Barnet (home to the Connors, a family of Irish travellers).

In fact, 16 families are living in million-pound-plus London properties funded by the controversial Local Housing Allowance, which allows people to rent from private landlords and hand the bill to the state. These examples alone cost us £2.4million a year - enough to put at least 100 extra police officers on the streets of the capital.

But this isn't the real story, or not all of the story, anyway. It gets even worse. Work and Pensions Secretary Yvette Cooper insists 'very high rents' represent only a 'small proportion' of overall housing allowance claims. Well, that depends on how you define 'very high'. Does £1,000-a-week fall into this category? The Mail has learned that around 100 households, mostly in London, now receive this amount via their local authority. How many families can afford monthly mortgage repayments of £4,000?

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) said it could not provide us with figures for those claiming £500 a week without receiving a Freedom of Information request in writing, which means Christmas would have come and gone by the time we got an answer. But Tory-run Westminster Council, which has been left to pick up the flak over Mrs Warsame, was happy to oblige. Funnily enough, no Freedom of Information request was required. In fact, a staggering 800 households in the borough qualify for £500-a-week payments. Or, to put it another way, they are living in properties that, back in the real world, they would only be able to afford if they were earning between £70,000 and £80,000 a year.

The average salary in this country, remember, is a little more than £20,000 a year.....

Here's one final statistic to ponder. In five other London boroughs, including Islington, and Hammersmith and Fulham, 722 families each receive a Local Housing Allowance of £2,000 a month - which adds up to more than £30million a year of taxpayers' money.

And this at a time of the worst recession in living memory. A time when, apart from anything else, we can't afford even to send our troops into battle in Iraq and Afghanistan with the proper equipment. Could there be a more potent example of just how wrong-headed this country has become?

More HERE



BBC succumbs to feminist pressure over age of onscreen presenters

Not allowed to do what they think will get them most audience

First she swapped her newsreader’s chair at ITN for a Scottish ancestral seat, becoming Lady MacGregor of MacGregor, wife of the Gregor clan chief. Now Fiona Armstrong is one of three middle-aged women being hired by the BBC to counter claims of ageism. Armstrong, 53, who also spent time on the GMTV sofa, joins Julia Somerville, 62, a former presenter of ITN’s News at Ten, and Zeinab Badawi, 50, who used to anchor the Channel 4 News with Jon Snow.

It is an about-turn by the BBC which angered viewers by dropping Moira Stuart from her newsreading role after more than 30 years. “I’m delighted that the BBC has gone for such talent,” said Joan Bakewell, the broadcaster and government adviser on older women. “They are all supremely qualified to interview, say, Hillary Clinton one minute and Clint Eastwood the next.”

Last summer Bakewell went directly to the BBC’s director-general, Mark Thompson, to tell him that it was wrong to employ many men over 50 to present TV news or current affairs programmes, but just a couple of women.

Yet there is some disappointment that none of the three new recruits will front a main bulletin such as the Six or Ten O’Clock News or a current affairs programme such as Newsnight. Initially, at least, all three will be presenters on the BBC News Channel. None of the three recruits applied for the post, though hundreds of others from inside and outside the BBC did. All three women were approached. The BBC said: “It’s important not to rest on our laurels and to reflect the public we serve.”

SOURCE



Muslim whiner loses out in Britain

He was just playing the "Muslim card" in hope of a payout. Now he will be paying

A Muslim chef who lost a claim of religious discrimination against Scotland Yard after complaining he was forced to cook sausages and bacon faces a legal bill of more than £75,000. Hasanali Khoja accused the Metropolitan Police of failing to consider his Islamic beliefs when he was asked to handle pork products as a catering manager at a police station. The £23,000-a-year chef claimed suggestions by his bosses that he should wear gloves and use tongs left him 'stressed and humiliated'. Muslims are banned from eating pork under Islamic law. But Mr Khoja, 62, lost his claim in May after a police employee told an employment tribunal how she saw Mr Khoja eat bacon rolls and sausages.

The Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA) has now won a ruling ordering Mr Khoja to pay its costs, which total at least £76,200. In its costs claim, the Met said Mr Khoja 'knew that he had asked for a bacon roll two or three times for personal consumption before bringing his claim and throughout the conduct of his claim'. 'The fact that he had knowingly come into contact with pork products before bringing the claim shows that the claim had no reasonable prospect of success from the outset.'

Judge Michael Southam agreed and ruled Mr Khoja should pay costs, though these would be determined at a later date at a county court.

Mr Khoja, from Edgware, North London, who is still employed by the Met, claimed at a hearing in Watford that he could afford to pay only £80 a week as he has little income, lives in rented property and is struggling with £30,000 legal bills of his own. But the court discovered he had sold another home last year, splitting profits of almost £200,000 with his wife and two sons.

The decision is another setback for the police chef, who believed he was on course for a large settlement when he launched his case in 2007. Mr Khoja, who sits on a Foods Standards Agency advisory committee on Muslim issues, decided to take action after Scotland Yard chiefs placed him on unpaid leave for a year after his refusal to work with pork. He said he was then given work in a different building but his role was downgraded.

But his case fell apart when another caterer, Mary Boakye, told the court she served him bacon rolls 'two or three' times at the Met canteen at Heathrow in West London. When she told him she was surprised because his religion banned him from eating pork, Mr Khoja allegedly replied: 'I eat them once in a while.' Another chef said he saw Mr Khoja once happily eat a sausage dish and told the court 'he was not as strict as some Muslims'. Judge Southam also heard how Mr Khoja had made 'wild and baseless' allegations about a human resource manager, allegedly making racial facial gestures.

Mr Khoja is one of several ethnic minority staff to launch racial discrimination claims against Scotland Yard. The most high-profile was former Assistant Commissioner Tarique Ghaffur, who last year accused Sir Ian Blair of excluding him from the upper echelons of the force because of his skin colour. Mr Ghaffur retired after receiving an out-of-court settlement and dropped the allegations.

SOURCE



Thousands of British patients 'could be denied lung cancer drug by Nice'

Thousands of patients could be denied a lung cancer medication after the Government’s drugs rationing body decided it was too expensive for the NHS. The drug, called Alimta or pemetrexed, has already been passed for use in the health service as a first line treatment. But in draft guidance the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) said that the evidence was that the drug was too costly to use a maintenance therapy, to try to prolong the time that patients stay in remission. The drug prolongs life for an average of around five months, but costs around £51,000 annually.

Nice said that it was “disappointed” to have to turn down the drug, which could be used by an estimated 2,000 patients a year. But it said that the information it had been given about the drug’s effectiveness and benefits by its manufacturers did not justify its use. Dr Carole Longson, from Nice, said: “We are disappointed not to have been able to recommend the drug as a maintenance treatment as well. “The committee felt that there were many uncertainties in the data and analysis provided by the manufacturer. “These uncertainties led the committee to conclude that, on current evidence, the cost of the drug related to the benefits it brings means that pemetrexed would not be a good use of NHS money. “The next step in the NICE process is for the manufacturer to consider the Committee’s comments and respond to its concerns.” The organisation is not expected to make a final decision about the use of the drug until next year.

Lilly, the pharmaceutical company which makes the drug, said that it was hopeful that it could change the decision and said that they were pleased that Nice had already accepted that the drug was an end of life medication, to which the body is required to look upon more favourably than other drugs. A spokesman for Lilly said: “We are pleased that within this preliminary guidance, NICE has found that Alimta fits within the end of life criteria. “We believe that the cost of Alimta related to its benefits is a good use of NHS resources and we look forward to participating in the ongoing NICE appraisal process during the consultation phase and providing additional information to further demonstrate the significant benefit that Alimta brings to patients."

SOURCE



British universities shun excellence under political pressure

Leading universities are shunning the new A-level A* grade for fear that it will derail their attempts to increase the numbers of students they admit from state schools and poor families. The new grade, which will be awarded for the first time next summer, was intended to help universities distinguish between the soaring numbers of A-level pupils scoring A grades.

Institutions that are ignoring the A* in the current round of applications, partly because it may lead to more private school pupils winning places, include Leeds, St Andrews and Cardiff. Others, including University College London (UCL) and Warwick are placing tight restrictions on the use of A*s in offers. Their concerns will be intensified by findings from researchers at the Independent Schools Council, who say that, based on this year’s A-level results, 16.5% of all papers taken by its members’ pupils would have scored an A*, more than double the national average.

The introduction of the new grade was intended to make it simpler for universities to select candidates, but schools have instead been left confused about whether their pupils will gain an advantage from achieving the grade. Cambridge is the only university using the A* as a standard part of its offers for entry in 2010. This has resulted in a slight fall in applicant numbers as weaker candidates are put off, bucking the national trend of rising university applications.

Imperial College London and Sussex, in addition to UCL and Warwick, will use the grade for a limited number of courses. Others, including Oxford, Bristol, Durham and Surrey, take into account whether a candidate is predicted by their school to score an A*, but will not make offers that include the new grade. They will wait to see how it operates in practice, but do not cite fears over the balance of independent and state school grades.

John Morgan, president of the Association of School and College Leaders, and head teacher of Conyers school, a comprehensive in Stockton-on-Tees, described such an approach as “wriggling a bit”.

Tim Hands, master of Magdalen College school, Oxford, and chairman of the main independent schools university committee, said: “Selection for top universities became a lottery because of lack of an A*. Now we have a double lottery where some use the A* and some don’t. The lack of transparency has been disgraceful.” One of Hands’s former pupils, Ed Bernard, 18, was celebrating winning a place at Durham last week after applying post-A-level. His scores were so good Hands believes he would have been predicted three A*s, had the grade been available. Because only As were possible, Bernard was rejected by all his preferred universities last year, leaving a surprise gap year.

To win an A*, candidates must score at least 80% overall in their two years of A-level study and 90% in exams taken in the second year. The new grade was introduced in response to complaints by universities that the soaring number of As at A-level was making it increasingly hard to identify the best candidates. One in eight pupils now achieves three A grades. Exam regulators soon warned that independent schools would dominate the new grade, creating a clash with another Labour priority in higher education — loosening the grip of privately educated students at leading universities.

This concern is reflected in the approach some institutions are taking to pupils now applying — the first year group eligible for the A*. Helen Clapham, head of student recruitment at Leeds, said: “We have reservations about the A* because of the likelihood that more will go to the independent sector. “The independent sector tends to do better in A-levels generally.”

Darren Wallis, Warwick’s admissions director, said his university would use A*s for a few maths offers this year, but would only cautiously widen its use depending in part on the “degree of dominance” by private schools.

The confusion about how the A* is used has been heightened by the decision of some universities to take into account schools’ predictions, despite refusing to make offers that include the grade. Some leading schools, including Cheltenham ladies’ college, are not making A* predictions as they believe there are no reliable data on which to base judgments.

Geoff Parks, Cambridge’s admissions director, said his university was making its own predictions, mostly ignoring those by schools. “Some of the A* predictions made by schools have been fanciful in the extreme,” said Parks.

SOURCE



British Christian teacher lost her job after being told praying for sick girl 'was bullying'

But the light of publicity seems to be causing a lot of backpedalling

A devout Christian teacher has lost her job after discussing her faith with a mother and her sick child and offering to pray for them. Olive Jones, a 54-year-old mother of two, who taught maths to children too ill to attend school, was dismissed following a complaint from the girl’s mother. She was visiting the home of the child when she spoke about her belief in miracles and asked whether she could say a prayer, but when the mother indicated they were not believers she did not go ahead.

Mrs Jones was then called in by her managers who, she says, told her that sharing her faith with a child could be deemed to be bullying and informed her that her services were no longer required.

Her dismissal has outraged Christian groups, who say new equality regulations are driving Christianity to the margins of society. They said the case echoed that of community nurse Caroline Petrie, who was suspended last December after offering to pray for a patient but who was later reinstated after a national outcry. Coincidentally, Mrs Petrie lives nearby and has been a friend of Mrs Jones for some years. Mrs Jones, whose youngest son is a Royal Marine who has served in Afghanistan, said she was merely trying to offer comfort and encouragement and only later realised her words had caused distress, for which she is apologetic.

The softly spoken teacher, who has more than 20 years’ experience, said she was ‘devastated’ by the decision to end her employment, which she said was ‘completely disproportionate’. She said she had been made to feel like a ‘criminal’, and claimed that Christians were being persecuted because of ‘political correctness’. Speaking at her home in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, she said: ‘Teaching was my dream from the age of 16. It is as if 20 years of my work, which I was passionate about, has gone. It is like a grief. ‘I have been sleeping badly and been in a daze. I haven’t even got around to putting up a Christmas tree or decorations. So much for Christmas cheer.’

Mrs Jones shares her comfortable four-bedroom house with her husband Peter, who is also a teacher and heads the maths department at a local state secondary school. The house provides few clues about her strong beliefs. There is a small wooden cross on one wall, a few plaques carrying religious texts, and some Bibles in the sitting room which she used in her studies for a diploma at the Pentecostal Carmel Bible College in Bristol.

She is a regular churchgoer, attending her local Church of England church most Sundays, but she also occasionally opts for more lively evangelical worship at the college.

After training to be a teacher at Aberystwyth University, where she met her husband, and a period bringing up her children – student Rob, 24, and soldier James, 23 – she returned to teaching in state secondary schools and sixth-form colleges. Wanting to concentrate more on family life, she began a part-time job more than four years ago at the Oak Hill Short Stay School and Tuition Service North, which caters for children with illness or behavioural difficulties. She had no formal contract but was scheduled to work to a timetable for about 12 hours a week at the school in a converted bungalow and one-storey prefabricated block in nearby Nailsea.

She prepared lessons, taught and marked work for about six children between 11 and 16 who had problems ranging from leukaemia to Attention Deficit Disorder. In reality, however, pupils were frequently unavailable for lessons, and she says she often found herself working as little as 20 hours a month.

As she was technically a supply teacher, she was paid £25 an hour plus mileage and had to submit a timesheet. While she was working, she was paid about £700 a month before tax and pension contributions by North Somerset Council, and received payslips. Occasionally she would teach one or two sick children at their homes, and from September she made half-a-dozen visits to one child in a middle-class area who she was tutoring in GCSE maths. On the fourth visit the girl stayed in her bedroom because she did not feel well enough for lessons, so Mrs Jones chatted to her mother and raised the subject of her faith, saying she believed God had saved her life.

The teacher said when she was a teenager she had been driving a tractor on the family farm near Carmarthen in Wales when it slid down a slope but came to a halt just before tipping over. ‘I shut my eyes and thought I was going to die,’ said Mrs Jones. ‘Then there was a sound of a rushing wind, like that described in the Bible, and then total stillness. ‘I was convinced it was a miracle. I shared my testimony to encourage the mother to believe that there is a God who answers prayer. I believe I have a personal relationship with God, who is a constant source of strength.’

Unbeknown to Mrs Jones, the mother complained about her comments to health authorities in the mistaken belief that they were her employers. It appears, however, that these criticisms were not passed on to Mrs Jones. Unaware that there were any problems, Mrs Jones’s fifth lesson with the child passed without incident, but when she returned for her sixth session towards the end of last month, things went awry. She said that although the girl came downstairs in her dressing gown, she could not face a lesson, so the three of them chatted over cups of tea about books they were reading. Mrs Jones once again referred to the incident involving the tractor and spoke about her belief in Heaven.

‘I told them there were people praying for them, and I asked the child if I could pray for her,’ said Mrs Jones. ‘She looked at her mother, who said, “We come from a family who do not believe”, so I did not pray. ‘I asked the mother if she wanted me to cancel the next lesson as her daughter had not been feeling up to maths, but she said no.’

She left on what she thought were good terms and returned to the unit to do some more work, but within a few hours she was told that the head of the unit, Kaye Palmer-Greene, wanted to see her in her office. ‘I suspected it must be serious as Kaye did not normally see people without an appointment,’ said Mrs Jones. ‘When I got to her office I was told to wait outside. ‘Then the unit co-ordinator Karen Robinson came out and said I would have to come back later. I could tell by her face I was in big trouble. ‘I asked her if I was being sacked but she refused to comment. I drove to a Tesco car park and sat in the car and called a few friends to ask them to pray.’

About an hour-and-a-half later she was told she could go back to the office, and she went in holding a Bible. ‘You could feel the tension in air,’ she said. ‘I was so frightened I could hardly breathe. ‘I was a total wreck. I was shaking and in shock. I had never experienced anything like this before. I had a faultless record. It was horrible, one of the worst experiences of my life. ‘They were very strict and firm. Kaye was mostly silent while Karen read comments from the parent from a sheet of A4 paper. One thing the parent said was that I had demanded a cup of tea, which I hadn’t. ‘Then she said that my testimony and mention of prayer had distressed her and her daughter, and she didn’t want me to tutor in their home again. Obviously, if I had known she was upset when I had first mentioned my testimony I would never have brought it up again. But I had no idea. ‘I don’t push my beliefs down other people’s throats, and I apologise for any unintentional distress I may have caused.’

Mrs Jones said that during the meeting Ms Robinson told her that talking about faith issues in the house of a pupil could be regarded as bullying. Ms Robinson also asked Mrs Jones why she had ignored her advice not to pray or speak about her faith at work, a reference to an occasion three years ago when the teacher had prayed for a girl with period pains. The girl appears to have complained and Ms Robinson had told Mrs Jones to be more professional, but Mrs Jones said there had been no written warning.

‘Karen then said I had been an exemplary maths teacher, but my services were no longer required. As I had no contract, they could tell me to go just like that. ‘They also told me that had I been on a contract, I could be facing disciplinary proceedings. But they never told me the grounds for that.’

Mrs Jones was advised by a friend to contact the Christian Legal Centre, an independent group of lawyers funded by public donations that defends Christians in legal difficulties.

‘I am not angry with my bosses, as they are trying to interpret new equality and diversity policies,’ she said. ‘But I am angry with the politically-correct system and about the fact that you can’t mention anything to do with faith to people who might find it of use. ‘My main concern is the interpretation of the policies concerned, which seem very ambiguous. ‘An atheist may think that you shouldn’t speak about anything to do with faith to students if it is not your specialist area, but it is not really clear. ‘It is as if my freedom of speech is being restricted. I feel I am being persecuted for speaking about my faith in a country that is supposed to be Christian. ‘I feel if I had spoken about almost any other topic I would have been fine but Christianity is seen as a no-go area. It felt as if I was being treated as a criminal. It is like a bad dream that had come true.’

She said that although she was clear that she had been sacked, she had recently been approached by a senior education official who had said the complaint was still being investigated and had suggested a meeting. She said she believed the approach had been triggered by the involvement of the Christian Legal Centre, and she was now taking legal advice about how to proceed.

Andrea Williams, a lawyer and director of the Christian Legal Centre, said: ‘The story of Olive Jones is sadly becoming all too familiar in this country. It is the result of a heavy-handed so-called equalities agenda that discriminates against Christians and seeks to eliminate Christian expression from the public square...

Nick Yates, a spokesman for North Somerset Council, said: ‘Olive Jones has worked as a supply teacher, working with the North Somerset Tuition service. A complaint has been made by a parent regarding Olive. This complaint is being investigated. ‘To complete the investigation we need to speak to Olive and we have offered her a number of dates so this can happen. At the moment we are waiting for her to let us know which date is convenient for her.’

SOURCE



Unprecedented breakdown of channel tunnel trains due to exceptionally cold weather

Another sign of global cooling

MORE than 2000 passengers spent a chilly and hungry night stranded in the Channel Tunnel linking France and Britain after cold weather caused five trains to break down. The trains failed as they moved from the freezing air of northern France into the warmer temperatures of the tunnel on Friday evening, operator Eurostar said. All Eurostar services were suspended until today.

Some passengers complained they were left to fend for themselves when the trains were halted under the English Channel during one of the busiest travel periods of the year. Lee Godfrey, who was travelling back to London from Disneyland Paris with his family, said: "We were without power. We ran out of water, we ran out of food and there was very very poor communication from the staff. "We lost air-conditioning when we lost the power. We had to open the emergency doors ourselves.

Eurostar said all the passengers had been evacuated from the affected trains, which were all travelling from France to Britain. It said the cold weather had forced the suspension of services until Sunday, adding to the chaos for travellers trying to reach their families for Christmas. "We have not had a situation like this in 15 years," Eurostar executive Nicolas Petrovic said.

The problems with the Eurostar trains added to an already difficult situation on one of the busiest travel weekends of the year in Europe as temperatures dropped as low as minus seven degrees Celsius.

More HERE





20 December, 2009

Woman wins £1m compensation after British NHS doctors misdiagnose back condition

Nicola Dalby, a woman who was left disabled after doctors misdiagnosed her spinal condition, has won a £1m out-of-court settlement. Miss Dalby said she had agreed a million-pound settlement with two local GPs and Barking, Havering and Redbridge NHS Trust. The 43 year-old former coffee shop manager from Harold Wood, Essex, needs crutches to walk and suffers from clawed hands after doctors took nine months to diagnose and treat compressed nerves in her spinal cord. She has been warned that she will become wheelchair-bound over the next few years because of the delay in providing her with treatment.

MIss Dalby first saw doctors in October 2002 when she started suffering tingling fingers and dragging feet. But GPs diagnosed carpal tunnel syndrome - a relatively common condition involving compressed nerves at the wrist ~ and referred her to an orthopaedic surgeon at hospital. The surgeon said she needed to see a neurologist urgently but procedural failures by the hospital meant she was not seen until July 2003. Miss Dalby finally had surgery nine months after her first visit to her GP but her condition had already seriously deteriorated.

"The NHS needs to look at the errors in my case and ensure that they learn from this," she said. "I wouldn't want anyone else to go through what I have had to." Medical experts believe that had she been operated on before May 2003 she would be much better today.

Auriana Griffiths, a clinical negligence specialist for lawyers Irwin Mitchell, who represented Miss Dalby, said: "We are pleased that this result will at least offer Nicola the resources to adapt her home and maintain a reasonable quality of life with the long-term care she needs."

Dr Tim Woodman, director of medicine for NHS Havering, said: "Since 2003, GPs have been operating to a new contract which enables us to take a closer look at the quality of care they provide. "From 2011, all GPs will have to undergo a vigorous revalidation to stay in practice. "NHS Havering are putting measures in place to support this process, which includes ensuring that GPs keep their skills up-to-date and learn from any untoward incidents."

A spokesman for Barking, Havering and Redbridge NHS Trust said: "The trust is pleased the claim has settled and that Ms Dalby has sufficient funds to pay for her future needs. "The trust would like to assure Ms Dalby that it continues to work hard to ensure the quality of its healthcare services improves and would again like to take this opportunity to wish her, and her family, all the best for the future."

SOURCE



British health officials 'paid almost £1.7m in bonuses despite NHS facing millions of pounds in cuts'

Department of Health civil servants have been paid almost £1.7m in bonuses this year despite the NHS facing millions of pounds in cuts, figures show. Almost 200 staff shared in the payouts, with the highest totalling £27,500 and the average £8,000. The figures, revealed in a written parliamentary answer, also show that over the last five years hundreds of health bureaucrats have benefited from bonuses totalling almost £7.7 million.

Opposition parties described the amounts as “staggering” while millions of families struggle to make ends meet during a recession. The revelation comes just weeks after a damning report, by Dr Foster Intelligence, suggested that thousands of patients could have died needlessly at seven hospitals with extremely high death rates over the last five years.

The NHS has already committed to making £20 billion of efficiency savings over the next four years. Earlier this month ministers announced plans to cancel parts of the NHS IT scheme in a move to save £600 million, while the health service has also has been told to cut management costs by almost a third in coming years. Hospitals are also facing a four-year long squeeze on their funding. The Government plans to freeze the income they receive per procedure, in effect a real terms cut.

Norman Lamb, the Liberal Democrat Health spokesman, said: “This is a staggering amount of money to be paid in bonuses this year. “While families across the country are struggling to make ends meet, ministers are paying out bonuses to senior civil servants that are equivalent to some people’s annual income. “It’s hardly surprising that the public finances are in such a mess with such apparent profligate use of taxpayer’s money.” He called on ministers to conduct a review of when to was appropriate to award bonuses during a recession.

The largest bonus given to a single official over the last five years was £49,000, paid out last year, the figures also show. The amount paid in bonuses this year so far is almost double that in 2005/06, when £961,843 was shared between 181 staff. Earlier this year a report commissioned by the Department of Health by McKinsey, the management consultancy firm, found that a tenth of health service jobs would need to be cut within five years to meet planned £20bn efficiency savings. However, ministers immediately disowned the report and insisted that they had no plans to implement its findings.

A spokesman for the Department of Health said that bonuses were rigorously assessed. He added: "Senior civil servants have a vital role in the success of the NHS and social care. "Their leadership, supporting clinical colleagues, has been vital to the NHS's strong performance in recent years: finances are under control, patients are experiencing the shortest waiting times on record and hospital infections have decreased significantly. "Our ambitious plans for putting quality at the heart of everything the NHS and social care does, require the best possible leadership."

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What’s liberal about booing off Johnny Ball?

The jeering of a climate sceptic by supposedly liberal atheists confirms that questioning manmade climate change is the new blasphemy

Everyone hates the tabloid phrase ‘You couldn’t make it up’, I know, but there are times when no other form of words will do. On Tuesday night Johnny Ball, the veteran children’s TV presenter who introduced my generation (thirtysomethings) to the wonders of science and maths, was booed and slow-handclapped off stage in London for daring to express scepticism about manmade climate change. And who was in the audience, doing the booing, the jeering, the hissing and the chanting of ‘shame, shame, shame’ until a ‘shaken-looking’ Ball agreed to ‘leave the stage’? (1) Liberal atheists who claim to be allergic to orthodox beliefs, and campaigning scientists who have defended ‘free speech for scientists’. As I said, you couldn’t make it up.

Ball was invited to speak at ‘Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless People’, one of an increasing number of religious right-style get-togethers at which hundreds of individuals mock and pour scorn on the deluded masses - except the gathered individuals are self-styled rationalists rather than Bible-bashers, and their targets are the thickos who believe in God or receive chiropractic treatment rather than drunks or single mums. Ball, who presented the BBC kids’ science show Think of a Number from 1977 to 1984, decided to devote his stint on stage to singing a George Formby-style ditty about the English physicist John Dalton, before making a speech in which he criticised the ‘bad science’ of global warming and said that natural emissions from insects and spiders (‘spiders farting’) are more damaging to the climate than fossil fuels (2).

Bad move. The new collective of liberal atheists, of agitated ‘rationalists’, of Keepers Of The Scientific Truth As Revealed Unto Them By Richard Dawkins, can tolerate nothing so intolerable as someone taking the piss out of scientific theories about climate change. According to one report there were ‘slow handclaps, whistles and jeers’ (3). A blogger who attended the event said ‘a cry of “shame” from the audience broke the dam, the boos started, and a perplexed and shaken-looking Ball was finally forced from the stage’ (4). No wonder Ball looked perplexed: he thought he had been invited to a free, open-minded, rationalist ideas-knockabout and then found himself being ‘forced from the stage’ as if he were a tattooed Satanist who had gatecrashed a bishops’ tea party down Lambeth way.

Ball says ‘the reaction of the audience [depressed] me’, as well it might. He also says that he just wants to poke holes in the idea that the world is spinning towards some kind of bad behaviour-induced hellfire (global warming): ‘We are depressing children by saying the world is coming to an end through climate change. This is simply wrong’, he said in an interview. Whatever about ‘farting spiders’, on that point he is absolutely right: the warping of scientific facts to tell a story about an imminent End of Days that is being somehow caused by cheap flights and hamburgers is one of the worst aspects of the politics of climate change. (Someone being booed by atheists for challenging the notion of End of Days? Once again, and hopefully for the last time, you couldn’t make it up.) But Ball now says he realises his speech was ‘a mistake’ and he won’t be repeating it at future atheist-scientist gatherings. Reader, he has been re-educated, or at least silenced, his ranting consigned to the Sin Bin of History by the illiberal liberals, or maybe intolerant toleraters, who make up contemporary ‘rationalist’ circles.

There are more ironies to this story than even Alanis Morissette could handle. First there is the irony of liberal atheists, gathered together by the liberal-atheist comedians Robin Ince and Chris Addison (‘Liberal-atheist comedians’? Come back, Jimmy Tarbuck, all is forgiven), booing someone for questioning what has become a debate-strangling, genuflect-demanding orthodoxy: that man caused global warming through his wicked behaviour, that he now must repent for it, and that if he doesn’t we are Doomed with a capital D. In fact, how’s this for ironic: Tuesday night’s Ball incident confirms that the real religiosity that governs society today - far more successfully and suffocatingly than the Catholic Church (collapsing) or the CofE (collapsed) or the religious right (bogeyman) - is the religiosity of climate change, attended and promoted not by smock-wearing God-squadders but by corduroy-sporting God-doubters.

In so many ways, climate-change alarmism, that ugly mish-mash of scientific findings, political hysteria and industry-demonising greenery, resembles traditional religious outlooks. The Science has replaced The Gospels as the container of truth about mankind’s downfallen condition and what he must do to rectify it and save himself. Green activists now march behind banners saying ‘The Scientists Have Spoken’ and give interviews in which they say ‘The Science demands that we [insert some miserabilist policy idea here]’ in the same way that priests once said ‘God demands that we [insert something about not having sex here]’. Carbon-offsetting, where you pay to plant a tree to make up for your eco-sins, smells a lot like Catholic penance. Talk about the ‘heat death of the universe’ (atheist hero Christopher Hitchens’ words) sounds a lot like Armageddon. And most importantly, the labelling of anyone who questions the politics, the science or the consequences (less development, more mud huts) of climate-change alarmism as a ‘DENIER’ springs straight from The Inquisition, when those who questioned the Bible were similarly branded with the D-word. It’s a very weird atheistic rationalism which borrows so liberally from the illiberalism of religious tyranny.

But the key thing here is that climate-change alarmism only ‘resembles’ traditional religions - it’s not the exact same thing, of course! No, because, if anything, it’s actually kind of worse. At least the old religions encouraged us to bend the knee, to live in a state of bread-and-butter self-denial and to censor our inner doubts in the interests of finally getting to some heavenly place in which we would meet Jesus Christ, live in the clouds and eat Philadelphia cheese all day. The dogma of environmentalism, by contrast, wants us to partake in all those backward things - especially self-denial and self-censorship - merely as a way of keeping the planet clean and tidy and not leaving behind an ‘eco-footprint’ when we leave. There’s no transcendence of everyday tedium, no final reward for goodness, no pearly gates… it’s just self-punishment for the sake of self-punishment. Life’s a bitch and then you die.

The second, and most notable, irony of this week’s Ball debacle is that many of those who attended the atheist shebang are defenders of ‘free speech for scientists’. They support Simon Singh’s campaign to reform the English libel laws after he was sued by the British Chiropractic Association for questioning their claims and practices. Indeed, Singh was in the audience that seems to have momentarily forgotten about, er, free speech, as it forced the shaken-looking Ball to leave the stage. The comedian Dara O Briain, who was on telly the other day slagging off the libel laws for curtailing scientific debate and ‘quashing dissent’ (5), compered the atheist get-together at which scientific debate was curtailed and dissent was quashed, announcing ‘I am shell-shocked’ - no, not by the treatment of Ball, but by Ball’s sinful words. ‘I’m discombobulated by a childhood hero doing that’, O Briain announced (6).

This reveals a high level of hypocrisy and double standards amongst today’s defenders of free speech for some (respectable scientists) but not for others (evil deniers). But it also reveals something very important about free speech itself - namely that it is threatened by laws, yes, but is often more urgently and thoroughly threatened by conformism, by a generally accepted way of viewing things, by what that great warrior for liberty John Stuart Mill described as ‘custom’. Indeed, Mill said that of the three major threats to liberty, the ‘tyranny of custom and tradition’ - that is, a non-statute based sense of correct wisdom - was the worst. These binding rules are enforced not by coercion, said Mill, but by the notion of unquestionable ‘right and proper ideas’ held by all respectable members of society. Or as the Ancient Greek leader Pericles described it: ‘that code which, although unwritten, cannot be broken without acknowledged disgrace.’ (7)

Climate-change alarmism has become just such a code. The ‘despotism of custom’, accepting the general and apparently correct view of things, is a ‘hindrance to human advancement’ and the ‘sprit of liberty’, said Mill. It discourages inquisitiveness and eccentricity of thought and action: ‘[T]he mind itself is bowed to the yoke… peculiarity of taste, eccentricity of conduct, are shunned equally with crimes, until by dint of not following their own nature, these [followers of custom] have no nature to follow: their human capacities are withered and starved; they become generally incapable of any strong wishes or native pleasures, and are generally without either opinions or feelings of home growth, or properly their own.’ (8) If there is a better description of the robotic adherents to the scientific-political dogma of climate-change alarmism, I have yet to read it.

And now another eccentric, with his nonsense about ‘spider farting’ and his common sense about this not being the end of the world, has been publicly humiliated and intellectually cowed. Yes, the use of libel laws against scientists (responsible or otherwise) and against anyone else is a disgrace, as spiked has been arguing for considerably longer than many of today’s libel reformers. But the use of unwritten codes to make a public example of disobedient thinkers, and to discourage serious, critical, eccentric or, yes, sometimes bizarre question-asking, is in many ways more frightening still. And the fact that those unwritten codes are being wielded precisely by the ‘free speech for science’ lobby… well, I’m going to have to say it one more time, aren’t I? You couldn’t make it up.

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Tinsel Taliban strikes as British Court Service ban staff from decorations

Forget nativity scenes and crosses. Even tinsel can be politically incorrect in authoritarian Britain

The 'Tinsel Taliban' have struck in Britain's courts. The Tories claim court officials have been banned from putting tinsel around front office-counters amid fears it will 'offend other religions'. Tinsel and other Christmas decorations have been outlawed at the Warwickshire Justice Centre in Nuneaton, where people pay fines.

But last night the Government denied the charge that the ban had been put in place to ensure Muslims were not offended. They said it was because they would be insensitive for criminals to have to pay fines in a room surrounded by tinsel.

However, one courts worker wrote to community cohesion minister Sayeeda Warsi to say he had been told the ban had been imposed because tinsel would 'break the Court Service Diversity Policy'. This commits court service managers to 'creating a culture where equality and diversity forms an integral part of everyday working life' and 'incorporating equality and diversity into day-to-day management activities'.

Baroness Warsi spoke out after receiving a letter from a worker at the centre who said: 'I work as an admin officer in the county court and we have been told that we can't put tinsel around our counter window as it might offend other religions, according to HMCS diversity policy.'

The Warwickshire Justice Centre houses police officers, the Crown Prosecution Service, four magistrates courts, the probation service, the local youth offending team and witness support services. The Court Service is headed by justice minister Bridget Prentice, who is spearheading a campaign to ban pink toys being sold because they are not sufficiently 'progressive' and 'funnel girls into pretty, pretty jobs'.

Baroness Warsi said: 'First toys; now tinsel. Labour's PC killjoys are determined to kill off Christmas. 'This has nothing to do with diversity; it's about the very opposite - a stultifying grey conformity. 'Non-Christians don't want to see Christmas banned, and they're fed up of being patronised by Labour.'

Last night a source at the Ministry of Justice admitted that tinsel had been banned at the front-office counter at the Nuneaton office. 'Over the counter, yes, where sensitive business like fine payments takes place,' he said. 'For that reason. Otherwise there is tinsel and stuff elsewhere. 'Nothing was removed for religious or diversity reasons. 'One piece of tinsel was removed from a counter where it was getting in the way. The rest of the tinsel remains there as festive as ever.' And he claimed: 'I have it on good authority that the court is one of the most festive places one could go, perhaps outside Lapland.'

The Conservatives have long accused Labour of bowing to PC concerns over Christmas - such as the famous example of Birmingham rebranding the religious festival as 'Winterval'. But two weeks ago, David Cameron faced embarrassment when it emerged the Tory website was selling Christmas cards with the PC message Season's Greetings. This is despite the fact he has in the past derided such cards as being 'insulting tosh'.

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Brain gym for pupils is pointless, admits British education boss

A programme used in thousands of classrooms in the hope of boosting children's brainpower has no scientific basis, Ed Balls's department has ruled. Schools around the country have spent taxpayers' cash on Brain Gym, a system of 26 postures and movements invented in California. But in a statement issued to MPs, the Department for Children, Schools and Families warned that studies put its success-down to nothing more than the 'placebo effect' and the general benefits of breaks and exercise. Officials said Brain Gym had been 'criticised as being unscientific in a wide-ranging and authoritative review of research into neuroscience and education'.

Despite the department's concern, Brain Gym is still promoted in a range of Government-backed literature. The Young Gifted and Talented programme, supported by the DCSF to stretch the brightest children, claims on its website that Brain Gym 'can have a sustained impact on learning'.

Hundreds and possibly thousands of schools - mainly primaries - have used Brain Gym techniques since the system was introduced to the UK in 1984. Some councils have spent thousands training teachers to lead the movements. The exercises are said to work on the principle that coordinating mental and physical activity boosts energy, stimulates the brain and enhances performance in the classroom. They include pupils touching so-called 'brain buttons' beneath their collarbones to stimulate blood flow to the brain and massaging their jaws to improve language skills.

But growing numbers of scientists are claiming that the programme is nothing more than 'hocus pocus'. They say that while the exercises may be harmless, the programme gives pupils false information about how the human body works and wastes school time and resources.

Now the DCSF has raised its own concerns about the programme to the Commons Science and Technology Committee. Asked by the committee about the scientific evidence for its use, the DCSF said: 'We are unaware of any sufficiently robust or peer-reviewed evaluation of the approaches it promotes which would allow any clear link between the use of Brain Gym and pupils' learning to be established. We are also aware of a significant body of criticism of the theoretical underpinnings of the programme.' It said that Paul Dennison, the Californian teacher behind it, had admitted that many of Brain Gym's claims were based on 'hunches'.

However the DCSF stopped short of ordering schools not to use the programme, instead declaring that it 'does not have a specific policy'. Schools still using Brain Gym include Westcliff Primary in Dawlish, Devon. Headmistress Barbara Capper said: 'It does help children's coordination and does help children's concentration.'

Brain Gym said it was a notforprofit company and revenue was ploughed back into developing the programme. Kay McCarroll, who brought Brain Gym to the UK, said: 'This has been around for 30 years. Where are the peer-reviewed studies the Government refers to? I'm not aware of them.'

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Britain's Gatwick Immigration Unit 'Deeply Depressing'

What's it supposed to be? A laugh a minute? If a prison is merely "depressing", it's pretty good

Prison inspectors have called for "urgent action" to address the "wholly unacceptable" conditions at an immigration removal centre connected with Gatwick Airport. The inspection of Tinsley House had been "deeply depressing", prisons chief inspector Dame Anne Owers said.

Arrangements for children and single women had deteriorated since her last visit in 2007, she went on. She added: "Tinsley House has become almost an afterthought, housing some poorly-cared-for children and a small number of scared and isolated single women."

The report claims unnecessary force was used on children during the removal of a family, while childcare and education have got progressively worse. Children at the centre were also said to have limited access to fresh air, and the centre's male-dominated population was described as intimidating for the single women being held.

Tinsley House is run by Group4 Security, a private contractor which manages the centre on behalf of the UK Border Agency. The centre can hold up to 154 detainees, many of whom are suspected of visa violations, illegal entry to the UK, or are awaiting deportation or decisions on asylum applications.

The UK Border Agency's David Wood said: "We accept the conditions at Tinsley House at the time of the inspection were not ideal but we do not agree that they are wholly unacceptable for women and children. "However, we are nonetheless reviewing our services. Treating women and children with care and compassion is a priority for the UK Border Agency. "Removal centres are a necessary part of enforcing immigration control. It is vital that they are well-run, safe and secure. "Detainees (must be) cared for with respect, with access to a range of medical, educational and welfare facilities."

About 1,000 children a year are held in privately run Immigration Removal Centres overseen by the UK Borders Agency. Earlier this month a report by the medical organisations in the UK called for an immediate end to the long-term detention of families with children.

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19 December, 2009

The "cultural sensitivity" of the British police kills woman

Twice, in the weeks before she was murdered by her father, Tulay Goren told the police that she feared for her life. And twice she was ignored. Mehmet Goren, who was convicted of murder yesterday, killed his 15-year-old daughter because she had fallen in love with an “unsuitable” older man. To Mehmet, the affair made her a “worthless commodity” who could not be married off for a £5,000 dowry. The authorities did nothing to protect her, even though the police became involved when her father attacked her boyfriend, and even though Mehmet demanded in front of police officers that his daughter take a virginity test. Only a decade after her murder in 1999 has justice been done.

“Honour killings” in Britain? Impossible. To many people the case of Tulay Goren will come as a shock, but not to me. I know from personal experience, and from working with victims, that such “honour” crimes are a huge social problem in this country. The shame is not just that it is happening on such a large scale, but that it is so often covered up for fear of upsetting cultural sensibilities. Serious crimes are being treated as a matter for diversity officers rather than for the police and the courts.

There are measures in place to help potential victims of honour crimes, but they are not being used to anything like the extent that they should be. In 2007 Parliament passed the Forced Marriage Act, which enables magistrates to issue protection orders to stop women and girls being married against their will. If necessary, victims, a third of whom are under 16, can be taken into care. Passports can be confiscated, and parents can be forced to reveal the whereabouts of daughters who have gone missing from school, most likely because they have been taken abroad to be coerced into marriage. According to a recent Home Affairs Select Committee report, 2,500 British girls have gone missing from schools and are believed to be at risk.

But the law will have been in vain if authorities refuse to use it for fear of being accused of being racist. Up until last month, 86 forced marriage protection orders have been issued, yet not one of them was in Bradford, Leicester or Tower Hamlets. Is this because forced marriage is not a problem in those areas, all of which have some of the largest Asian populations in Britain? Or is it because authorities there are failing to use the powers for fear of creating offence? I am afraid it is the latter.

Two years ago Cleveland Police set up a helpline for victims of forced marriage. In that time it has received more than 300 calls. If that is the scale of the problem in an area where only 3 per cent of people are from ethnic minorities, imagine how many calls police in areas with large Asian populations would get if they became more proactive.

If a white child went missing from school or rang a helpline to complain that she was being taken away to be married, you can be sure it would be followed up. But I have seen at close quarters what happens when the child is Asian. Many schools and social service departments decline to act. Recently, I tried to get posters put up in schools around Derby, but the headteachers refused on the grounds that they didn’t want to upset the local communities. A lot of people still consider forced marriage to be part of Asian culture and that it is offensive to intervene. But it is not part of anyone’s culture to be abused.

Since the Government set up its forced marriage unit in 2005, 400 victims of forced marriages have been repatriated from abroad. One third of them were minors. But we are still only scratching the surface because people are very unwilling to face up to these “honour” crimes. Consider this: Tulay’s mother took ten years to report her daughter’s killing. And I know only too well the guilt and shame that prevents victims of “honour” crimes talking about what has happened to them.

In 1981, aged 15½, I was taken out of my school in Derby and told by my parents that seven years earlier I had been promised in marriage to a man from Punjab. They showed me a photograph of him. They had not even met him themselves, but they wanted me to marry him because they knew it would give them great status to be able to get this man into Britain and gain him citizenship.

When I refused to go through with the marriage I was locked in a room. My mother told me: “unless you marry who we say, you are dead in our eyes”. Unknown to my parents I had a boyfriend, and I ran away with him to Newcastle where we slept in a car and washed in public toilets before we managed to find a bedsit.

I spent seven years in hiding and it was only when I heard that my 24-year-old sister Robina had set fire to herself rather than suffer the shame of leaving a violent arranged marriage, and had died as a result, that I returned to Derby to campaign against forced marriage. Even now my brother and surviving sisters will cross the road rather than talk to me.

I was lucky compared with many victims. When I was on the run in Newcastle I told my story to a policeman who agreed not to send me back home. Unfortunately, the police often fail to believe girls who tell them they are in danger; they are treated like stroppy teenagers who have fallen out with their parents. Tulay Goren begged to be put into a children’s home. If she had been listened to she would be alive now.

Over the past 20 years attitudes towards domestic violence among the white population have changed immeasurably. No longer do police say “it’s just a domestic” when they receive a call from a woman who is being attacked by her husband. Sadly, different standards still apply to violence among Asians. While it is too late for Tulay Goren, I hope that the story of her appalling and avoidable death will finally wake us up to the abuse taking place in our midst and that we will stop trying to excuse forced marriage as just a price to pay for multicultural diversity.

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Patients 'still suffering at crisis hit British hospital'

Patients are still suffering unnecessarily at a hospital criticised six months ago for poor standards that contributed to hundreds of deaths, according to a new report. At least one patient has died because of similar problems since, the review suggests. Health watchdogs also found that Stafford Hospital, run by Mid-Staffordshire NHS Trust, was still suffering staff shortages.

In March a damning investigation found that up to 1,200 people had died because of the poor standards of care at the hospital. Regulators found overstretched nurses who turned off vital pieces of equipment because they did not know how to use them and reception staff expected to judge the seriousness of the conditions of patients arriving at A&E.

The latest report, by the Care Quality Commission, found that improvements were being made but that the changes needed to happen faster. In one case the commission found that a “serious untoward incident” on an ward where concerns had been raised about staffing levels led to a patient’s death. The hospital closed the 12-bed Clinical Decision Unit (CDU) soon after the death.

But the CQC warned that there were still staff shortages across the hospital. Relying heavily on bank or agency nurses could also have a negative impact on patient care, the report states.

Too many patients are still being sent unnecessarily to casualty when they could be dealt with in other parts of the hospital, inspectors also found. In one case a patient with heart failure who was already in the outpatients department was sent to A&E instead of straight to see a specialist when he developed breathlessness.

The report also found that patients were being seen by senior doctors sooner but that there were still problems contacting consultants during night shifts.

Andrea Gordon, regional director for CQC in the West Midlands, said: "On CQC's six month follow up review we found that while some progress had been made against the trust's action plan, more still needs to be done. "Permanent staffing levels remain a concern and this must improve. “Although there had been some change, there was still a shortfall in permanent nursing staff and the trust was still using bank and agency staff to supplement numbers. “We are aware that the trust is working to address these issues but there is still some way to go.”

Antony Sumara, the chief executive of Mid-Staffordshire Trust, said: “We know that there is more to do and that this needs to be delivered more quickly. Staff at our hospitals are as committed as I am, to making changes for the benefit of our patients.”

Last month the CQC warned that hundreds of patients had died needlessly at another hospital, Basildon University Hospital, because of poor care.

Katherine Murphy, director of the Patients Association, said: "This is a Trust under unbelievable levels of pressure to improve and it still can't get the basics right every time or ensure it has enough staff. "That should be worrying for all of us. "The local community don't want improvement over a few months or 6 months or a year, they want it straight away. "They are the ones that suffer if things aren't put right."

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Lawyers growing rich on NHS negligence

It would be a lot cheaper for them to do their job properly in the first place but that doesn't enter a bureaucratic mind. It's not their money that they are wasting

The number of negligence cases being brought against the NHS is rising at 11 per cent a year. Lawyers representing patients in clinical negligence claims frequently take more money from the NHS than their clients receive in damages. The rise of no-win, no-fee actions against the health service has been blamed for a sharp increase in the proportion of payouts ending up in the pockets of the claimants’ lawyers.

Law firms representing patients made more than £100 million last year from successful claims concluded against the NHS. Their costs, at rates of up to £400 an hour, were more than double those for lawyers representing the health service. “Success” fees charged by lawyers working on a no-win, no-fee basis — which cover their risk of losing some cases — can double the cost, according to the NHS Litigation Authority (NHSLA).

Figures released by the authority, which handles all clinical negligence claims, show that legal fees accounted for almost half the £312 million damages claims closed last year. Patients’ legal costs exceeded the damages that they received in more than one in five cases. According to the authority, the number of cases being brought against the health service is rising at 11 per cent annually, with more than 6,700 cases expected for this financial year.

The cost to the NHS is accelerating at a similar rate. The authority’s annual report says that payouts, including both completed cases and continuing payments, will pass £800 million this year — a 60 per cent rise on five years ago. When settlements relating to staff injuries are included, the total is even higher.

A review of civil litigation costs, which is due to report next month, is expected to address the way no-win, no-fee costs can spiral. Submissions to the review, seen by The Times, describe how this problem has grown in recent years because of success fees and insurance premiums taken out by lawyers to protect against losing the case. Since 2000, both have been recoverable from the NHS.

Christine Tomkins, chief executive of the Medical Defence Union, which provides medico-legal support to health professionals, said that analysis of their cases had shown that the average damages was just under £10,000. Claimant costs, including legal fees, success fees and insurance premiums, had been calculated at an average of more than £20,000.

Dr Tomkins said that cases and costs should be more closely managed, with a cap on fees, adding that the no-win, no-fee cases were being “cherry-picked because they were winnable”. She said: “There needs to be much closer attention to costs being accrued by claimants’ solicitors. We are often not aware of a case until we are contacted and we immediately think: ‘We must settle.’ But we can then discover that there have already been weeks of costs accrued.”

Among contested claims highlighted in the NHSLA annual report was the case of six male cancer patients who had banked semen samples with a hospital trust for possible future use. The samples thawed and became unviable. In another case a child born with congenital rubella syndrome, “due to admitted NHS negligence”, is receiving care costing £130,000 a year.

The Conservatives, who identified some of the disparities in legal costs and damages, said that there were cases where lawyers were getting ten times as much as patients. They calculated that over the past five years, almost £700 million in NHS funds has been spent on fees to lawyers dealing with clinical negligence claims. Mark Simmonds, the Conservative health spokesman, said: “Taxpayers will be rightly angry that hundreds of millions of pounds of their money is being paid out for mistakes in the NHS and that in many cases lawyers get their hands on more of the compensation money than the patients.”

Stephen Walker, chief executive of the NHSLA, described the claimant costs as “seriously disproportionate”. He said: “These law firms are not doing anything dishonest or illegal, they are just playing the system.”

A Department of Health spokesman said that litigation costs were a concern across government and were the reason for the current review, adding: “The vast majority of the millions of people treated by the NHS every year experience good quality, safe and effective care. However, if patients do not receive the treatment they should and mistakes are made, it is right that they are compensated and have access to legal representation.”

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The crooked British Left again

Vandals deface town war memorial

A Royal British Legion boss says vandals have “dishonoured those who have given their lives for our country” by defacing Burton's war memorial. Roy Whenman, vice-chairman of the town’s Legion branch, received calls from members saying an extremist message had been written on the statue.

Having been informed at 9.20am, borough council chiefs had cleaned the graffiti from the relic, situated outside Burton College, in Lichfield Street, by 9.40am.

Mr Whenman, of Birches Close, Stretton, has described whoever committed the offence as “diabolical”. He said: “There’s nothing worse, in my eyes, than discrediting a war memorial. It dishonours those who have given their lives for our country. “I don’t know how long it was there for, but I was pleasantly surprised by the council’s quick action and I commend them for it.

Dennis Fletcher, chairman of East Staffordshire Racial Equality Council, said he suspected someone from the far right was responsible.

More HERE

Do you wonder why the graffiti got cleaned off so quickly? 20 minutes is the speed of light for a British bureaucracy. The picture of it below may help. The details below were "removed" from most pictures of the vandalized memorial



Those dastardly "Far Rightists"!



East Anglia CRU’s below-standard computer modeling

While the rest of the world focused on the e-mails from East Anglia’s CRU describing attempts to “hide the decline” and silence critics, a programmer in the UK focused on the programming code for CRU’s computer modeling. John Graham-Cumming says he’s not an AGW skeptic, but he’s becoming a skeptic of East Anglia, thanks to its below-standard computer programming for its climate modeling. Breitbart TV has his assessment and damning conclusion in this clip, which gets down to the brass tacks: would you spend money on any conclusions offered by these models? Watch the clip below for the answer:



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Teachers should stop labelling children as dyslexic, say British politicians

The term does seem to be overused but that is surely an argument for using it more precisely. Throw the baby out with the bathwater?

Schools should stop labelling children 'dyslexic' because the condition cannot be distinguished from other reading difficulties, an all-party group of MPs will declare today. The Government's definition of dyslexia is too broad to be meaningful, according to the Commons Science and Technology Committee. Schools should target extra help at all children struggling with reading and not just those diagnosed with dyslexia, it added.

The MPs recommended that dyslexia teachers should be renamed 'literacy difficulty' teachers. In their hard-hitting report, they said ministers had bowed to a powerful dyslexia lobby and framed many of their policies around the condition rather than considering the full range of reading difficulties. 'There are a range of reasons why people may struggle to learn to read and the Government's focus on dyslexia risks obscuring the broader problem,' the report said. It is 'not useful from an educational point of view' to try to differentiate between youngsters with dyslexia and other reading difficulties, it added.

Committee member Graham Stringer, MP for Manchester Blackley, said: 'We came to the conclusion the definition of dyslexia was so wide as to be meaningless.' Around one in ten children - more than a million - are now diagnosed with dyslexia, compared with barely any two decades ago. The condition is often used to win up to 25 per cent extra time in GCSEs and A-levels. Critics are now arguing that extra time in exams should be conditional on a clear description of the candidate's problems rather than a diagnostic label.

In its report, the Labour-dominated committee said there was 'no convincing evidence' that treating dyslexia differently to other reading problems made any difference to children's progress. The report said: 'That is because the techniques to teach a child diagnosed with dyslexia to read are exactly the same as the techniques used to teach any other struggling reader. 'There is a further danger that an overemphasis on dyslexia may disadvantage other children with profound reading difficulties.'

It said the Government's favoured definition of dyslexia was 'exceedingly broad' and 'a continuum with no clear cut-off points'. 'The definition is so broad and blurred at the edges that it is difficult to see how it could be useful in any diagnostic sense,' the report said.

The committee heard evidence from Professor Julian Elliott, of Durham University, who argued that attempts to distinguish between dyslexia and other categories of poor reader were 'scientifically unsupportable and arbitrary'.

In further findings, the committee warned that a flagship Government reading scheme, Reading Recovery, was relying too heavily on discredited teaching methods which encourage struggling readers to guess at words. It had not fully embraced the back-to-basics 'synthetic phonics' method of teaching children to read, which encourages them to learn the sounds of the alphabet and blend them together.

Ministers had extended the programme nationally despite only low quality evidence it worked, they said. No 'randomised controlled trials' had been carried out even though they are the 'gold standard' of research. The report said: 'Wikipedia is more thorough and informative than the Government's guidelines on randomised controlled trials.'

SOURCE



BBC slammed over gay execution debate

For once I think the BBC have a point. If something's happening out there in the real world, you should be free to discuss it from all angles. It's a bit amusing when the BBC get censored though -- seeing they do so much censoring themselves.

"British politicians today condemned the BBC for hosting an online debate asking: "Should homosexuals face execution?" The debate on the government-owned broadcaster's Have Your Say Web site has now closed, and the title was changed to "Should Uganda debate gay execution?" after it provoked uproar online. It was in response to a proposed bill in Uganda that could lead to the death penalty for gay people.

On his blog Labour Member of Parliament Eric Joyce said: "What's happened here, I think, is that the BBC has attempted to tap into the Ugandan zeitgeist, if you will, and reflect the sort of discussions going on in Kampala." He said: "Is the BBC really there to provide credibility to a vile discussion around a profoundly hideous and savage piece of legislation?"

The BBC, in its Editor's Blog, defended its decision to host the debate. "The editors of the BBC Africa Have Your Say program thought long and hard about using this question which prompted a lot of internal debate," the post said. "We agree that it is a stark and challenging question, but think that it accurately focuses on and illustrates the real issue at stake."

Source

18 December, 2009

Russian scientists say that British scientists shamelessly distorted the Russian temperature record to exaggerate global warming

And Russia is a very large part of the Earth's surface. This does sound like the end of the CRU at least

Climategate just got much, much bigger. And all thanks to the Russians who, with perfect timing, dropped this bombshell just as the world’s leaders are gathering in Copenhagen to discuss ways of carbon-taxing us all back to the dark ages. Feast your eyes on this news release from Rionovosta, via the Ria Novosti agency, posted on Icecap.

A discussion of the November 2009 Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident, referred to by some sources as “Climategate,” continues against the backdrop of the abortive UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen (COP15) discussing alternative agreements to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol that aimed to combat global warming.

The incident involved an e-mail server used by the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norwich, East England. Unknown persons stole and anonymously disseminated thousands of e-mails and other documents dealing with the global-warming issue made over the course of 13 years.

Controversy arose after various allegations were made including that climate scientists colluded to withhold scientific evidence and manipulated data to make the case for global warming appear stronger than it is.

Climategate has already affected Russia. On Tuesday, the Moscow-based Institute of Economic Analysis (IEA) issued a report claiming that the Hadley Center for Climate Change based at the headquarters of the British Meteorological Office in Exeter (Devon, England) had probably tampered with Russian-climate data.

The IEA believes that Russian meteorological-station data did not substantiate the anthropogenic global-warming theory. Analysts say Russian meteorological stations cover most of the country’s territory, and that the Hadley Center had used data submitted by only 25% of such stations in its reports. Over 40% of Russian territory was not included in global-temperature calculations for some other reasons, rather than the lack of meteorological stations and observations.

The data of stations located in areas not listed in the Hadley Climate Research Unit Temperature UK (HadCRUT) survey often does not show any substantial warming in the late 20th century and the early 21st century.

The HadCRUT database includes specific stations providing incomplete data and highlighting the global-warming process, rather than stations facilitating uninterrupted observations.

On the whole, climatologists use the incomplete findings of meteorological stations far more often than those providing complete observations.

IEA analysts say climatologists use the data of stations located in large populated centers that are influenced by the urban-warming effect more frequently than the correct data of remote stations.

The scale of global warming was exaggerated due to temperature distortions for Russia accounting for 12.5% of the world’s land mass. The IEA said it was necessary to recalculate all global-temperature data in order to assess the scale of such exaggeration.

Global-temperature data will have to be modified if similar climate-date procedures have been used from other national data because the calculations used by COP15 analysts, including financial calculations, are based on HadCRUT research.

What the Russians are suggesting here, in other words, is that the entire global temperature record used by the IPCC to inform world government policy is a crock. As Richard North says: This is serial.

UPDATE: As Steve McIntyre reports at ClimateAudit, it has long been suspected that the CRU had been playing especially fast and loose with Russian – more particularly Siberian – temperature records. Here from March 2004, is an email from Phil Jones to Michael Mann.

Recently rejected two papers (one for JGR and for GRL) from people saying CRU has it wrong over Siberia. Went to town in both reviews, hopefully successfully. If either appears I will be very surprised, but you never know with GRL.

And here is what one of the commenters has to say about the way the data has been cherry-picked and skewed for political ends:

The crux of the argument is that the CRU cherry picked data following the same methods that have been done everywhere else. They ignored data covering 40% of Russia and chose data that showed a warming trend over statistically preferable alternatives when available. They ignored completeness of data, preferred urban data, strongly preferred data from stations that relocated, ignored length of data set.

On the final page, there is a chart that shows that CRU’s selective use of 25% of the data created 0.64C more warming than simply using all of the raw data would have done. The complete set of data show 1.4C rise since 1860, the CRU set shows 2.06C rise over the same period.

SOURCE



British Health and safety killjoys remove village Christmas tree... "in case it distracts motorists"

Highway officials have been branded festive killjoys today after removing a village Christmas tree because it could distract passing motorists. The 8ft tree, which was covered with decorations, had been placed in the middle of a drab roundabout by residents in Dobwalls, Cornwall. But officers from the Highways Agency moved in overnight and took the fir down claiming it was an 'unauthorised item'. They said they had taken the tree away over health and safety fears.

Initially, residents thought that their new tree, complete with baubels and tinsel, had been stolen, but the agency confirmed it had taken it away to a depot. Sylvia Crome, who helped erect the tree, branded the agency 'Scrooges'. She said: 'It's Christmas and with all the terrible things happening in the world they have to do something like this.

'A Highways Agency van drove past us when we were putting it up and they took it away in the dead of night two days later - they didn't even tell us. 'I think they are being quite petty, they have no Christmas spirit. 'I think it's absolutely pathetic, I really don't believe it.'

Peter Scott, 56, who runs Heads or Tales newsagents, added: 'We thought we'd try to brighten up the roundabout for Christmas and put up the tree, complete with baubles and tinsel. 'We tried to make an effort to brighten things up. It is just unbelievable it has happened - the tree was doing no harm to anyone and certainly wasn't any sort of risk.'

He added that the 8ft Norwegian Spruce, which was donated by a farmer, was wedged securely two feet into the ground and that all the decorations were tied on with cable ties. He said: 'We were very careful not to put anything in there that wasn't securely attached and we didn't want anything that was a hazard in any way. 'The tree itself was two feet in the ground and was wedged into the ground. The wedges were driven in with a sledgehammer.' Robert Newton, chairman of the parish council, said: 'It's supposed to be the season of goodwill - where is theirs?'

The tree was put up on Sunday night by villagers, but had disappeared by 6am yesterday morning. A Highways Agency spokesman said the tree could be a danger to road users. He said: 'Our policy is to ensure the safety of road users by removing any unauthorised items placed on our roundabouts or roads. 'Anything that causes a distraction or impairs visibility presents a real danger to motorists on high speed roads.

'The tree has been taken to a nearby depot, where it can be collected by the owner. 'Alternatively, if the owner wishes, we can arrange to have the tree taken to a suitable site, where it can be enjoyed safely by the local community.'

SOURCE



Investigate EVERY crime report, British police are ordered in new crackdown on 'no crime' scandal

A political force to become a real police force? This is going to cut into the time they have for their more favoured pursuits -- such as harassing photographers and Christians

Police are to be forced to investigate all crimes reported by the public. Tough new rules will end the scandal of officers writing off thousands of assaults and thefts under the heading 'no crime'. This happens when police dismiss a person's report of an offence without making even cursory inquiries, in effect deciding the victim is either wrong or lying.

There was an outcry when it emerged in October that up to 6,000 cases of serious violence had been wrongly 'no crimed' - denying victims the chance of anyone being punished. They included a woman left battered and bruised after her partner slapped her, grabbed her by the neck and threw her on the floor, and a man who needed six stitches in a head wound after a street attack.

One force - Devon and Cornwall - admitted that an internal audit had found 40 per cent of violent incidents marked 'no crime' should not have been. Overall, it is estimated that around 200,000 complaints are 'no crimed' each year.

Now ministers have ruled that, in future, crime reports can not be written off unless there is hard proof the offence did not take place. This could include CCTV footage showing that it could not have happened - for example film of a drunk falling before claiming he had been assaulted. Home Secretary Alan Johnson said in a statement that 'no crime' rulings must have 'hard' evidence such as CCTV footage. 'Soft' evidence, like an officer's belief that the complainant was lying, was not enough.

The ruling will delight campaign groups, who say victims have for too long been ignored by the police and Government. But police are concerned it will burden them with even more bureaucracy, and that time which could be spent on patrol will be spent trawling through CCTV footage.

Simon Reed, vice-chairman of the Police Federation, said: 'We are going to end up investigating every incident to prove no crime has happened. 'We need to trust the officer's discretion. All we are doing is making the process more bureaucratic.'

Critics questioned the timing of the Government's announcement, which follows a blistering report on 'no criming' by Her Majesty's Inspector of Constabulary. It is likely to lead to a rise in crime figures as cases which were previously written-off are included in official statistics. But this will not happen until after a General Election.

The ruling will also do nothing to end the separate police practice of 'screening out'. This happens when officers accept a crime has taken place, but decide there is little or no chance of securing a prosecution. As a result, they do not bother to carry out a full investigation. Last year, police chose not to investigate 1.5million reported crimes under this system including sex attacks, robberies, drug use, fraud and thefts.

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling said: 'This Government's reputation over its use of crime figures is so shot to pieces that frankly most people will think that Labour Ministers are engaged in yet another attempt to massage figures.'

A spokesman for Victim Support said: 'We are glad the government is taking this issue seriously, because if victims feel their experience of crime is being dismissed that risks adding insult to injury. 'But as well as making sure crimes are recorded properly, the police need to do more to promote the help available to victims and witnesses.'

SOURCE



You're not worthy: Council snubs move to honour British Army's most decorated regiment

The usual Leftist hatred of the military



They have fought bravely in Iraq and Afghanistan and count Victoria Cross hero Johnson Beharry among their number. But the troops of the most decorated regiment in the British Army are the victim of an extraordinary snub by a council in Surrey, which says they are not 'appropriate' recipients of a public honour.

More than 2,000 people in Epsom have signed a petition to hand the freedom of the borough to the soldiers of the Princess of Wales's Royal Regiment, which has won 57 Victoria Crosses in its 350-year history.

But a furious row has erupted after Liberal Democrats and independent councillors united to block the move - which would not cost taxpayers a penny - because the regiment, based in nearby Guildford, is 'not local enough'.

The regiment said it would be a 'huge honour' to have the freedom of the borough and march through the streets of the town when they come home from fighting the Taliban. More than 30 other councils have bestowed the same honour on the regiment, including Tunbridge Wells in Kent, 50 miles away.

Guest of honour at a homecoming parade in Tunbridge Wells was Lance Corporal Johnson Beharry, who won the Victoria Cross in 2004 for saving 30 colleagues by guiding them through an ambush in Iraq.

The Epsom and Ewell council committee that voted to snub the soldiers last conferred the freedom of the borough on their own retiring chief executive, while other previous recipients include a man who ran Epsom buses, the wife of a leading trade unionist, and two local businessmen.

Critics said the objection was rooted in political prejudice, because the move was proposed by a Tory councillor, and bureaucracy. On Tuesday night the council agreed to hold a special meeting to make a final ruling in the coming weeks but it will not be open to the public, and councillors are overwhelmingly opposed to the idea. Jean Steer of the Residents Association council group conceded that the regiment regularly signs up recruits from Epsom but said that granting them the freedom of the borough would be 'inappropriate'. 'It would be a nice thing to do but it's a high honour,' she said. 'I would love to see them marching through the borough but I don't think they should be given the honour. It has to be appropriate.'

Sean Sullivan, the Tory councillor who is pressing to honour the troops, said: 'The Princess of Wales's Royal Regiment contains what used to be the East Surrey regiment. This is a local regiment. 'It would be wrong and downright offensive to refuse to honour this regiment.'

Three soldiers in the PWRR were killed during the Iraq War, including Private Lee O'Callaghan, 20, of London, who was killed in Basra during an attack by insurgents in 2004. Last night his mother Shirley said: 'To refuse them this honour seems so petty and shows a lack of gratitude for what they are doing.'

The PWRR, also known as 'The Tigers', has a long and illustrious history in Britain's Armed forces. It has been involved in virtually every theatre of war since The Battle of Tangier in 1662. For recent service in Iraq soldiers have also been awarded three Conspicuous Gallantry Cross medals, two Distinguished Service Orders and 16 Military Crosses.

SOURCE



British faith school admissions in doubt after ruling

The power of faith schools to select pupils along religious lines has been thrown into doubt following a controversial Supreme Court ruling. All Jewish schools in England are already being forced to rewrite admissions rules after the court upheld an earlier judgment that a school in north London racially discriminated against a boy. He was rejected from JFS – formerly the Jews’ Free School, in Brent – because his mother was not born Jewish.

It is thought the ruling will force most of the 38 state and 60 private Jewish schools to tear up their entry policies as admissions were not based solely on the child’s faith. The court said this amounted to racial discrimination.

But lawyers acting for Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary, warned that the judgment “potentially impacts on other schools that give preference to members of particular faiths” because religion was “closely related” to ethnic origin. In some areas, Christian schools may be “largely or exclusively white”, the Government said in a submission to an earlier court hearing. “If membership of a religion in that area is regarded as ‘closely related’ to one ethnic group rather than another, it may be that admissions arrangements will fall within the ambit of the… decision,” the document said.

Mr Balls insisted that action could be taken to allow England’s 7,000 Christian, Sikh, Muslim, Hindu and Jewish schools to continue selecting along religious lines. He said: "We are going to need to look carefully at the implications of this, and all faith organisations will as well. We must make sure that the role of faith schools is properly protected in our state education system. Any further steps which have to be taken should only be taken once we have studied the judgment."

The school went to the Supreme Court after three judges at the Court of Appeal ruled in June that the admissions rules were unfair. On Wednesday, the Supreme Court failed to overturn the decision. Lord Rodger – one of nine Justices who heard the case – said the decision meant “that there can in future be no Jewish faith schools which give preference to children because they are Jewish according to Jewish religious law and belief.”

“Jewish schools will be forced to apply a concocted test for deciding who is to be admitted [that] has no basis whatsoever in 3,500 years of Jewish law and teaching,” he said. “The… decision leads to such extraordinary results, and produces such manifest discrimination against Jewish schools in comparison with other faith schools, that one can’t help feeling that something has gone wrong.”

After the hearing, the Board of Deputies of British Jews said it was “extremely disappointed by this decision”. It said it would lobby for a law change to allow Jewish schools to apply admissions rules based on the faith of children’s parents, which was a “fundamental right for our community”.

But the move was welcomed by groups opposed to faith schools. Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain, chairman of Accord, which lobbies for a major overhaul of faith schools entry requirements, said: "We hope this ruling will serve as a wake-up call to faith schools by showing that religious admissions rules must conform to the law of the land, though we will continue urging for all faith schools to stop discriminatory policies entirely. Taxpayer funded faith schools should serve not just themselves but also the community around them.”

A boy - named only as M – was rejected because his mother was not born a Jew. She converted to the faith but this was not recognised by the Office of the Chief Rabbi. It is a basic principle that a child is not recognised by the OCR and other bodies as Jewish unless his or her mother is Jewish. JFS argued that its admissions policy giving preference to Jewish children when the school was oversubscribed was lawful because it was based on religious and not racial criteria.

SOURCE



British government hospitals 'are wrong to ban flowers as a health threat'

Hospitals that ban flowers in an attempt to stop infections spreading are actually slowing patients' recovery, researchers have found. They say visitors bringing bouquets to wards do not increase the spread of germs and help speed a patient's return to health. In fact, the biggest hazard posed by flowers could be nurses' irritation at having to change the water.

A growing number of hospitals have introduced 'no flower' policies, with Southend University Hospital bringing in a blanket ban this summer despite protests. Bosses said patients were in favour because of the potential health and safety risk to bedside electrical life support equipment as well as fears over the spread of germs.

But research in the British Medical Journal says the risks have been overplayed. There is no record of an outbreak of infection in a hospital being traced to bacteria found in flower water, according to Giskin Day and Naiome Carter from Imperial College London. Vases might tip over, they admit, but the risk is no greater than that posed by crockery containing food and drink.

The researchers say studies show flowers have immediate and long-term beneficial effects on emotional reactions, mood and memory. One trial found that patients in rooms with plants and flowers needed significantly less pain relief after surgery. They also had lower blood pressure readings, lower rates of pain, anxiety and fatigue and more positive feelings than those who were in flower-less wards.

However, hospitals continue to impose bans on the wards despite the absence of any ruling from the Department of Health.

The study also found evidence of contrasting attitudes to flowers on private and NHS wards, after questioning patients and staff at two London hospitals, the Royal Brompton and the Chelsea & Westminster. Private nurses appeared much keener on flowers than those from the public sector.

Charge nurse Dermot Richards-Scully at the Royal Brompton said: 'I hate them [flowers].' 'My staff don't have time to change stagnant water, spillage is responsible for slips, trips and falls, and they cause hay fever.'

But sister Susan Bunce, in charge of the Sir Reginald Wilson ward for private patients at the same hospital, welcomes them. 'Maintaining flowers doesn't take up any nursing time and they have a positive effect on patients,' she said.

The BMJ article concluded: 'Although flowers can undoubtedly be a time-consuming nuisance, the giving and receiving of flowers is a culturally important transaction.' It recommends bedside lockers be designed to cut the chances of spillage from vases.

SOURCE



Need urgent help? Dial 111, but you may have to pay

An admission that existing services are failing -- after 60 years to get them right

An 'urgent care' phone number will be set up for sick patients to ease pressure on ambulances, despite fears it could cause confusion and even delay life-saving treatments. Health minister Mike O'Brien will tomorrow outline plans for the phone line - 111 - for those who need treatment but not enough to warrant a 999 call.

It would mean patients deciding whether to call 999, 111, NHS Direct or their GP.

Dr Hamish Meldrum, chairman of the British Medical Association, said: 'We would want to be assured that what is being proposed really does simplify things for patients rather than adding to the confusion as to which part of the NHS they should be going to for care. 'We would certainly not want to see a situation where patients are so confused that genuine life-threatening emergencies are missed.'

Patients may even have to pay to ring the service. Ministers have suggested either a 10p flat fee, or up to 5p a minute - ignoring concerns that poorer patients and pensioners may be put off by the charge.

The Department of Health quotes polling which reveals most patients would be happy to pay a small fee. The 111 number is designed for people who need 'urgent advice, care, treatment and diagnosis'.

The number, which would be piloted from spring 2010 would be staffed, like NHS Direct, with a mixture of call centre workers and clinicians. The Department of Health would not comment last night.

SOURCE



British ginger-bashing ad banned

A strange British prejudice in the limelight yet again:

"An ad for a TV dating show has been banned for suggesting that people with ginger hair were unattractive, Britain's advertising watchdog said. Virgin Media's newspaper advert for the program Dating in the Dark included the text: "How do you spot a ginger in the dark?"

Virgin said the premise of the show was to challenge people's perception of attractiveness and to encourage decisions based on personality as well as looks.

However the Advertising Standards Authority agreed with three complainants that the ad was likely to cause serious offence and should not be used again. "We considered the text was likely to be interpreted ... as a statement that reflected a choice between looks and personality ... being a suggestion that people with ginger hair were unattractive," the ASA said. "We considered the ad was unlikely to be interpreted to be light-hearted in tone and was instead likely to be seen as prejudicial against people with ginger hair."

Source

There are all sorts of nicknames for red hair. "Ginger" is of course common, even though all the ginger I have ever seen is an off-white color. The oddest may be "carrot top", since carrot tops are green. And a nickname that seems to be used only in South Australia is "ranga", after Orang Utans, which do have red hair. Most Australian redheads are however addressed as "Blue" or "Bluey", with no offence being taken or intended. It's part of traditional Australian jocularity. In a similar spirit, German immigrants with the Christian name "Heinz" -- a common name in Germany -- are sometimes referred to as "57 varieties".





17 December, 2009

More evidence of anti-Israel bias at Britain's Foreign Office

It is frequently said that all FO people understand the Arab penchant for clandestine homosexuality and quite a few share it. Hence the ingrained pro-Arab bias

One of Britain's most eminent historians has assailed the country's policy towards Israel, questioning why Queen Elizabeth II has visited a host of despotic regimes but has never made an official visit to the Holy Land. Speaking at the Anglo-Israel Association dinner in central London last week, Andrew Roberts suggested that the Foreign Office had a de facto ban on royal visits to Israel.

"The true reason of course, is that the FO [Foreign Office] has a ban on official royal visits to Israel, which is even more powerful for its being unwritten and unacknowledged," he said. "As an act of delegitimization of Israel, this effective boycott is quite as serious as other similar acts, such as the academic boycott, and is the direct fault of the FO Arabists."

Roberts, whose work includes biographies of Churchill and Chamberlain, as well as Hitler and Roosevelt and a look at the relationship between Napoleon and Wellington, said that Britain had been at best "a fair-weather friend" to Israel.

The 400 attendees at the dinner, held at the prestigious Grosvenor House Hotel on Park Lane, included ambassadors, diplomats, lords and Christian leaders celebrating the 60th anniversary of the AIA, the oldest organization of Anglo-Israel friendship in the UK.

Roberts told them that he wanted to try to strip away some of the myths surrounding the relationship between Israel and Britain. "It is, therefore, no coincidence that although the Queen has made over 250 official overseas visits to 129 different countries during her reign, neither she nor one single member of the British royal family has ever been to Israel on an official visit," he said. Even though, he said, Prince Philip's mother, Princess Alice of Greece, was recognized as a Righteous Among the Nations for sheltering a Jewish family in her Athens home during the Holocaust, and is buried on the Mount of Olives, Prince Philip did not visit her grave until 1994 - "and then only on a private visit."

Roberts questioned the Foreign Office's attitude to Israel, because it is the Foreign Office that organizes and sanctions royal visits. The Foreign Office has responded that Israel was not unique in not having received an official royal visit, as "many countries have not had an official visit," Roberts said. "That might be true for Burkino Faso and Chad, but the FO has somehow managed to find the time over the years to send the queen on state visits to Libya, Iran, Sudan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Jordan and Turkey. So it can't have been that she wasn't in the area.

"Perhaps her majesty hasn't been on the throne long enough, at 57 years, for the Foreign Office to get round to allowing her to visit one of the only democracies in the Middle East. "At least she could be certain of a warm welcome in Israel, unlike in Morocco, where she was kept waiting by the king for three hours in 90-degree heat, or at the Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Uganda the time before last, where they hadn't even finished building her hotel."

Roberts, whose current book The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War reached No. 2 on the Sunday Times best-seller list, also attacked those who accuse Israel of responding "disproportionately" to provocation. "William Hague [a Conservative MP] called for Israel to adopt a proportionate response in its struggle with Hizbullah in Lebanon in 2006, as though proportionate responses ever won any victories against fascists," he said. "In the Second World War, the Luftwaffe killed 50,000 Britons in the Blitz, and the Allied response was to kill 600,000 Germans - 12 times the number and hardly a proportionate response, but one that contributed mightily to victory. Who are we therefore to lecture the Israelis on how proportionate their responses should be?"

He then questioned how Britain would respond to similar provocations faced by Israel. "Very often in Britain, especially when faced with the overwhelmingly anti-Israeli bias that is endemic in our liberal media and the BBC, we fail to ask ourselves what we would do placed in the same position? "The population of the UK is 63 million - nine times that of Israel. In July 2006, to take one example entirely at random, Hizbullah crossed the border of Lebanon into Israel and killed eight patrolmen and kidnapped two others, and that summer fired 4,000 Katyusha rockets into Israel which killed a further 43 civilians. "Now, if we multiply those numbers by nine to get the British equivalent, just imagine what we would not do if a terrorist organization based as close as Calais were to fire 36,000 rockets into Sussex and Kent, killing 387 British civilians, after killing 72 British servicemen in an ambush and capturing a further 18?

"I put it to you that there is absolutely no lengths to which our government would not go to protect British subjects under those circumstances, and quite right, too. So why should Israel be expected to behave any differently?"

SOURCE



Father Christmas turned away from British asylum centre

Police were called in to prevent a clergyman dressed as Father Christmas from delivering presents to children at an asylum centre due to fears he posed a security threat. The Rev Canon James Rosenthal, dressed in a red robe with a long white beard and holding a bishop's mitre and crook, was refused entry by guards at Yarl's Wood immigration removal centre in Bedfordshire.

After gently protesting that he was not a threat, he started to bless the £300 worth of gifts donated by congregations of several London churches. But after an unedifying stand off, the security guards then called the police on the visitor, who was accompanied by one of Britain's most distinguished clerics.

Mr Rosental, who is the Anglican church’s leading expert on St Nicholas, said he was “extremely disappointed” that 35 boys and girls at the centre were denied a pre-arranged visit by the patron saint of children and the imprisoned.

"St Nick has never been turned away from anywhere before," he said. "So I was extremely disappointed not to be able to hand deliver the gifts to the children detained at Yarl's Wood. I hope the kids realise that they will be firmly in my prayers."

Mr Rosental is writing a formal letter of complaint to the centre about how it handled the visit and the heavy-handed tactics employed by the guards who patrol the perimeter fence.

Serco, a private security company that operates Yarl’s Wood, referred questions to the Home Office. A spokesman said that only people subject to stringent security checks can be allowed into the detention centre and there can be no exceptions.

But the St Nicholas Society, of which Mr Rosental is patron, said that Serco did not respond to numerous requests before the visit earlier this month to discuss how a handover of presents could be carried out and also refused requests to provide details about the 35 children in the centre so they could receive appropriate presents.

Serco also refused permission for the two clerics to enter the centre to visit two refugee families later the same day, as it had previously agreed. They were handed letters from Dawn Elaine, contracts manager at Yarl's Wood, saying permission had been revoked because of "concerns about your conduct".

Mr Rosental said: "If this is how visitors are treated, I shudder to imagine what else transpires inside Yarl's Wood.”

He was accompanied on the trip earlier this month by the Rev Professor Nicholas Sagovsky, canon theologian at Westminster Abbey.

He said: "This was about bringing a moment of joy to kids locked up in a deplorable situation. I can't help but contrast the smiles and wonderment on the faces of the children St Nicholas visited at a local primary school with the sad fate of those kids who will be locked up in Yarl's Wood over Christmas."

The presents were eventually loaded into an unmarked van by staff who refused to provide a name, number or receipt for the gifts. Mr Rosental asked one "guard" his name and the man said "write down 'Father Christmas'".

SOURCE



Why equal pay does not equal happy employees

Some people need an economist to tell them these things

Equal pay can cause resentment and low productivity in the workplace, a study has revealed. The research found that hard-working members of staff resent staff who make less effort for the same money. Economists say this creates low motivation and morale, causing dedicated employees to slacken their work rate to create what they see as fairer working conditions. This in turn can spell disaster for companies' productivity.

The findings, from the highly regarded Nottingham School of Economics, raise a question mark over the ideal of equal pay, which has governed the thinking of public sector employers and the courts since the 1990s.

The study asked almost 150 volunteers to play the roles of employers and employees. Each employer was given a fixed amount of money, assigned two workers and told to pay them according to their efforts. In the first experiment the manager paid identical wages, regardless of effort. In the second he was allowed to set individual wages based on performance.

The study's co-author, Dr Johannes Abeler, found workers who were paid individually worked almost twice as hard as those who got the same pay. But those who put in more work while remaining on the same pay as lazier colleagues subsequently slowed their work rate.

Dr Abeler, an expert in behavioural economics, added: 'Hard workers get discouraged under equal pay and reduce their effort levels to those of low-performing colleagues. 'But under individual pay the high performers keep working hard - and the low performers change their behaviour and get better.'

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The nanny state turns nasty

From smoking bans to sin taxes, Scotland has proved itself a willing victim for the nanny state’s angrier successor: the bully state

At the start The Bully State, his rambunctious account of the nanny state’s recent history, Brian Monteith argues that the term ‘nanny’ is too cuddly a word for the alliance of ‘puritans, control freaks and prohibitionists’ who are waging war on individual freedom on both sides of the Atlantic.

Nanny, he says, has lost her patience with us. Her policies of re-education have failed to ‘nudge’ us towards government-approved behaviour. Targets have not been met. Too many calories are being consumed. Too many units of alcohol are being knocked back. Some of us are even smoking and using offensive language. Not so much disappointed as angry, she has now turned bully. What happens now is going to hurt us a lot more than it hurts her.

In some ways, Monteith has written a British companion to David Harsanyi’s self-explanatory "Nanny State: How Food Fascists, Teetotalling Do-Gooders, Priggish Moralists and Other Boneheaded Bureaucrats Are Turning America into a Nation of Children" (2007). Both books take a chapter-by-chapter swipe at the ongoing battles over diet, alcohol, smoking, motoring and surveillance, and both feature an interchangeable cast of professional reformers. Wielding spurious research and chanting their ‘think of the children’ mantra, these neo-prohibitionists will be familiar to anyone who has read a newspaper in the past decade.

If California provided Harsanyi with the richest seam of big-government meddling to mine, that role is fulfilled here by Scotland, much to the chagrin of its author, a former Conservative member of the Scottish parliament. It is a sign of how quickly nanny has been working that many of the policies merely being proposed by those wacky Californians when Harsanyi wrote his book (banning incandescent lightbulbs, banning the smacking of children, banning teenage sunbed use) have since become law in Scotland. It is an irony not lost on Monteith that Scottish devolution did not so much lead to a Braveheart-inspired dash for freedom so much as a rush to become the international bellwether for what he calls ‘lifestyle fascism’.

While the Scots embrace the bully state with ‘Calvinist relish’, other countries strive to keep pace. Politicians around the world now regard being the first to ban an activity as ‘a symbol of a town or country’s virility’. When New York City banned trans-fats in restaurants, a distraught Chicago alderman said: ‘I’m disappointed we’re losing bragging rights to be the first city in the nation to do this.’ (Perhaps he took consolation when Chicago was later ranked number one in Reason magazine’s list of America’s most illiberal cities.)

A true libertarian, Monteith identifies the seat-belt and motorcycle helmet laws introduced 30 years ago as the first tentative steps down the slippery slope. Various parliamentarians warned that the ‘for your own good’ argument that lay at the heart of these laws would open a Pandora’s box of meddlesome legislation. They were ignored. Wearing a motorcycle helmet was, after all, a sensible precaution and the freedom to not wear one was a small freedom indeed. Who would miss it?

One person who did miss it was the Second World War veteran Fred Hill who had always worn his beret while motorcycling and was not going to let this new-fangled law change the habit of a lifetime. Like Norman Stanley Fletcher, Hill accepted the occasional prison term as an occupational hazard even if, in the more innocent times of the 1970s, the local police force often turned a blind eye. On one occasion the desk sergeant left his cell door open and told Hill to ‘bugger off when no one’s looking’.

In the years that followed, countless campaigners, do-gooders and moral guardians invoked the precedent set by the helmet and seat-belt laws to compel other members of society to do what was thought best for them. Ever-dubious estimates of the money smokers, drinkers and motorists were costing the National Health Service were used to justify a raft of regulations, bans and ‘sin taxes’. Each new restriction inspired another. Few expected the ‘sin tax’ on cigarettes to inspire campaigns for higher taxes on alcohol, petrol, meat, sunbeds and carbon dioxide. Who really believed that schools would ban Marmite from being served inside and ice-cream from being sold outside? Even five years ago, the idea of forcing shopkeepers to hide their tobacco products from view or banning pub-goers from standing at the bar would have been almost universally mocked (the first of these will soon become UK law, the second has been trialled in several towns).

If the mandatory wearing of helmets and seat-belts marked the beginning of the nanny state, the smoking ban raised the curtain on the bully state. The smoke-free legislation was such a blatant attempt to discourage and ‘denormalise’ a legal activity that the fig-leaf of passive smoking could barely disguise the overt paternalism that lay behind it. In keeping with nanny’s transformation from Mary Poppins to Biffa Bacon, no exemptions could be permitted and no tolerance could be shown. Rather than being told to ‘bugger off when no one’s looking’, ‘smoke-ban rebels’ like Hamish Howitt and Nick Hogan were driven to the brink of bankruptcy after being convicted of ‘permitting smoking to take place’ on their premises.

The smoking ban represented a milestone because it successfully pitted a largely ambivalent majority against a dwindling and cowed minority, while blurring the distinction between public and private property at the same time. The coalition of government agencies, professional reformers and state-funded charities that engineered the smoking ban set the template for the neo-temperance campaigners, green activists and food faddists who came in their wake.

These activists – or ‘storm troopers’ as Monteith’s describes them – are far closer to the government than the public is led to believe, both in ideology and funding. Action on Smoking and Health, Alcohol Concern, Barnardo’s and dozens of other ‘campaigning charities’ receive so much money from the state that they could almost be considered the government in drag. Through the use of rigged public consultations, dubious opinion polls and policy-based evidence, this self-serving elite manufactures a demand for greater state power.

A favoured tactic is to float a new piece of Draconia in the press and if it is met with anything less than howls of derision, it gets the go ahead. The public, says Monteith, are then fed ‘a steady stream of news releases, PR stunts, giveaways and junk science dressed up as authoritative research from quangos and politically active charities that have morphed into lobby groups’. If, on the other hand, the idea gets shot down (such as the plan to force people to buy smoking licenses or banning people from buying more than three drinks in a pub), it is popped into a file marked ‘Too Soon’, to be reopened at a later date.

The book covers much ground. Eating, drinking and smoking feature prominently, since they have been propelled into the frontline by an over-mighty public health lobby. But, as Monteith argues, this regulation of lifestyle is a symptom - albeit a far-reaching one – of a wider shift of power from the individual to the state. The expansion of CCTV, the erosion of trial by jury, identity cards, censorship, health-and-safety hysteria and the DNA database constitute a ‘bullies’ charter’ made more dangerous by the ‘jobsworth mentality’ of British officialdom.

At the heart of Monteith’s thesis are the ‘neo-socialists’ who have, he says, ‘forsaken their jackboots, their boiler suits and their AK-47s and are instead using surveillance, regulation, guidance, inspection, by-laws, and local summary justice as weapons to subjugate us’. This argument will have an allure for some, even if the author tends to view the Thatcher era through rose-tinted spectacles. The Iron Lady did, after all, give us the seat-belt law and was keen to issue identity cards to football fans.

Monteith does, however, accept that what he calls ‘lifestyle socialism’ has infected all political parties. While he hopes that a future Conservative government will put nanny back in her box, he ruefully concedes that many Tories harbour their own patrician hobbyhorses. He has little faith in the Liberal Democrats ever living up to the first half of their name and despairs of the Scottish Nationalists and Greens doing anything other than putting their own authoritarian stamp on the legislature wherever they get the chance.

Far from being the preserve of the authoritarian left, then, big government appeals to politicians and activists of all persuasions. Indeed, it is the very fact that the bully state serves so many vested interests that makes it so formidable. Although he is convinced that any system of government built on repression and prohibition will be doomed to failure, Monteith paints a convincing picture of a many-headed beast comprising ‘fake charities’, government departments, NGOs, ‘earnest do-gooders’ and ‘malevolent power grabbers’, to say nothing of the over-eager epidemiologists and the ‘monstrous’ British Medical Association.

Some are motivated by their own obsessions, some by government targets and others by the need to keep the grant money rolling in. Their one shared characteristic is a complete lack of humour, not an accusation that could fairly be levelled at Monteith himself, who proves to be an affable and gregarious guide throughout, liberally scattering his narrative with personal anecdotes and stories of the ‘you couldn’t make it up’ variety.

Readers who have not visited Britain for several years may be shocked by the lurch towards authoritarianism described in this book. Those who have witnessed the creep of the bully state first hand will be enraged, amused and informed in equal measure. Californian politicians can simply use it as an instruction manual.

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The Calais problem

Last September, when French authorities sent riot police to raze "the Jungle," a makeshift camp near Calais, they made sure plenty of international media were on hand. By closing the camp and dispersing its population of clandestine aliens who were awaiting a chance to sneak across the Channel to Britain, the authorities aimed to provide clear proof of France's determination to battle illegal immigration. But less than three months later — with TV cameras gone — humanitarian workers are struggling to deal with problems that have actually been exacerbated by the raid.

On Dec. 9, the aid group Secours Catholique won permission to begin setting up a center to care for the most vulnerable aliens who stayed in Calais after the Sept. 22 operation. The approval didn't come easy. With more than half of the nearly 1,000 refugees who occupied the camp relocated elsewhere, Calais city officials fought efforts by Secours Catholique and other aid groups to set up any services for the remainder for fear that even minimal aid could swell illegals' numbers again. Secours Catholique not only had to win a November court case to overcome the refusal of Calais authorities but also promised that the unit would provide just health, medical and sanitary services to women, children and ailing men among the 300 illegals currently estimated to be in the area — and run it only during the day.

"There will be no lodgings in it, and it will be administering to the most vulnerable of refugees," says Philippe Lefilleul, a member of Secours Catholique. "Resistance to any facility was sufficiently high that we're having to limit what we do to minimum humanitarian levels."

Lefilleul says a majority of people who had resided in the Jungle have fallen back to nearby towns on the coastline — or have retreated all the way back to camp aside canals in Paris where they wait for smugglers to hide them in U.K.-bound trucks or freight trains. And Calais doesn't want those and newly arrived illegals to join the estimated 300 Jungle inhabitants still in town. The reason is evident: with its proximity to Britain — 30 miles, connected by ferries, trucks, cars and passenger and freight trains using the Chunnel — Calais remains a magnet for clandestine aliens and the human traffickers exploiting their desire to reach the U.K. (where obtaining refugee status is easier and brings more in aid payments). Britain has long demanded that Paris take action to prevent migrants from congregating on French shores with the aim of illegally sneaking across the Channel. (See the top 10 news stories of 2009.)

France took a first step in 2002, when then Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy closed down the Red Cross–run refugee shelter in the Sangatte suburb of Calais, which had housed thousands of illegals planning a jump to England. That only sent inhabitants of Sangatte's center flocking to other parts of Calais and its environs.

With Sarkozy now President — he has made fighting illegal immigration one of his main priorities — the destruction of the Jungle was designed to send a forceful message that France's humanitarian sympathy had run out. That message seems to have little impact on the people who view Calais as a staging post for a new life, many of whom have fled greater privations and dangers than a newly hostile Calais can offer. Instead, Lefilleul reports, migrants have simply gone underground and into deeper misery, hiding from even the aid groups looking to provide them minimal levels of assistance. "We aren't condoning illegal immigration and aren't naive about the role of traffickers in all this," he says. "But offering a little humanitarian care to such vulnerable people is our duty as fellow human beings and Christians." (See the TIME video "In Calais, a Dead End for Refugees Bound for Britain.")

That's not how Lefilleul's Secours Catholique day center, due to begin operating in January, is viewed across the Channel, where some hostile press reports dubbed it Sangatte II. "This is another gesture of contempt from France to Britain," said U.K. Conservative Party shadow immigration minister Damian Green. "It will encourage more potential illegal immigrants to try to break our law."

Natacha Bouchart, conservative mayor of Calais and a backer of Sarkozy's anti-immigration hard line, says her city and others on the coast are "hostage to the British" asylum laws. She says the U.K. should tighten those rather than shift the responsibility on French authorities to keep illegal aliens from making it to Britain.

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More British parents 'educating children at home'

Growing numbers of parents are shunning state schools to educate their children at home

Up to 150,000 children are taught outside mainstream schools and numbers are "believed to be growing steadily", said the Commons schools select committee. In a report published on Wednesday, it was suggested the trend was driven by parents’ failure to get sons and daughters into their preferred school, coupled with the impact of testing and a perceived rise in bullying.

MPs said there was also growing evidence that some children were being effectively forced out of school by head teachers and local councils. Parents were "coerced to deregister" children from school because of problems with their examination results, attendance or behaviour, said the report.

The findings will raise fresh fears that schools are prioritising their reputation and league table position over the needs of individual children. It came as the select committee criticised new rules designed to crackdown on parents who educate their children at home.

Earlier this year, Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary, announced plans to force all families with children taught at home to register sons and daughters with local councils for the first time. They must also submit lesson plans every 12 months. Under proposals, authorities can “inspect” parents’ homes and order children back into school if education standards are not high enough. The move followed claims in a study by Graham Badman, former head of education at Kent Council, that home education could be a front for abuse.

In the least report, the select committee said these claims were built on a “less than robust evidence base”. MPs welcomed some of the measures to improve home education but insisted many of the recommendations went too far. It suggested the registration scheme should be voluntary and education officials lacked the training and expertise to support families. MPs also demanded the introduction of a more precise definition of what constituted a “suitable” education.

The study said that – despite the action – more parents were choosing to educate children in their own home. “The lower estimate is 45,000 – higher estimates are 80,000 and 150,000,” the study said. This represents up to two per cent of the 7,300,000 schoolchildren in England, it was disclosed.

MPs said that a “common motivation” for pulling children out mainstream education was the “nature of schooling, including the impact of testing on children and children’s learning”. Children with special needs were often educated at home because local authorities had failed to cater for them in normal schools, it was claimed.

The report added: “There were also references to instances where children had been so badly bullied and traumatised by their time at school that they did not feel able to return to a school environment. “The comments of some of the local authority officers with whom we met as part of our inquiry suggested that the failure to obtain a place for the child at the family’s preferred school was another reason for a family to choose to home educate.”

In some cases, local councils and schools "coerced" parents into pulling children out of mainstream education, MPs said. "Local authorities and schools encourage parents to deregister their child from school it is typically as a result of a child’s poor school attendance, poor behaviour and/or poor attainment," the report said. "That schools are held accountable on all three is no doubt part of the explanation for this practice."

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British headteacher rapped for keeping a box of Kit-Kats to reward well-behaved pupils

Food fads are not harmless. Here we see good educational practice undermined by them. The sheer dogmatism of it all is unnerving. There are frequent claims from researchers to say that chocolate is beneficial but these killjoys just KNOW it is bad

A school headmaster has been criticised for breaching healthy food guidelines by handing out chocolate bars to reward pupils for effort. John Waszek, of St Edward’s College, Liverpool, was pulled up by a joint team of NHS and town hall healthy eating inspectors tasked with eradicating junk food and excess sugar and salt in schools.

Mr Waszek’s methods were called into question when an auditor from the city’s Transforming School Food Strategy unit inspected the school and spotted a box of KitKats in his office. He was sent a warning that the school was in breach of guidelines which have banned such items since 2007. The warning stated ‘There are a number of non-permitted school meal items in stock. These include confectionery items – sweets and chocolate.’

Mr Waszek confirmed the school operates a policy to promote healthy eating. He said: 'The person came into school and I was told that chocolate should not be allowed and we were in breach of the regulations. 'I asked “Do you mean the box of KitKats?” and I was told yes. I just laughed.'

Mr Wazsek often holds informal 'pastoral' meetings to discuss and problems and progress with pupils. He added: 'I ask the students would they like a tea, coffee or hot chocolate and they can have a KitKat with the drink. 'That's why we have a box of KitKats in school.'

He also revealed the school had also been warned against handing out sausage rolls to members of sports team after a game. However, he pointed out that St Edward's has achieved National Healthy School Status, awarded for excellence in physical activity, healthy eating and emotional health.

Mr Waszek added: 'The motives are fantastic. I don't have a problem with the healthy schools sentiment and a lot of the guidelines are absolutely right. 'But our job is made more difficult by legislative requirements.'

The Transforming School Food Strategy unit is run in partnership by Liverpool NHS Primary Care Trust and Liverpool City Council. Liverpool City Council said the team was working with schools to advise and help them meet national healthy eating targets set out by the Food Standards Agency. A town hall spokesman said: 'We have had a fantastic response from schools, who tell us how useful this service is in helping them meet these targets. 'The government says all students are entitled to a broad and balanced diet. We are there to support schools in achieving this. 'This work is having a real impact, with the quality of school meals and food in general improving dramatically in recent years. 'Eight out of every 10 schools have now achieved National Healthy School status which means the vast majority of our schools are providing the very best for students, helping to fight obesity and building a healthier future for our young people.'

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Drink to health with champagne

The usual old polyphenol speculation. NO apparent research on people at all below

IF you need an excuse to pop the cork on a bottle of bubbly this festive season, here it is: It's good for your heart. British academics have found that champagne is packed with polyphenols – plant chemicals thought to widen the blood vessels, easing the strain on your heart and brain. And researchers believe the health benefits aren't limited to the expensive stuff, but are also found in cheaper alternatives, such as cava and prosecco.

The Reading University study builds on earlier findings that two glasses of red wine a day help keep heart and circulatory problems at bay.

Polyphenols are believed to boost the levels of nitric oxide in the blood, which then widens the blood vessels. They are found in relatively high levels in red wine, but not in white. Champagne, however, is most commonly made from a blend of red grape varieties pinot meunier or pinot noir and white chardonnay.

Polyphenols are also found in tea, olive oil, onions, leeks, broccoli and blueberries.

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British supermarket yanks Christmas card after redheads complain

This seems a bit nutty to Americans and Australians but it is a serious issue in England. In England only, to my knowledge, redheads do get picked on, and not only at school. It's probably a relic of hostility to Scots and the Irish, among whom red hair is fairly common. See here. Blacks and Muslims are protected but not redheads.

"Britain’s biggest retailer Tesco apologised on Tuesday after complaints that a Christmas card it sold was offensive to people with ginger hair. The card in question shows a child with red hair sitting on the lap of Santa Claus under the banner: ‘Santa loves all kids. Even ginger ones.’

Davinia Phillips, whose three children all have red hair, was enraged when she saw the card at one of Tesco’s stores in northern England. ‘It’s discrimination, pure and simple. I have shown it to a lot of friends and they are all disgusted by it,’ she was quoted by newspapers as saying. ‘I just don’t find it funny at all. If it had been about a black child or an overweight child the store would have been shut down by now.’

Tesco said the offending card had now been withdrawn from all its stores.”

Source

UK: Newspapers victorious in battle to protect sources: "The Independent has helped win an important court ruling protecting members of the public who supply confidential information to the media. Judges at the European Court of Human Rights said that The Independent and four other media groups were right to defy a court order to disclose documents that would have identified the source of a story about a multimillion pound City takeover in 2001. By standing their ground the four newspapers and one news agency faced massive fines and seizure of their assets, while the journalists who wrote the stories could have been jailed.”

Turning children into Orwellian eco-spies: "There is a long and sordid tradition of trying to socialise children by scaring them. The aim of such socialisation-through-fear is twofold: firstly, to get children to conform to the scaremongers’ values; secondly, to use children to influence, or at least to contain, their parents’ behaviour. When I was a schoolchild in Stalinist Hungary, we were frequently warned about the numerous threats facing our glorious regime. I also recall that we were encouraged to lecture our errant parents about the new wonderful values being promoted by our brave, wise leaders. The Big Brothers of the 1940s saw children as tools of moral blackmail and social control. Today, in the twenty-first century, scaremongers see children in much the same way, exploiting their natural concern with the wonders of life to promote a message of shrill climate alarmism.”





16 December, 2009

Perverse British justice again: The criminal gets a much better deal than the victim

Man who fought off a knife-wielding burglar is jailed while the intruder is let off! No allowance made for the fact that many normal men would lose their rag if their family had been so badly treated and threatened. If the habitual criminal involved can be let off, why could not the victim be let off too?

A millionaire businessman who fought back against a knife-wielding burglar was jailed for two-and-a-half years yesterday. But his attacker has been spared prison. Munir Hussain, 53, and his family were tied up and told to lie on the floor by career criminal Waled Salem, who burst into his home with two other masked men.

Mr Hussain escaped and attacked Salem with a metal pole and a cricket bat. But yesterday it was the businessman who was starting a prison sentence for his 'very violent revenge'. Jailing him, Judge John Reddihough said some members of the public would think that 56-year-old Salem 'deserved what happened to him' and that Mr Hussain 'should not have been prosecuted'. But had he spared Mr Hussain jail, the judge said, the 'rule of law' would collapse.

He said: 'If persons were permitted to take the law into their own hands and inflict their own instant and violent punishment on an apprehended offender rather than letting the criminal justice system take its course, then the rule of law and our system of criminal justice, which are hallmarks of a civilised society, would collapse.'

Salem, who has previous convictions, has already been given a non-custodial sentence despite carrying out what the judge called a 'serious and wicked' attack.

Mr Hussain's nightmare began on September 3 last year when he, his wife, 18-year-old daughter and two sons aged 18 and 15 returned from their mosque during Ramadan to find three intruders in their home in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire.

They were tied up and told to get on the floor if they did not want to be killed. One of Mr Hussain's sons managed to escape and alerted Mr Hussain's younger brother Tokeer, 35, who lived a few doors away. Mr Hussain made a break for freedom by throwing a coffee table at his attackers. He and Tokeer chased the gang and brought Salem to the ground in a front garden.

Reading Crown Court heard how Mr Hussain and his brother then beat Salem while he lay on the ground, using a cricket bat, a pole and a hockey stick - leaving him with a fractured skull and brain damage following the 'sustained' attack.

What is the law on defending your home? If you use force which is 'not excessive' against burglars then the law is on your side. Last year's Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill contained clauses to protect people from prosecution if they act instinctively and out of fear for their safety. Justice Secretary Jack Straw said: 'Law-abiding citizens should not be put off tackling criminals by fear of excessive investigation. 'For a passer-by witnessing a street crime or a householder faced with a burglar, we are reassuring them that if they use force which is not excessive or disproportionate, the law really is behind them.'

Salem's condition meant he was unable to enter a plea to false imprisonment. He was given a non-custodial sentence-in October. Salem, of Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, did not give evidence at Mr Hussain's trial. Michael Wolkind, QC, representing Mr Hussain, who runs a soundproofing company, said his client's actions were 'taken in the agony of the moment' and that his 'calm judgment was not available'. 'If there was a call to arms it was down to the extreme moment of stress,' he said. Mr Wolkind said Mr Hussain, a devout Muslim, blamed himself for the attack and felt guilty for not protecting his family properly. 'It will take him a number of years to recover,' he said.

The court also heard from psychiatrist Dr Phillip Joseph who said Mr Hussain was a calm person who kept himself in control, but that his body had chosen the 'fight rather than flight' option....

Razi Shah, Mr Hussain's solicitor, said his family were devastated but hoped the conviction could be overturned at appeal.

Last night an MP condemned the decision to jail Mr Hussain as 'perverse'. Philip Davies, Tory MP for Shipley, said: 'It's absolutely disgraceful. The public are sick to the back teeth of this kind of decision. 'Whatever the rights and wrongs, the starting point should be that this man's home was violated. He must have been absolutely petrified. 'A person who inflicts this kind of misery is free to go out and do it again somewhere. It's always the same, the real criminals get away scot free.'

SOURCE



More evidence the Anglican episcopate doesn't believe in anything

They are just dressup queens playing a role and fishing for popularity

THE new bishop for Britain's armed forces voiced regret today if he caused offence by saying the Taliban could be admired for their religious conviction and sense of loyalty. Stephen Venner said his comments in a newspaper interview appeared "incredibly insensitive," as he underlined his support for British troops battling Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan.

The Anglican clergyman nevertheless argued that it would be harder to reach a peaceful solution to the war in Afghanistan if the Taliban insurgents were all portrayed as "pure evil." "There's a large number of things that the Taliban say and stand for which none of us in the West could approve, but simply to say therefore that everything they do is bad is not helping the situation because it's not honest," he told the Daily Telegraph. "The Taliban can perhaps be admired for their conviction to their faith and their sense of loyalty to each other."

In clarifying his comments, Bishop Venner told BBC television that the words were were from a short section of a long interview. "The way it's come out .... makes it look incredibly insensitive and if that has caused offence, I am deeply grieved by it because that's the very last thing that I would want to do," he said.

The British Government's strategy in Afghanistan includes attempting to divide the Taliban insurgency by splitting off mercenaries from the Islamist militant hardcore and encouraging them into the democratic fold.

Bishop Venner gave his "full support" to the British troops and their allies. "The way that the Taliban are waging war in Afghanistan is evil, both in their use of indiscriminate killing and their terrorising of the civilian population. No religion could condone their actions," he said.

The conflict has claimed the lives of 100 British soldiers this year alone, and 237 since the Taliban was ousted from power in 2001.

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Midwives in meltdown: A former NHS worker reveals how understaffed maternity wards are sinking into chaos

What the British midwife reports below is dreadful but there is often great neglect in Australian public hospitals too. For that reason, when my stepdaughter was going to have her first baby recently, I sent her to a large private maternity hospital nearby, where she got excellent attention and resort-style accommodation. She was admitted on Friday, had the baby on Saturday and kept in until Wednesday morning to make sure that there were no problems: Nearly it used to be and most unlike the public hospital rush these days. I was there a few hours after the birth and found not a distressed mother but a "happy little Vegemite", as we say in Australia. A picture of the happy mother and day-old baby here. Contrast that with the story below. Government medical care is a disaster -- JR

Clutching her husband's hand and with agony and exhaustion etched on her face, a young woman struggled into a room in the maternity unit where I worked. She was in the early stages of labour with her first baby, she was terrified, in excruciating pain and desperate for any crumb of support. Helpless beside her, her overnight bag in his hand, her poor husband looked equally traumatised.

My heart went out to them. But I knew there was little I could do. With five other pregnant women to care for at the same time, all with hugely different and complex problems, I was rushed off my feet and didn't have the time to look after her properly, to allay her fears or to hear about how she wanted the birth to unfold.

I longed to sit with this poor young woman, calm her and remind her gently to breathe deeply through each contraction. Just half an hour of my time could have made all the difference. Instead, I put on my cheeriest smile and followed hospital procedure. 'Would you like a painkiller?' I asked. Ten hours later, after she had been drugged to the eyeballs to dull the pain, I heard she'd given birth. Her baby was healthy, but I knew I'd let her down.

As I watched her being wheeled into the ward, I felt eaten up with guilt. She'd effectively been ignored from the moment she turned up until the moment she gave birth. Plonked on an antenatal ward until her time came, with no one to reassure her during what was most likely the most terrifying moment of her life. No woman should have to give birth in these conditions - let alone in a modern hospital with professional staff at hand.

Welcome to the modern NHS maternity ward. A world of shoddy practice, poor hygiene standards and a shocking disregard for patients' individual needs.

When I read about newly qualified midwife Theresa Naish, who hanged herself in January after a premature baby died on her shift, I couldn't help wondering if she, too, was a victim of the over-worked and under-resourced labour wards I have experienced. Her father Thomas told the inquest into her death: 'Like all NHS staff, she was over-worked, doing too many hours in a department that was understaffed.' Although the child had little chance of survival, poor Theresa spent weeks torturing herself that she was to blame, before killing herself.

I don't want to alarm people for, of course, the vast majority of babies are born healthy and safe, but I think it's time we admit what is happening in our hospitals. Driven by targets and mired in red tape, our NHS maternity wards are becoming baby-producing factories where mothers' needs come very low on the agenda. The quicker midwives turn out babies, the more successful everyone tells us that we are. We might as well be producing sausages. It's utter madness.

I started working as a midwife in Basildon in 1995. I left to work as an independent midwife in January last year because I simply could not bear to let any more women down.

During a typical 12-hour shift, I could be the sole midwife in charge of six women in the antenatal ward - some in early labour - or one of two qualified midwives running a postnatal ward with up to 32 women. If I was in the delivery unit, I would assist in the births of up to three babies a shift.

Obviously, if there was a crisis during a woman's labour - such as a sudden need for an emergency Caesarean - there was always a surgical team on call, and there would be an anaesthetist available to administer epidurals and so on. But in terms of the normal care through labour, that was all down to the midwives. Although we were under huge stress even back in 1995, current cutbacks mean fewer and fewer midwives are caring for more and more women. No wonder new mothers are encouraged to leave hospital just hours after giving birth.

When I started in the mid-Nineties, there were 35,000 midwives working in Britain. A year or two ago, that number had fallen to 25,000, more than half of whom were part-time.

So, how bad did it get? Take one typical day I remember a few years ago. I found myself with up to six patients to look after at once and no back-up. From the moment I stepped into the admissions ward, the area was crammed with women clamouring for attention. Two women were in early labour. I longed to reassure them. But my stress levels rocketed when I saw the dramas that lay ahead.

One young woman, expecting her second baby in three months, had arrived in an ambulance with high blood pressure. She had been sent by her GP, who feared that her life and her baby's were in danger. High blood pressure is often a symptom of pre-eclampsia - one of the most serious risks facing a pregnant woman and one of the most difficult to detect. Terrified she was going to lose her baby, or die, or both, she was frightened. I tried to reassure her.

All the while, half my brain was on the screams of the two women in early labour a few doors away. Did they need more pain relief? When would they need to go into the delivery suite? I had to check my new patient's blood pressure every 15 minutes as well as taking blood samples to be sent for analysis to see exactly what the problem was. It was a race against time because if her blood pressure carried on rising I'd have to ensure she was whisked off for emergency surgery.

As I ran between her bed and the two women in early labour, I barely had time to greet another patient. She was in floods of tears. Her baby was due in a month. He had stopped moving and she was convinced he was dead. Strapping her up to a monitor to check the baby's heartbeat, I tried to calm her. But I didn't even have time to offer her a cup of tea before rushing to another new arrival.

She'd arrived in an ambulance after her waters broke while she was out shopping. The baby wasn't due for another week. Again, her unborn baby had to be urgently monitored.

I was frantically checking my watch to ensure I remembered my patient with high blood pressure when a young woman, hair matted with sweat and eyes wild with fear, staggered towards me. 'I can't take any more,' she said, gripping my hand. 'You've got to help me.' She'd been in labour for five hours and the pain was excruciating. I knew she'd be happier in a delivery room - which is more comfortable and has better specialist equipment - rather than a bed on the ward, but my heart sank. There was no room. I felt sick with guilt as I led her back to her bed. She was in agony, but she'd have to wait.

It was an hour before she was wheeled into the labour room. And in between nursing, I had to write up notes on each patient. There were days when I barely had time to go to the toilet.

In the 13 years since I joined the NHS, conditions have deteriorated. Starting from the moment they arrive through the hospital doors, birth plans tucked neatly in their overnight bags, women are being betrayed. There is reams of evidence to prove that a woman's labour is likely to be shorter and she runs less chance of needing medical intervention if she feels calm and relaxed in the early stages. It's not rocket science. Yet because midwives don't have time to sit with women in early labour for more than a few minutes at most, we are encouraged to do the next best thing. We offer them strong painkilling drugs such as pethidine or diamorphine - which is a form of heroin. Drugs keep the mother nice and quiet which, of course, suits staff. But they also likely to make her and her unborn baby terribly sleepy.

Although these drugs can sometimes increase contractions, they all too often slow them down. The end result at the woman will need more drugs, not fewer, and labour will take longer. But, of course, we don't explain of that as we dole out our pain killers. Besides, on a busy ward, what's the alternative?

Once a woman is in full labour, you'd thought we'd put her needs first. But I'm embarrassed to admit that, all too often, we were not allowed to. Most hospitals rigidly enforce the rule that, once in labour, a woman's canal must dilate at the rate of 1cm an hour. If that isn't happening, midwives are encouraged to tell the her that her baby may be getting in distress - even if that isn't the case. Terrified and exhausted by a haze of drugs, the woman agrees to anything which is offered. In practice, this means we give her extra drugs to intensify the contractions and so speed the arrival of the child.

Her pain levels increase and she'll need an epidural injection in her spine to numb the pain around her groin. It's a vicious circle. I felt terribly mean persuading women to go along with it. I knew I wasn't always acting in their best interests. But what could I do?

It's a joke to say women have choices over how they give birth. The truth is - thanks to the drive to cut costs and improve efficiency - births are turning into conveyer-belt productions. Women dream of having a natural birth and there is often no medical reason why they can't. Instead, they leave the delivery room with a healthy baby, but feeling like a failure because they have used drugs. Some are on such heavy drugs they don't remember giving birth at all. It's heartbreaking.

I also get very angry when I hear NHS authorities extolling the virtues of breastfeeding. According to the NHS website, it's the 'best start in life'. I couldn't agree more. But the truth is that breastfeeding rates are plummeting in the hospitals I've worked in. The reason is simple. Midwives don't have the time to spend helping mothers to feed properly. And without that vital support in the early days, women give up. With three women arriving on a ward at any one time, and three ready to leave, how could I possibly sit for an hour and help a new mother? It's physically impossible, particularly as we are encouraged to rush women home as soon as they are on their feet.

It's to save money, but it does at least reduce the risk of the new mums and their babies picking up an infection. It's no news that hospitals are often dirty. By the time I left, I was almost inured to the filth around me. With so many women and too little time, it was impossible to keep the wards spotless. I regularly found myself wiping off blood which had been missed by the cleaners in their rush.

It's a huge relief to have left the NHS. As an independent midwife in Northwich, Cheshire, I am finally able to help women the way they deserve. Calm, supported and not rushed, my mothers give birth in six to seven hours. In the units where I worked, the average labour was ten to 14 hours.

I feel guilty about the women I let down as an NHS midwife. Weak and in pain, they don't have the knowledge or strength to stand up for themselves. Instead, they end up being patronised by doctors and bullied by midwives into taking drugs they don't want.

But what makes me most sad and angry is that those hospital staff - everyone from managers down - are taking advantage of women when they are at their most vulnerable.

SOURCE



Girl, two, died 24 hours after NHS hospital doctors said she 'had no illness'

Lazy government doctors again. Diagnostic tests? Who's heard of them?

A girl of two died of suspected swine flu the day after hospital doctors allegedly told her parents she had no illness and sent her home. Michelle Fernando, two, began showing symptoms a week after her mother was diagnosed with the virus in November. Her worried father took her to hospital but said medics sent them home, telling him to give the little girl Calpol and water.

The next day Michelle stopped breathing and died. In a tragic twist of fate, it was the day ministers announced that under-fives would be vaccinated against swine flu.

Her mother Uthpala, 27, who lives with husband Rashid and their son Marlon, four, in Bristol, said Michelle would still be alive if she had not been sent home. 'We trusted the doctors but we don't any more,' she said yesterday. 'When Rashid took her to hospital, the doctors told him she had no illness. 'Even when my husband explained I had swine flu, they didn't take it seriously.'

Michelle was taken to Bristol Children's Hospital after she stopped eating and was very weak. Her parents claim doctors did not carry out a blood test or X-ray before sending her home, where her condition worsened.

Her parents were due to receive a report today, which will reveal if swine flu killed her. They have made an official complaint. Health chiefs in Bristol said an inquiry has started.

SOURCE



British doctors often bungle prescriptions

Doctors are to be formally tested on their knowledge of medicines before they graduate amid concerns about poor prescribing practises.

The British Pharmacological Society (BPS) is developing a national prescribing assessment alongside a website where students can practise their skills, including “dragging and dropping” the right drug doses on to virtual patients.

The BPS believes that current training in prescribing is “piecemeal” and more needs to be done to ensure standards are high. In some cases doctors had filled out a hospital prescription care just a handful of times during their entire medical degree — before taking on roles that could require them to write 50 prescriptions a day.

It comes after a study commissioned by the General Medical Council (GMC), published earlier this month, found doctors rely heavily on pharmacists and nurses to correct their mistakes with medicines. More experienced staff act as a “safety net” to help catch errors before they reach patients, it revealed.

The report said a lack of “safety culture” within the NHS is causing some errors, which occur in around one in 10 hospital prescription orders.

But the study found no evidence that junior doctors made more mistakes than doctors who had been in their jobs far longer.

The BPS welcomed that report but said there needed to be far more focus on ensuring medical students are properly educated.

Professor Simon Maxwell, chairman of the BPS prescribing committee, said prescribing was the “core business of the NHS” and the evidence of a problem with its quality was “now overwhelming”. He said about half of all spending outside of staff costs went on medicines and mistakes were a major reason behind why patients sought compensation from the NHS.

“We recognise that the majority of prescriptions are appropriate, safe and effective [but] the evidence is now unequivocal that there are problems,” he said.

“One of the concerns the BPS has is that there is somewhat of a culture of acceptance that medication errors happen but they are stopped by the good actions of nurses and pharmacists.”

He said the NHS could do a lot better and that such an error rate would not be acceptable in industries such as aviation.

There was a lack of skills training for students despite the fact education was “critical” to driving down the error rate, he said. After “years of indifference and even denial”, the corner may now be turned, he said. “I think everybody accepts that standards of prescribing in the NHS should and can be improved.”

Dr Jeffrey Aronson, president of the BPS, said doctors were dealing with more and more complex drugs and more complicated treatments. As people age, they tend to suffer a range of problems and more medications are prescribed, increasing the potential for negative interactions between drugs, he added.

SOURCE




ClimateGate Research Unit Disables Its Website

More lies and evasions

The Climatic Research Unit at the heart of the ClimateGate scandal has taken down most of the information previously available at its website.

Prior to November's release of controversial e-mail messages and documents from Britain's University of East Anglea, there was a separate website for the institution's CRU that allowed readers to review articles and studies created by and for the Unit.

Now, no matter what link one tries to access via a Google search, it directs you to a page that reads: "Due to the present high volume of visitors to this page, you will shortly be directed to the latest news about CRU on the main University of East Anglia website, or you can go there immediately by clicking on this link."

Once there, readers are exclusively offered the following:

CRU Statements

* Sir Muir Russell to head the Independent Review into the allegations against the Climatic Research Unit (CRU)

Today the University of East Anglia (UEA) announced that Sir Muir Russell KCB FRSE will head the Independent Review into allegations made against the Climatic Research Unit (CRU).

* CRU update 3

Professor Phil Jones has today announced that he will stand aside as Director of the Climatic Research Unit until the completion of an independent Review resulting from allegations following the hacking and publication of emails from the Unit. Read more

* CRU update 2

The University of East Anglia has released the following press release and statements from Prof Trevor Davies, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research, Prof Phil Jones, head of the Climatic Research Unit, and from CRU.

* CRU update 1

It is a matter of concern that data, including personal information about individuals, appears to have been illegally taken from the university and elements published selectively on a number of websites.

As such, you can now only retrieve statements from CRU concerning the current controversy, but NOT information and data related to it.

For instance, as Anthony Watts reported moments ago, you can no longer retrieve information about Keith Briffa's tree ring data which is so crucial to the whole manmade global warming myth.

In fact, the following links available at Google all redirect to the CRU Statements page:

* Climatic Research Unit

* Index of /cru

* Temperature Trends: Surface (CRU)

* Data available from CRU

* About the Climatic Research Unit

* CRU information sheets

Some pages don't redirect at all. Temperature Trends: Surface (CRU) goes to a page that says, "Sorry, but the page you requested does not exist."

As for the idea that this is because of "the volume of visitors," Watts noted, "[I]f indeed 'traffic' is a concern, redirecting to another page on the UEA server system doesn’t do much for the load, it just moves it around."

Will global warming-obsessed media that have been either ignoring or downplaying ClimateGate notice what's happened at the website of the CRU in the middle of this scandal, and if they do, how will they report it?

SOURCE. See also here for more comments.



Tony Blair: The world must take action on climate change even if the science is not correct

My! How the false fronts are falling!

Following the ‘climategate scandal’, Mr Blair said the science may not be “as certain as its proponents allege”. But he said the world should act as a precaution against floods, droughts and mass extinction caused by climate change, in fact it would be “grossly irresponsible” not to.

The first week of key UN negotiations on climate change saw clashes between the rich and poor world over the failure of countries like the US to commit to strict cuts in carbon dioxide. Later this week world leaders, including Gordon Brown and President Barack Obama, will arrive.

Mr Blair admitted that the talks are “one of the toughest negotiations that international leaders will ever have been involved in.” But despite sceptics claiming emails stolen from the University of East Anglia question the science, he said it was urgent to act now. “It is said that the science around climate change is not as certain as its proponents allege. It doesn’t need to be. What is beyond debate, however, is that there is a huge amount of scientific support for the view that the climate is changing and as a result of human activity,” he said.

“Therefore, even purely as a matter of precaution, given the seriousness of the consequences if such a view is correct, and the time it will take for action to take effect, we should act. Not to do so would be grossly irresponsible.”

A new report from the ‘Breaking the Climate Deadlock Initiative’ found that the current commitments of rich countries would not be enough to stop global warming. But Mr Blair insisted that even a weak agreement would set the world on a path to a "low carbon future" by encouraging investment in green energy and he suggested a review every five years to toughen targets. He also called for an agreement to halt deforestation that is responsible for a fifth of the world's emissions by paying poor countries not to chop down trees.......

SOURCE



Breast cancer drug combination offers new hope to women

Comment from Britain

A new breast cancer drug has been shown to shrink tumours in women for whom all other treatments have failed. Forty per cent of women with an aggressive and advanced form of breast cancer who were given the treatment in clinical trials saw their tumours reduce. The new drug - a combination of Herceptin with a particular type of chemotherapy - slowed the spread of disease in more than half of women with HER2-positive cancer, a particularly aggressive form of the disease. In 40 per cent of cases, tumours were reduced for at least six months.

The results are particularly significant because the research was carried out on women whose cancer was progresssing despite the fact they had already tried many other drug treatments. Charities described the study's findings as "promising" and called for rapid major trials to test the drug on larger numbers of women.

Around 10,000 women in Britain are diagnosed with HER2-positive cancer each year, making up around 20 to 30 per cent of all breast cancer cases. The diagnosis means women have been found to have large quantities of a protein known as HER2 on the surface of the tumour cells, which makes the disease more aggressive.

In recent years, the "wonderdrug" Herceptin, which targets this protein, has been hailed as the best solution for such women. The new trial found that for those women whose disease had continued to progress, the combination of Herceptin with a type of chemotherapy called DM1 - which prevents the cell division which spreads cancer - could offer a last hope.

On average, the 110 women in the study had already undergone seven types of different drug treatments, which had failed to stop the spread of their cancer, before they were given the "two-in-one" treatment, called TDM1. Tumours were shrunk in 40 per cent of cases, while a further 12 per cent of women saw their disease stabilise for six months or more, according to the study, which will be presented later today [Sunday] at the annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, in Texas.

Experts said the new treatment - which is not yet licensed in this country - could offer hope to women who had exhausted all other options. Charities called for rapid large scale trials to see if the new drug was as effective as the US study suggests.

Dr Jane Maher, Chief Medical Officer at Macmillan Cancer Support said: "These findings are definitely promising. What we need is more work quickly to see if the results are as good using large scale, randomised control trials." The combination drug is not yet licensed, and TDM1 could take three to five years to be available in this country.

Dr David Miles, from the Institute of Cancer Research, said it was rare to see a drug work so dramatically on women whose disease was so aggressive. He said: "These results are promising news for the thousands of women with advanced HER2-positive breast cancer who have already received many rounds of new treatment, and need new options to be available. To see such efficacy in such a large proportion of women with this aggressive type of cancer is unusual".

SOURCE



Novelty ice-cube tray causes offence

Some people are easily offended. The pity is that they are so often taken seriously these days. Note: "one critic" makes the news.

"An ice cube tray has gone on sale in which drinkers can make a replica of the Titanic - complete with four icebergs. The product is called the Gin And Titonic Ice Tray.

The manufacturer says it allows drinkers to 're-create history' by making the two objects collide in the glass, but one critic has branded the idea 'sick and distasteful'. Titanic historian Brian Ticehurst has gone so far as to suggest the product is akin to making light of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

Manufacturer Fred and Friends is renowned for its off-beat household items. The packaging for Gin and Titonic reads: 'Ice ahoy! Gin and Titonic is guaranteed to be an unsinkable addition to your next party. 'This reusable ice tray contains four icy Titanic ships and four menacing icebergs. Pair them up in your mixed drinks and re-create history. Go ahead...sink another round!'

Company spokesman Joe Edmundson said: 'We design housewares that are functional and fun. The Gin and Titonic is quite a good seller around the world. 'Somebody is always going to be offended by something, especially when it involves humour with a little edge.'

Source

It may be in poor taste to some and they are entled to that view -- but wishing to impose your own taste on someone else shows an inflated view of your own wisdom and importance. De gustibus non disputandum est, as the Romans used to say





15 December, 2009

Drug denial hits victims of leukaemia in England

Leukaemia sufferers in England will be denied potentially life-saving drugs freely available in Scotland. The proposal to ban English patients from getting the medication on the NHS has been branded 'stupid and heartless'.

Doctors and campaigners say the Government rationing body's measures will worsen the postcode lottery, with patients north of the border able to get dasatinib and nilotinib that could add years to their lives.

The preliminary guidance from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence affects patients with chronic myeloid leukaemia. Although the drugs cost £30,000 a year, only a maximum of 300 patients a year are likely to need them. They have failed to respond to treatment with another drug, called Glivec, or become resistant to it.

Professor John Goldman, a specialist at Hammersmith Hospital, in West London, said it was 'a stupid and unjustified decision'. Calling for a rethink, Tony Gavin, of Leukaemia CARE, said: 'Nice's decision is very bad news because there is no acceptable alternative.'

Professor Peter Littlejohns, of NICE, said the evidence presented was 'extremely poor' and the costly drugs were not 'an appropriate use of resources'.

SOURCE



Gamma Knife: a life-and-death lottery for British brain tumour patients

Too many British brain tumour patients are denied state-of-the-art treament that could extend their lives by years

Sally-Anne Wright, a sales manager who lives with her husband and two daughters in Redhill, Surrey, knew something was seriously wrong when she woke up one morning in March to find she had lost all feeling on the right side of her face. "I couldn't feel my nose run, taste anything on the right side of my mouth, or even feel the earring in my right ear," she recalls.

Sally-Anne, 48, went straight to her GP, and was referred to a local ear, nose and throat specialist. "I have medical insurance through my work, so I was able to have a private CAT scan," she says. "A week later, I was told that I had a golf-ball-sized tumour in the middle of my brain. It was a benign, slow-growing meningioma and was pressing on the trigeminal nerve, which controls sensation in the face, and this was what had caused the numbness.

"The tumour was deep, and I was told that removing it surgically would damage healthy tissue. Surgery could also cause terrible complications, such as epilepsy and loss of function on my right side. Instead, my neurosurgeon recommended a non-invasive treatment called Gamma Knife."

Sally-Anne had never heard of Gamma Knife, but she did some research on the internet and discovered that it was a state-of-the art procedure, also known as stereotactic radio-surgery, which uses a single dose of highly focused radiation, designed to destroy only the tumour and leave the surrounding healthy tissue undamaged. It can be used to treat brain tumours (often secondaries which have spread from primary breast cancers, for examople), and conditions such as arteriovenous malformation, a problem affecting the blood vessels in the brain.

Sally-Anne decided it was her best option. "My job involves a lot of driving and if I'd undergone surgery, it could have taken a year to recuperate." In October, she was treated at the BMI Thornbury Hospital in Sheffield, which has a 92 per cent success rate in using a Gamma Knife on this type of tumour.

The procedure was carried out by Mr Andras Kemeny, a pioneer of the treatment, and involved a special frame being attached by pins to the skull under local anaesthetic. The Gamma Knife itself is a semicircular, helmet-like structure containing around 200 sources of radioactive cobalt.

An MRI scan performed while the frame is attached serves as a "road map" for immobilising the patient's head in the helmet. Although each beam causes no damage to the tissue en route, when they all meet at the target, the resulting dose destroys the tumour. The one-off treatment lasts about an hour and most patients leave hospital with only minor side-effects such as a headache.

Sally-Anne's operation was a success, and she went home the next day. "I felt a bit tired and headachy and my face was slightly swollen, but within hours I felt perfectly well and I was driving three days later. I have regular checks, but Mr Kemeny says that it's unlikely to cause any more problems. It's great to come through this unscathed."

Sally-Anne is one of the lucky ones. Though Gamma Knife technology is not new (it was developed in 1967 and has been refined and improved ever since), access to this treatment is limited. There are five Gamma Knife centres in the UK: one at the Leeds General Infirmary, two in Sheffield, at the Royal Hallamshire and BMI Thornbury hospitals, and two in London, at the Cromwell and St Bart's. They are used to treat about 1,500 people each year. However, many cancer specialists, including Professor Christer Lindquist at the Cromwell Hopspital in London and Mr Andras Keneny at the Hallamshire and BMI Thornbury hospitals in Sheffield, believe that thousands more patients are being denied treatment, which could save or extend their lives, because of a shortage of knives and stringent NHS criteria determining who gets access to it.

All Gamma Knife treatment must be approved by a patient's local Primary Care Trust, and the criteria by which PCTs decide who will be approved for funding is set by one of 10 Specialised Commissioning Groups covering different areas of the country. Some take a harder line than others. Patients in Devon are far more likely to be approved than those in parts of Derbyshire and Yorkshire. Some people refused treatment on the NHS, choose to pay for the £17,000-plus cost, often incurring large debts, rather than undergoing surgery.

The only alternative is Whole Brain Radio-Therapy (WBRT), a treatment most often used on large tumours. WBRT involves delivering daily doses of radiation over three weeks. It is far less precise than Gamma Knife and can cause sickness and hair loss. It also damages normal cells along with cancerous ones, and may cause severe side-effects, such as dementia and loss of movement.

Although a single Gamma Knife treatment costs considerably more than the estimated £1,500 for a three-week course of WBRT, most neurosurgeons acknowledge that the enhanced quality of life and savings on nursing care more than compensate for the expense. "Gamma Knife treatments are highly effective," says Prof Lindquist. "It is more like surgery than Whole Brain Radio-Therapy and is very focused on the tumour.

"Some of our breast-cancer patients can live many years if their secondaries elsewhere are well controlled, but if we don't treat the brain tumours the patients often die within months. Our longest surviving patient has kept going for 19 years after treatment for melanoma (skin cancer). Another Gamma Knife patient with breast cancer has survived 10 years, despite being given six months to live in 1999 when 10 brain tumours were discovered. "With the incidence of cancer on the rise, we certainly need more Gamma Knives; probably double the five we have at the moment."

But funding is not the only issue, according to a Specialised Services Commissioner, who asked to remain anonymous. "Cost is not a major factor," he says. "We have nationally agreed criteria governing who should get the treatment. All people who are suitable, and meet the criteria, are routinely funded and receive their treatment. The apparent differences in treatment provision are down to individual Specialised Commissioning Groups. Work has been in progress for some time, co-ordinated at a national level, to consider any new evidence that has emerged since those criteria were introduced, and if necessary the specifications will be revised, probably within the next few months."

Despite this hint at a change of heart, Sally-Anne's surgeon, Mr Kemeny, remains frustrated at the bureaucracy involved in getting the NHS to pay for treatment. "Each PCT comes up with its own set of rules, based on finance, justified by their reading of the medical literature. If you have two brain metastases and live in Derbyshire, you cannot have Gamma Knife on the NHS, even if it is your only option, because all else has been tried, whereas you may have four treated if you are referred from London or the South West. It is a total lottery.

"More Gamma Knives would not help if we are not allowed to treat those patients who are suitable. In spite of a positive assessment by all the doctors involved, one has to fill in endless, different forms for each patient, jumping through hoops, trying to prove "exceptionality" when the treatment is standard around the world," he says. "It is incredibly sad to see a young woman with small children denied the opportunity of living another few years with good quality of life when, without this treatment, the alternative is death."

Eileen O'Grady, 68, from Bolton, felt almost suicidal after suffering from trigeminal neuralgia (severe pain in her face) for nearly a decade. "It was excruciating" she said. "l couldn't chew, walk or even touch my face. Drugs had no effect, and I wasn't suitable for surgery. In July, my neurosurgeon recommended Gamma Knife treatment on the NHS at the Royal Hallamshire Hospital in Sheffield. It took just half an hour and I came home at once. I can't believe the difference: no pain for the first time in years, and I haven't had a tablet since coming out of hospital. Everyone says I look totally different because I've got my life back."

Jane, 42, a housewife from Nottingham, who requested anonymity to protect her children, was diagnosed with breast cancer eight years ago. She had two sons under four years old. She developed a brain tumour in 2005, which was treated with Whole Brain Radio-Therapy and removed surgically, which has left her with memory loss. Another small brain tumour appeared two years later and, in September 2008, Jane was referred for Gamma Knife treatment, and was the first patient to be treated by Mr Andras Kemeny at the BMI Thornbury in Sheffield.

"It was amazing," she said. "It took just half an hour and was quite painless. I've had two scans since and there's been no recurrence. I'm now 42 and to still be here eight years after that first diagnosis is fantastic. My sons are now 10 and 12. Each year is a milestone I never thought I'd see. At the time, it broke my heart to see the boys asleep in bed. I was terrified I wouldn't be around for their next birthday. We have medical insurance, but it seems so wrong that, with this amazing facility available, the recommending committees don't let specialists treat more people who would benefit like me."

SOURCE



Big Brother Britain's sham backdown

Vetting shambles: Ed Balls' U-turn exempts 2 million adults from criminal checks... but 9 million parent helpers will still fall into the net

Millions of parent helpers will still have to undergo paedophile and criminal checks after a 'sham' U-turn by Ed Balls. The Schools Secretary confirmed that laws requiring criminal records checks on adults who work with children will be watered down after a public outcry that they were 'strangling school life'. Two million people will no longer have to be checked by the Vetting and Barring Scheme. But the VBS - set up to prevent paedophiles working with children - will still apply to around nine million.

Mr Balls said he had accepted all the recommendations of an independent review. Adults will have to be vetted only if they are working with the same group of children once a week or more, rather than once a month at present. But critics said schools were almost certain to demand the checks in case they were sued. A father who helps out with his school football team every week or a mother who volunteers at her child's nursery will still have to be vetted.

A pledge that families who host foreign exchange students would escape vetting turned out to mean only those who have spoken to the foreign family and agreed the exchange. Exchanges organised through schools will still involve vetting.

Tory spokesman Tim Loughton said: 'It will take a bigger shift in this juggernaut of over-control before schools and sports clubs feel confident that they don't have to vet every adult in sight. 'The point is that because the Government has gone overboard on this, everyone else thinks they need to go even more overboard.'

Mr Balls ordered a review of the vetting scheme by Sir Roger Singleton, chairman of the Independent Safeguarding Authority, following a storm of complaints that volunteers were being deterred from working with children. The outcry was led by children's authors, including Philip Pullman, who were told they would have to be vetted if they gave readings in schools. They will now escape vetting, unless they take part in 'workshops' with children.

Mr Balls yesterday denied making a U-turn, saying there had been a 'ludicrous over-reaction' from some schools and organisations. He told BBC1's Andrew Marr Show that parents trust schools and organisations to look after their children and it was right to ensure their trust was not misplaced.

But Josie Appleton, director of the Manifesto Club, which campaigns against over-regulation, labelled the climbdown 'a sham'. She said: 'The policy would still require ISA registration of the father who helps out at his son's football team every week, or the mother who volunteers at her children's nursery. 'Ordinary people will still have to register on this vetting database - and be subjected to constant criminal records vetting - for carrying out the most natural and everyday activities.'

Philip Pullman welcomed the changes but said that such regulation was still 'fundamentally unhealthy'. He said: 'The whole thing seems to be based on the feeling that you can't trust anyone, that everyone is a suspect until they're proved innocent, and of course you can never entirely do that, so everybody has to remain a suspect.'

John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, also welcomed the move and said the system was now 'more proportionate to risk'.

The ISA's checks are more stringent than those of the Criminal Records Bureau. The CRB looks for previous convictions but the ISA also looks at lists of people barred from working with vulnerable adults, which were previously held by separate government departments. The vetting scheme was recommended by the Bichard review into failures by police and social services involved with Soham murderer Ian Huntley. It is being phased in across England, Wales and Northern Ireland and will be compulsory from next November.

SOURCE



Mailmen refuse to deliver parcels in bureaucratized Britain

The aim of all bureaucrats is to maximize their funding and minimize their workload

Postmen across the country are deliberately failing to deliver parcels, a study reveals today. Householders expecting a package are routinely left 'Sorry you were out' cards without so much as a knock on the door. More than half of customers - 55 per cent - claim to have received one of the cards despite being at home when the postman called. Nearly a quarter - 23 per cent - say that this has happened at least three times in the past year, according to the study by customer watchdog Consumer Focus.

There are suspicions postmen are leaving parcels in the office to lighten their load for the day - and a leaked Royal Mail internal memo acknowledges staff are discarding parcels 'without any attempt to deliver the packet'. The practice means postmen are shifting the inconvenience of collecting packages to residents. Customers who get a card are forced to travel to delivery offices, often miles away and operating restricted opening hours, and stand in line to collect their goods.

Publicly, Royal Mail chiefs have played down the problem suggesting there are only a few isolated incidents. But a postal expert at Consumer Focus, Robert Hammond, said: 'There's a growing body of evidence that the "Sorry You Were Out" card issue is far from a series of isolated incidents as Royal Mail has claimed. 'This issue has to be thoroughly investigated and the problem stamped out. 'The high regard many of us have for Royal Mail will fade rapidly if they can't find a way of delivering parcels conveniently.'

The stories of some of the customers let down by the system will feature on BBC Panorama tonight. Research scientist Dr Andrew Curtis, from Bristol, tells the programme: 'I heard the letters drop through the postbox. 'I went to check immediately and there was a card there saying "We tried to deliver a parcel to you but unfortunately you weren't in". Obviously-I had been in - I'd been sat next to the front door. I hadn't heard the door bell ring, hadn't heard a knock.'

Panorama has seen an internal Royal Mail memo warning staff the practice must stop. Royal Mail operations director Paul Tolhurst said: 'It shouldn't be happening if customers tell us that it's happening, we will discuss that in the local office with the local postmen and we will try and put that right. 'That is not what they should be doing, but of course it does happen, and I'm not saying that it doesn't.'

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No joking in humourless Leftist Britain

Top comedians and wits, including Alexei Sayle, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Fry, say Britain is being turned into a “global laughing stock” because of its draconian libel laws. They are the latest critics to call for reform of the legislation which is stifling free speech. Sayle says he endured a “horrible experience” after he was sued for libel. He eventually won the case, but said he risked financial ruin because of the high costs of defending himself in the London courts. The comedian said yesterday the case racked up thousands of pounds in costs, which he never recovered even after successfully defending the action. “It would have been cheaper if I’d just stabbed the f*****,” he said. “The most I would have got was an Asbo barring me from certain parts of Croydon.”

Sayle said the libel writ was issued after he wrote a graphic novel called Geoffrey the Tube Train. Someone who worked with Sayle in the comedy business claimed one of the characters resembled him and his reputation had been sullied. “I was determined to fight the case,” said Sayle. “But everything you own hangs on a philosophical discussion about the meaning of words. I risked losing everything. “The penalties of a libel case — both in terms of awards and legal costs — are completely distorted and out of proportion to any offence.”

Sayle and other comedians are supporting a campaign for an overhaul of the libel laws. They say the threat of a ruinous writ means comedians, as well as scientists and other individuals and bodies, are having to sanitise their output.

Robin Ince, a stand-up comedian and television panellist, said lawyers hired by TV channels were routinely censoring comic material because of libel fears. He said: “England is the envy of the world for anyone who wants to crush dissent. “It means you now have this hideous mire of lawyers and there is a constant fear [of a possible action]. They err on the side of over-caution.”

The Sunday Times has highlighted how British libel laws are being used to threaten scientists publishing critical research and to prevent scrutiny of rich and powerful figures based overseas.

Last week Dara O’Briain, the presenter of BBC2’s satirical show Mock the Week, launched a Libel Reform Campaign petition. He said the libel laws were a “dangerous joke” being used to silence or censor writers. O’Briain said he was most concerned by the threat to scientific research and comment but had also feared for his own performances. “I think in a couple of cases the people in question thought, ‘We will just look stupid if we take action’,” he said. “But this is essentially a poker game because even if you are right you will lose a six-figure sum. It’s ludicrous.”

Dave Gorman, the comedian and author, said: “The costs of a libel action silence people because you cannot afford to fight. We should have a legal system that gives redress to people whose reputations have been damaged, but this isn’t it.”

Other comedians supporting the campaign include Ricky Gervais and Stephen Fry, the presenter and wit, who said Britons should “cringe with embarrassment” at existing legislation that made the UK a “global laughing stock”. “Our laws can be manipulated to protect the corrupt and to hide the truth,” he said.

A public backlash against the libel laws began after the British Chiropractic Association (BCA) sued the science writer Simon Singh for describing chiropractic remedies for some childhood ailments, including asthma, as “bogus” since there was insufficient clinical evidence. He has appealed against a preliminary judgment against him but has already racked up legal costs of £100,000.

Mr Justice Eady, who presides over many libel cases, is a popular judge with many claimants. In a preliminary hearing in Singh’s case, he ruled the word “bogus” in an article meant the science writer was accusing the BCA of dishonesty, which Singh disputes and certainly never intended. Eady has also allowed foreign claimants to pursue cases against overseas publications, bolstering London’s reputation as a centre for libel tourism. Lawmakers in several American states have passed laws to protect their citizens from UK courts.

Eady defended the libel courts at a legal conference earlier this month, saying there were very few cases involving foreign claimants. Campaigners point out that the mere threat of a London libel action by a rich individual or powerful corporation is often enough to quash criticism, so most cases are unlikely even to reach Eady’s court.

It has also emerged that respected American newspapers are considering pulling their London editions because of the risk of a costly libel action. An Oxford University report published last year found libel court costs were 140 times higher in Britain than in the rest of Europe.

The Libel Reform Campaign — backed by English PEN, the Index on Censorship, Sense about Science and Reporters without Borders — wants capped damages, strict controls on costs and a stronger defence of public interest. The petition, launched last week, states: “Journalists, authors, academics, performers and blog-writers cannot risk extortionate costs, which means they are forced to back down.”

Jonathan Heawood, director of English PEN, which promotes literature and human rights, said: “There is growing public anger. It’s wrong that writers are being intimidated into silence.”

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Is this a last hurrah for ocean acidification?

Below is an article from "The Times" of London. The writer has not kept up with the science however. His high-school chemistry has not prepared him for the complexity of nature: Both shellfish and corals THRIVE under higher levels of CO2. And warmer water EXPELS CO2 anyway, which is probably what is causing the present slight elevation of atmospheric CO2 levels. The Comments on the article give the author quite a caning anyway. He really is a drip who should stick to something he knows about. He is just a smug journalist with a chip on his shoulder

Ocean acidification has been quite scandalously left out of the reckoning in the past few weeks. I am not for a moment belittling the science behind man-made global warming. This still seems to me solid, despite the shenanigans at the University of East Anglia. That levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are rising is not disputed. We have known since the 19th century that carbon dioxide was a crucial greenhouse gas. Venus has a lot of it and is hot as hell. Mars has almost none and is cold as ice. [Errr... could we mention their very different distances from the sun?]

However, even if you happen to believe that everything we know about greenhouse gases is illusory — unlikely though that is — we would still need to agree at Copenhagen this week to cut our emissions of carbon dioxide because of what is happening to the sea, the source of roughly half our food and provider of other useful services that we tend to take for granted.

We know the ocean absorbs about 25% of the carbon dioxide we emit each year. This CO2 dissolves through wind and wave action to form carbonic acid. This is altering the chemistry of the seas in ways that are not disputed and are far simpler to understand than the effect the same pollutants are having on the atmosphere. I recommend the startling practical demonstration on YouTube of what acidity will do to the oceans given by Jane Lubchenco, administrator of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, to a congressional select committee this month.

Since the beginning of the industrial revolution in about 1750, sea water acidity has increased by 30%. The speed and degree of this change are faster than anything that had happened for 55m years. The changes being observed are beginning to disrupt the ability of any organism to make shells out of calcium carbonate. Organisms that do this include corals, crabs, lobsters, small creatures vital to the diet of fish and plankton of the kind that die and form chalk deposits such as the white cliffs of Dover.

Projections show that by 2060, given the current rate of fossil-fuel emissions, sea water acidity could have increased by 120%. Lubchenco showed Congress a scary picture of what a shell would look like if it had spent a month in water as acidic as this. The shell had begun to dissolve.

Such an effect could trigger a chain of reactions through entire ecosystems, from whales to fish and shellfish, with huge implications for economies and wildlife. It could even stop the sea absorbing as much carbon dioxide as it does now, accelerating global warming. It is pretty scary stuff.

Predictably, the science of ocean acidification, which is accepted by governments on both sides of the Atlantic, does not go uncontested by the global warming sceptics. They say you can’t acidify the ocean because it washes over alkaline rocks. This process of weathering rocks is indeed how the alkalinity of the ocean will recover, but leading scientists say it will take hundreds of thousands of years. At the unprecedented speed that acidification is happening, the marine organisms will be knocked out before the rocks can dilute the acid.

There is plenty we still need to know about the acidification of the ocean. However, it looks as if unpleasant things start to happen if we go beyond 450 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (bear in mind we reached 390ppm earlier this year). That is, coincidentally, the threshold for holding the Earth’s average temperature rise down to a relatively “safe” 2C.

So ocean acidification, which people are beginning to call climate change’s “evil twin”, may be an even more pressing reason to move to a low-carbon economy than climate change itself. And that makes it doubly irresponsible for those people who scorn the need to cut carbon emissions to ignore what is going on in the oceans.

SOURCE



A.A. Gill in Copenhagen

Gill is famously in love with words but he has an important point below: Warmism is the establishment now. He does not consider that we may be seeing its highpoint before a decline -- a sort of Edwardian England in 1913

Standing here for half an hour to get my accreditation, which is all done by Danish schoolgirls with impeccable mockney accents, I realise that I am standing on one of those ley lines of history, a joint in the space-time continuum. I am stepping across an invisible border, balancing, Nureyev-like, on a pivot of a remarkable moment, a moment of moment.

This chilly melee is the tipping point. Not the climatic one — more important than that. Copenhagen is where the principle and the process of environmental change and global warming have gone from being the exclamation of a pressure group, and a charity whine, to being the orthodoxy, the accepted wisdom, the mainstream.

The environment was outside the big tent. Now it’s inside and it makes absolutely no difference what opinion polls or referendums say. It matters nought that the Green party has singularly failed in every democracy. It doesn’t matter that they’re all as boring and righteous as goodness. It doesn’t matter that scientists fake messages and bury statistics, that they do everything in secret. None of this matters now. It doesn’t even matter if it’s actually going to happen. All that matters is that the people who matter think it matters.

When the heads of nearly every government turn up here to make promises, sign agreements that they will undoubtedly break and fudge and chuckle over and lie about, that’s not what’s important. They may bounce the cheque, but they won’t bounce the reason for writing it. They’re on board for global warming.

Global warming is where the momentum is. Global warming is the future. The deniers, the sceptics, are now the crusties, the Swampies, the loonies with the sandwich boards, the swivel-eyed Cassandras. They will of course go on complaining and gainsaying, they will pick nits and write books and turn up on late-night cable TV shows. But they’re out of the big room. This is the new deal.

Inside the Bella centre you notice a number of things. First, that the Danish don’t make pastries and, second, that there aren’t any signs. They don’t like to tell you what to do.

I spend three days dazed and lost, aimlessly skidding round thousands of folk in bits of tribal costume sitting in makeshift huddles round the communal computer. Talking endlessly and tapping ancient rhythms into their keyboards.

There is a distinct absence of hippies, although there are three Asians dressed as trees. There aren’t any ponytails; there are hardly any beards or home-knits or hand-woven things. The people here aren’t the ones you see in the demos. They’re not wearing Peruvian hats. They haven’t shaved up the sides of their heads while drunk and they’re not the kids outside doing street theatre.

This is the third generation of ecowarrior. It started with the wild prophets in the 1970s, who wrote books in woad and became hermits in distant wildernesses, listening to Gaia and talking oblivion. And then it was their students, the alternative geeks, the white rastas, the furless models, skinny boys in bands, fashion designers, folk who made cider and grew hemp. But they’re all gone. Now there’s traction. And it’s being made by professionals. The technocrats.

This room is full of thousands of the overqualified, who are softly spoken in four languages. They’re the people you find running NGOs and huge charities and UN agencies. The alternative bureaucracy of the world and they’re almost all under 45.

The ecology thing has become too big, too momentous, to be left to romantics with nits. Let them write blogs, build cycle paths. In here, it’s about arranging the world economy for the next century.

So big business is here. Car manufacturers, airlines, oil companies. Energy providers. They know which way the wind farm’s blowing. They all want to be inside the tent. They understand that environmentalism has edged closer to the axis of power and cynicism.

There are untold fortunes to be made in fighting global warming, in technology, innovation, carbon trading, grants and guilt. Guilt is big money. And the people you want as customers are all here: young, clever, savvy, global civil servants.

In the southern, developing world, apart from tourists, the only people you see on aeroplanes are locals flying to environmental and medical conferences. This is where all the smart cash is, not with the ancient sceptics or deniers. They aren’t going anywhere. They’re not buying anything. Their only aspirations are to keep everything as it is and win a Test match.

None of this could have happened without the laptop. Everyone here has one; everyone is constantly lit from beneath, like a character from a gothic movie. They call it the green movement because that’s what it makes you look like.

None of them will ever complain or campaign about the carbon expended on the web, or by search engines, or the resources used in manufacturing laptops, or the wages of the workers who have to make them. These tools are their swords of burning gold, their chariots of fire. The ecology movement was made possible by the web, the blogs and the emails and computer modelling. Fifteen years ago, nobody would have been here.

That of course doesn’t mean there’s no more paper: there’s unfeasible reams of it. Every stall, every nation, every special-pleading NGO prints acres and acres of booklets and pamphlets and study documents, all scribbled in a densely illiterate techno-speak. The entire convention is of course plastic-bag-free, so they hand out printed and dyed cotton bags instead, which are far more wasteful and damaging and expensive.

In the two main halls (all the rooms are named after famous Danes: the biggest one is Isak Dinesen, who you’ll remember had a farm in Africa) the bureaucratic official business creeps along with all the wit, excitement and warmth of a receding glacier.

There are the bureaucratic points of order, the bland language of government, the weight of an international organisation being built like a great pyramid, with none of the excitable shouting or enthusiasms of a student demo. The delegates fit in their nationally adopted seats, dying of jet lag, boredom and incomprehension.

This for a moment is the world turned upside down, the first are last and the last are first. The developed, industrial, postcolonial world is at the bottom of the pile; the pariahs who must do the most to catch up. On top are the specks of land, the minute and unvisited corners. So let’s hear it for the Solomon Islands, the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu and Togo.

Few things infuriate quite as much as the constant reference to indigenous people. Everyone has to say indigenous people at least once in every statement. I fight the urge to put up my hand and shout: Please sir, can you point out those that are not indigenous persons? Which of us is a disindigenous human? Which the Caliban-bastard, unconnected to even a square foot of this earth?

The patronising of indigenous people is hideous. Indigenous of course means prehistoric, ancient, pettable. The indigenous are spoken of like endangered hominids, elevated to the iconic status of pandas and polar bears. Their pictures, in colourful Victorian anthropological outfits of fur, feather and face paint, grace every stall and poster.

Because we’re up north, Eskimos abound in kayaks, hunting with spears, something they haven’t done in a generation. Eskimos hunt with rifles in plastic boats with outboard motors, wearing North Face parkas. The reason polar bears are scarce in Greenland is not because the ice is melting so much as they are being shot to shreds by unemployed Inuit with nothing better to do.

One of the things that is most depressing and disturbing about this whole green thing is that they seem to have no sense of taste at all.

They don’t care what they eat, they don’t care what they wear and they don’t care what’s on the walls. They have no concept of their own culture, only of other people’s, which they revere without criticism, grabbing bits and pieces of primitive pattern, handprint and rock carving.

All the delegates are dressed appallingly in Lego shoes and flappy fibrous urban survival gear, sporting that old school tie of liberal sensibility, the ethnic scarf.

Even communism and fascism managed to translate their philosophies into an aesthetic. The green movement is just too crap and shabby and unimaginative. It doesn’t have time. It doesn’t think it’s worth it. It’s too glued to its models and its blogs to even make up some decent protest music. No art, nothing but some sadly punning slogans and the most uninspired, turgid and solipsistically verbose writing.

But, despite that, what makes the green movement triumphantly successful is that it has the most important and precious of things: it has a story.

It is telling us our own saga, the adventure of saving the world. This has all the elements of a great myth, the impossible trials, the dragons and giants to be defeated, the magic seeds to be found, the wells and fountains of health and youth, the band of brothers, the implacable enemy. The princesses to be rescued. The kingdoms to be won.

If you look at the global warming debate as simply the first draft of the first new creation myth to be invented in thousands of years, then you see why it’s irresistible. Who wouldn’t want to be part of their own fairy tale?

SOURCE



British officials cover up wind farm noise report

Coverups are the name of the game for the Green/Left

Civil servants have suppressed warnings that wind turbines can generate noise damaging people’s health for several square miles around. The guidance from consultants indicated that the sound level permitted from spinning blades and gearboxes had been set so high — 43 decibels — that local people could be disturbed whenever the wind blew hard. The noise was also thought likely to disrupt sleep. The report said the best way to protect locals was to cut the maximum permitted noise to 38 decibels, or 33 decibels if the machines created discernible “beating” noises as they spun.

It has now emerged that officials removed the warnings from the draft report in 2006 by Hayes McKenzie Partnership (HMP), the consultants. The final version made no mention of them. It means that hundreds of turbines at wind farms in Britain have been allowed to generate much higher levels of noise, sparking protests from people living near them.

Among those affected is Jane Davis, 53, a retired National Health Service manager, who has had to abandon her home because of the noise. It lies half a mile from the Deeping St Nicholas wind farm in south Lincolnshire whose eight turbines began operating in 2006. “Our problems started three days after the turbines went up and they’ve carried on ever since. It’s like having helicopters going over the top of you at times — on a bad night it’s like three or four helicopters circling around,” she said. “We abandoned our home. We rent a house about five miles away — this is our fourth Christmas out of our own home. We couldn’t sleep. It is torture — my GP describes it as torture. Three hours of sleep a night is torture.”

The HMP report was commissioned by the business department whose responsibilities for wind power have since been taken over by Ed Miliband’s Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC). The decision to stick with existing noise limits became official guidance for local authorities ruling on planning applications from wind farm developers. It has also been used by ministers and officials to support the view that there was no need to revise official wind farm noise guidelines and that erecting turbines near homes posed no threat to people’s health and wellbeing.

In 2007 Mike Hulme of the Den Brook Judicial Review Group, a band of residents opposing a wind turbine development close to their houses in Devon, submitted a Freedom of Information request asking to see all draft versions of the study.

Officials refused the request, claiming it was not in the public interest for them to be released. Hulme appealed to the information commissioner’s office, which has ordered Miliband’s department to release the documents. The drafts show the HMP originally recommended that the night-time wind turbine noise limit should be reduced from 43 decibels to 38, or 33 if they made any kind of swishing or beating noise — known as “aerodynamic modulation”.

The HMP researchers had based their recommendations on evidence. They took noise measurements at houses close to three wind farms: Askam in Cumbria, Bears Down in Cornwall and Blaen Bowi in Carmarthenshire. They found that the swish-swish signature noise of turbines was significantly greater around most wind farms than had been foreseen by the authors of the existing government guidelines, which date from 1996. They also found that the beating sound is particularly disruptive at night, when other background noise levels are lower, as it can penetrate walls. In their draft report the HMP researchers recommended that “Consideration be given to a revision of the night-time absolute noise criterion”, noting that this would fit with World Health Organisation recommendations on sleep disturbance.

However, an anonymous government official then inserted remarks attacking this idea because it would impede wind farm development. He, or she, wrote: “What will the impact of this be? Are we saying that this is the situation for all wind farms ... I think we need a sense of the scale of this and the impact.”

The final report removed any suggestion of cutting the noise limits or adding any further penalty if turbines generated a beating noise — and recommended local authorities to stick to the 1996 guidelines.

Hulme said: “This demonstrates the conflict of interests in DECC, because it has the responsibility for promoting wind farm development while also having responsibility for the wind farm noise guidance policy ... meant to protect local residents.”

Ron Williams, 74, a retired lecturer, lives half a mile from the Wharrels Hill wind farm in Cumbria. He has been forced to use sleeping pills since its eight turbines began operating in 2007. “The noise we get is the gentle swish swish swish, non-stop, incessant, all night,” he said. “It’s like a Chinese torture. In winter, when the sun is low in the sky, it goes down behind the turbines and causes flickering shadows coming into the room. “It’s like somebody shining car headlights at your window ... on and off, on and off. It affects us all. It’s terrible. Absolutely horrible.”

Lynn Hancock, 45, runs a garden maintenance business. She has suffered disruption since 2007 when the 12-turbine Red Tile wind farm began operating several hundred yards from her Cambridgeshire home. “Imagine a seven-ton lorry left running on the drive all night and that’s what it’s like,” she said. “People describe it as like an aeroplane or a helicopter or a train that never arrives. It’s like it’s coming but it never gets here.”

Such problems are likely to increase. Britain has 253 land-based wind farms generating 3.5 gigawatts, but this is expected to double or even triple by 2020 to help to meet targets for cutting CO2 emissions.

SOURCE



British children have never worked so hard and learnt so little

For all the time and money put in, the education system is fundamentally flawed, says Charles Moore

Exams in the summer are well known for high stress, but mid-December is the time of the school year when everyone is at their most tired. What John Donne called “the year’s midnight” coincides with the end of the longest term. Look at the strained, anxious faces of mothers on the school run. Look at the pale, exhausted children who totter out of school into the mid-afternoon darkness. Look at the teachers, writing reports, filling in forms, snuffling with incipient colds and trying to smile through the Nativity play (where “diversity” policy still permits it).

What is it all for? Never in history have politicians talked more about the importance of education. Never has it been more generally agreed that the modern world is a “knowledge economy”. The famous Clause Four of the Labour Party’s constitution referred to securing for “workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry”. Everyone realises that nowadays brain usually secures fuller fruits than hand.

And yet, does the average pupil end up knowing more or knowing things more deeply than, say, 50 years ago? Could the average pupil of today do long division, or speak French, or write an English paragraph, or explain the Great Reform Bill, or find Valparaiso on a map, or operate the laws of thermo-dynamics better than his or her equivalent half a century ago?

Perhaps not, the defenders of current education would say, but modern pupils know much more about saving the planet, safe sex, Eid, and challenging racism, not to mention things not even thought of in the 1950s, such as the internet. They learn more that is “relevant”. They also, modern educationalists argue, acquire more “skills”. Instead of being crammed with sterile facts, they know how to engage with a subject. They learn less mere “what”, but more “why” and “how to”.

This is not all rubbish. Looking back on my own (mostly good) education, both state and private, in the 1960s, I can see some of its deficiencies. We were not taught where history came from. It was just a series of facts and stories: no one taught me the idea of sources and evidence until I was about 15.

We learnt grammar – both Latin and English – well, but we never quite knew what grammar was. Grammar was considered so important that it gave its name to the best state schools in the country, but why was it considered so important? We were not really told. The aim of modern education to teach children to ask more questions, and not simply to stuff them with information, is surely right.

But that promise has been broken. We seem to have devised a system of curriculum and examination which pulls off the incredible double of being very hard work but very low quality. There are endless projects and modules, and endless ways of re-marking to upgrade one’s results, but no definite test of what is known and understood.

In this process, a strange thing has happened. For all the patter about diversity, education has become more hostile to things that are outside the immediate experience of the pupil. Much less pre-20th-century history or literature is taught. Fewer pupils learn foreign languages, let alone dead ones. Individual sciences have been conflated into the easier “dual science” paper. We heard this week that a quarter of primary schools never teach pupils the Lord’s Prayer, partly (presumably) because the words of a Jew who has been dead for 2,000 years are considered out of date.

Because of my current war against Andrew Marr’s TV history of The Making of Modern Britain, I went on the Today programme yesterday to argue with the historian Tristram Hunt. He said that 14-year-old London pupils who had watched Marr had pronounced it boring because, despite all Marr’s costume capers and silly accents, it was not relevant enough to them. Hunt wanted Marrxism squared – yet more japes to get the wandering teenage attention.

In the end, though, how can anything be taught if the test is whether pupils who know very little find it boring? One of the worst things about being badly educated is that you are easily bored. If somebody asks, “How could Jane Austen/Plato/Mozart/William the Conqueror/Einstein or whoever be relevant to inner-city kids?”, the answer is surely that it is the kids, not Jane Austen etc, who have the problem. It is the job of teachers to help them out of it.

There is a nice bit in Boswell’s Life of Johnson when Dr Johnson stops a poor boy and says, “What would you give, my lad, to know about the Argonauts?” “Sir, I would give everything I had,” the boy replies. But we have given up teaching poor boys about the Argonauts. We have despaired of the transformation which education can bring about.

Schooling is now effectively compulsory from the age of four to 18. But too often, the people who emerge from those long years have not learnt the “what” or the “how to” or the “why”. You can see this in the practical things of daily life. Huge numbers of drugs, it turns out, are wrongly administered in hospital because nurses have not followed the instructions precisely. No one taught them the habit of accuracy.

How many people can draft, unaided, a letter or email that coherently makes an argument? How many people can calculate their own tax, or work out whether they are choosing the right pension? How many people can begin to understand the legal system or argue successfully with a bureaucrat or comprehend with any accuracy what their doctor is telling them?

More important still, how can people enjoy the richness of our civilisation if no one has introduced them to its glories? It is possible to go to school now without ever learning why those large buildings in every town have plus signs on them, or to look at a pound coin and not to know why it says “D.G.REG.F.D” on it, or to catch a train at Waterloo station without knowing why it is so called.

None of this can improve so long as politicians are so heavily engaged in education. Ed Balls can no more work out what our children should be taught than he can bring them up for us. Education is essentially a contract between parents, who want their children to acquire knowledge, and teachers, who must have their own independent idea of what that knowledge should be. The role of the state is only to support it, not to order it.

And that, in embryo, seems to be the policy that the Tories are developing. I sometimes wonder if they really know how radical they are being, and therefore how fiercely the bureaucracy will resist them.

SOURCE



Britain: Student play-acting deemed racist



Must not imitate black people or Muslims

"The Athletics Union (AU) of the London School of Economics (LSE) has been forced to apologise after members of the society dressed up as Guantanamo Bay inmates and drunkenly yelled ‘Oh Allah’ outside the college bar.

At least a dozen students attending the December 4th ‘Carol’, the annual fancy-dress Christmas party for all sports teams, chose to wear costumes deemed “racist, religiously insensitive and demeaning”. These included students who painted their faces brown and wore orange jump suits in imitation of Guantanamo Bay inmates, and others who claimed to be dressed as ‘Somalian pirates’.

After complaints from students, the AU President Charlie Glyn wrote a joint statement with Student Union General Secretary Aled Dilwyn Fisher in The Beaver, LSE’s student newspaper, which condemned the actions “of a minority of students” as “racist, religiously insensitive and demeaning”.

Source

A sense of humor no longer allowed in Britain



There is a new lot of postings by Chris Brand just up -- on his usual vastly "incorrect" themes of race, genes, IQ etc.





14 December, 2009

George Soros says UK Muslims are Europe’s most patriotic

Georgy-porgy is up to his tricks again. No mention of the sampling method. You can prove anything you like without random sampling

Muslims in Britain are the most patriotic in Europe — but more than a quarter in some parts of the country still do not feel British, according to a new study. The report, funded by George Soros, the billionaire philanthropist, found that on average 78% of Muslims identified themselves as British, although this dropped by six points in east London. This compares with 49% of Muslims who consider themselves French and just 23% who feel German.

The findings, based on more than 2,000 detailed interviews, suggest that Muslims may be better integrated in Britain than in other parts of the European Union.

The report will reopen the debate about the merits of multiculturalism, a policy that has actively promoted cultural and religious differences among minorities in Britain but has been criticised as a barrier to integration by Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

France prides itself on its secular notion of citizenship and has banned Muslim pupils from wearing the hijab, or headscarf, in classrooms. Yet the study, by the Open Society Institute, found only 41% of Muslims in Paris see themselves as French.

The report appears to contradict previous research in the UK suggesting some Muslims are failing to embrace British values. A Populus poll in 2006 claimed that 7% of British Muslims believed suicide attacks on fellow civilians could be justified. The debate about the integration of Europe’s 20m Muslims was thrown into sharp relief last month when the Swiss controversially voted to ban the building of new minarets.

Many Europeans worry that aspects of Islam — such as women’s rights — clash with their own values. A survey conducted last week for Le Parisien newspaper found only 54% of French people think Islam is compatible with their society.

The Soros study, however, found that strength of religious belief made no difference to how patriotic Muslims feel. Conducted over two and a half years, the report involved 2,200 in-depth interviews and 60 focus groups in 11 cities across Europe with large Muslim communities. The cities were chosen to be representative of varying levels of integration and cohesion across the continent.

In Britain, researchers focused on Leicester, which is often held up as a successful model of multiculturalism, and Waltham Forest, east London, where bungled police raids on nearby Forest Gate in 2006, targeting suspected extremists, had alienated many Muslims.

The survey found that levels of patriotism are much higher among second-generation Muslims. In Leicester, 72% of Muslims born abroad said they felt British; this figure jumped to 94% among UK-born Muslims.

Experts believe that Muslims in Germany may feel less patriotic because they have only been allowed citizenship since the 1990s. France’s divisive history with its colonies, such as Algeria, could explain its lower levels of patriotism.

The report also discovered that 55% of Muslims across the EU believe that religious and racial discrimination have risen in the past five years. “There is a disturbing message that emerges from these findings,” said Nazia Hussain, director of the research project. “Even though Muslims overwhelmingly feel British, they’re not seen as British by wider society. That said ... there has been a policy of trying to accommodate difference here and it appears to be paying off.”

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"Daily Mail" digs deep

The Daily Mail is a popular (print circulation over 2 million) British conservative newspaper that specializes in exposing scandals of all sorts. And in bureaucratic Britain, there is plenty to expose. And below they have got onto the huge and gaping hole in the Warmist story: The demonstrable invalidity of tree-rings as measures of temperature. The coverage below will reach many people and may even inspire better coverage from the rest of the British press

The claim was both simple and terrifying: that temperatures on planet Earth are now ‘likely the highest in at least the past 1,300 years’. As its authors from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) must have expected, it made headlines around the world. Yet some of the scientists who helped to draft it, The Mail on Sunday can reveal, harboured uncomfortable doubts. In the words of one, David Rind from the US space agency Nasa, it ‘looks like there were years around 1000AD that could have been just as warm’.

Keith Briffa from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU), which plays a key role in forming IPCC assessments, urged caution, warning that when it came to historical climate records, there was no new data, only the ‘same old evidence’ that had been around for years. ‘Let us not try to over-egg the pudding,’ he wrote in an email to an IPCC colleague in September 2006. ‘True, there have been many different techniques used to aggregate and scale data - but the efficacy of these is still far from established.’

But when the ‘warmest for 1,300 years’ claim was published in 2007 in the IPCC’s fourth report, the doubters kept silent. It is only now that their concerns have started to emerge from the thousands of pages of ‘Warmergate’ emails leaked last month from the CRU’s computers, along with references to performing a ‘trick’ to ‘hide’ temperature decline and instructions to resist all efforts by the CRU’s critics to use the Freedom of Information Act to check the unit’s data and conclusions.

Last week, as an official inquiry by the former civil servant Sir Muir Russell began, I tried to assess Warmergate’s wider significance. The CRU’s supporters insisted it was limited. ‘In the long term, it will make very little difference to the scientific consensus, and to the way politicians respond to it,’ Professor Trevor Davies, the university’s Pro-Vice Chancellor and a former CRU director, told me. ‘I am certain that the science is rock solid.’ He admitted that his CRU colleagues had sometimes used ‘injudicious phrases’, but that was because they kept on being ‘diverted’ from their work by those who wished to scrutinise it. ‘It’s understandable that sometimes people get frustrated,’ he said. The only lesson the affair had for him was that ‘we have got to get better in terms of explanation. Some scientists still find it quite it difficult to communicate with the public.’

Others, however, were less optimistic. Roger Pielke, Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of Colorado, could in no sense be described as a climate change sceptic, let alone a ‘denier’. ‘Human-caused climate change is real, and I’m a strong advocate for action,’ he said. ‘But I’m also a strong advocate for integrity in science.’

Pielke’s verdict on the scandal is damning. ‘These emails open up the possibility that big scientific questions we’ve regarded as settled may need another look. 'They reveal that some of these scientists saw themselves not as neutral investigators but as warriors engaged in battle with the so-called sceptics. ‘They have lost a lot of credibility and as far as their being leading spokespeople on this issue of huge public importance, there is no going back.’

Climate science is complicated, and often the only way to make sense of raw data is through sophisticated statistical computer programs. The consequence is that most lay individuals - politicians and members of the public alike - have little choice but to take the assurances of scientists such as Davies on trust. He and other ‘global warmists’ often insist that when it comes to the IPCC’s main conclusions - that the Earth is in a period of potentially catastrophic warming and that the main culprit is man-made greenhouse gas emission - no serious scientist dissents from the conventional view. Hence, perhaps, Gordon Brown’s recent comment that those who disagree are ‘behind-the-times, antiscience, flat-Earth climate sceptics’.

In fact, there is a large body of highly-respected academic experts who fiercely contest this thesis: people such as Richard Lindzen, Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a disillusioned former IPCC member, and Dr Tom Segalstad, head of geology at Oslo University, who has stated that ‘most leading geologists throughout the world know that the IPCC’s view of Earth processes are implausible if not impossible’.

These dissenters focus their criticisms on the IPCC’s analysis of the way the atmosphere works and the models it uses to predict the future.

However, Warmergate strikes at something more fundamental - the science that justifies the basic assumption that the present warming really is unprecedented, at least in the past few thousand years. Take the now-notorious email that the CRU’s currently suspended director, Dr Phil Jones, sent to his IPCC colleagues on November 16, 1999, when he wrote he had ‘just completed Mike’s Nature trick’ and had so managed to ‘hide the decline’.

For example, some suggest that the ‘medieval warm period’ was considerably warmer than even 1998. Of course, this is inconvenient to climate change believers because there were no cars or factories pumping out greenhouse gases in 1000AD - yet the Earth still warmed.

The CRU’s supporters have protested bitterly about the attention paid to this message. In the course of an extraordinary BBC interview in which he called an American critic an ‘****hole’ live on air, Jones’s colleague Professor Andrew Watson insisted that the fuss was completely unjustified, because all Jones had been talking about was ‘tweaking a diagram’.

Davies told me that the email had been ‘taken out of context’ adding: ‘One definition of the word “trick” is “the best way of doing something”. What Phil did was standard practice and the facts are out there in the peer-reviewed literature.’

However, the full context of that ‘trick’ email, as shown by a new and until now unreported analysis by the Canadian climate statistician Steve McIntyre, is extremely troubling. Derived from close examination of some of the thousands of other leaked emails, he says it suggests the ‘trick’ undermines not only the CRU but the IPCC.

There is a widespread misconception that the ‘decline’ Jones was referring to is the fall in global temperatures from their peak in 1998, which probably was the hottest year for a long time. In fact, its subject was more technical - and much more significant. It is true that, in Watson’s phrase, in the autumn of 1999 Jones and his colleagues were trying to ‘tweak’ a diagram. But it wasn’t just any old diagram. It was the chart displayed on the first page of the ‘Summary for Policymakers’ of the 2001 IPCC report - the famous ‘hockey stick’ graph that has been endlessly reproduced in everything from newspapers to primary-school textbooks ever since, showing centuries of level or declining temperatures until a dizzying, almost vertical rise in the late 20th Century.

There could be no simpler or more dramatic representation of global warming, and if the origin of worldwide concern over climate change could be traced to a single image, it would be the hockey stick.

Drawing a diagram such as this is far from straightforward. Gabriel Fahrenheit did not invent the mercury thermometer until 1724, so scientists who want to reconstruct earlier climate history have to use ‘proxy data’ - measurements derived from records such as ice cores, tree-rings and growing season dates. However, different proxies give very different results. For example, some suggest that the ‘medieval warm period’, the 350-year era that started around 1000, when red wine grapes flourished in southern England and the Vikings tilled now-frozen farms in Greenland, was considerably warmer than even 1998. Of course, this is inconvenient to climate change believers because there were no cars or factories pumping out greenhouse gases in 1000AD - yet the Earth still warmed.

Some tree-ring data eliminates the medieval warmth altogether, while others reflect it. In September 1999, Jones’s IPCC colleague Michael Mann of Penn State University in America - who is now also the subject of an official investigation --was working with Jones on the hockey stick. As they debated which data to use, they discussed a long tree-ring analysis carried out by Keith Briffa.

Briffa knew exactly why they wanted it, writing in an email on September 22: ‘I know there is pressure to present a nice tidy story as regards “apparent unprecedented warming in a thousand years or more”.’ But his conscience was troubled. ‘In reality the situation is not quite so simple - I believe that the recent warmth was probably matched about 1,000 years ago.’

Another British scientist - Chris Folland of the Met Office’s Hadley Centre - wrote the same day that using Briffa’s data might be awkward, because it suggested the past was too warm. This, he lamented, ‘dilutes the message rather significantly’.

Over the next few days, Briffa, Jones, Folland and Mann emailed each other furiously. Mann was fearful that if Briffa’s trees made the IPCC diagram, ‘the sceptics [would] have a field day casting doubt on our ability to understand the factors that influence these estimates and, thus, can undermine faith [in them] - I don’t think that doubt is scientifically justified, and I’d hate to be the one to have to give it fodder!’

Finally, Briffa changed the way he computed his data and submitted a revised version. This brought his work into line for earlier centuries, and ‘cooled’ them significantly. But alas, it created another, potentially even more serious, problem. According to his tree rings, the period since 1960 had not seen a steep rise in temperature, as actual temperature readings showed - but a large and steady decline, so calling into question the accuracy of the earlier data derived from tree rings.

This is the context in which, seven weeks later, Jones presented his ‘trick’ - as simple as it was deceptive. All he had to do was cut off Briffa’s inconvenient data at the point where the decline started, in 1961, and replace it with actual temperature readings, which showed an increase. On the hockey stick graph, his line is abruptly terminated - but the end of the line is obscured by the other lines.

‘Any scientist ought to know that you just can’t mix and match proxy and actual data,’ said Philip Stott, emeritus professor of biogeography at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies. ‘They’re apples and oranges. Yet that’s exactly what he did.’

Since Warmergate-broke, some of the CRU’s supporters have claimed that Jones and his colleagues made a ‘full disclosure’ of what they did to Briffa’s data in order to produce the hockey stick. But as McIntyre points out, ‘contrary to claims by various climate scientists, the IPCC Third Assessment Report did not disclose the deletion of the post-1960 values’. On the final diagram, the cut off was simply concealed by the other lines.

By 2007, when the IPCC produced its fourth report, McIntyre had become aware of the manipulation of the Briffa data and Briffa himself, as shown at the start of this article, continued to have serious qualms. McIntyre by now was an IPCC ‘reviewer’ and he urged the IPCC not to delete the post-1961 data in its 2007 graph. ‘They refused,’ he said, ‘stating this would be “inappropriate”.’

Yet even this, Pielke told me, may not ultimately be the biggest consequence of Warmergate. Some of the most controversial leaked emails concern attempts by Jones and his colleagues to avoid disclosure of the CRU’s temperature database - its vast library of readings from more than 1,000 weather stations around the world, the ultimate resource that records how temperatures have changed. In one email from 2005, Jones warned Mann not to leave such data lying around on searchable websites, because ‘you never know who is trawling them’.

Critics such as McIntyre had been ‘after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I’ll delete the file rather than send to anyone’.

Yesterday Davies said that, contrary to some reports, none of this data has in fact been deleted. But in the wake of the scandal, its reliability too is up for grabs.

The problem is that, just like tree rings or ice cores, readings from thermometers or electronic ‘thermistors’ are open to interpretation. The sites of weather stations that were once open countryside become built up areas, so trapping heat, and the type of equipment used changes over time. The result is what climate scientists call ‘inhomogeneities’ - anomalies between readings that need to be ‘adjusted’. But can we trust the way such ‘adjustments’ are made?

Last week, an article posted on a popular climate sceptic website analysed the data from the past 130 years in Darwin, Australia. This suggested that average temperatures had risen there by about two degrees Celsius. However, the raw data had been ‘adjusted’ in a series of abrupt upward steps by exactly the same amount: without the adjustment, the Darwin temperature record would have stayed level.

In 2007, McIntyre examined records across America. He found that between 1999 and 2007, the US equivalent of the Met Office had changed the way it adjusted old data. The result was to make the Thirties seem cooler, and the years since 1990 much warmer. Previously, the warmest year since records began in America had been 1934. Now, in line with CRU and IPCC orthodoxy, it was 1998.

At the CRU, said Davies, some stations’ readings were adjusted by unit and in such cases, raw and adjusted data could be compared. But in about 90 per cent of cases, the adjustment was carried out in the countries that collected the data, and the CRU would not know exactly how this had been done. Davies said: ‘All I can say is that the process is careful and considered. To get the details, the best way would be to go the various national meteorological services.’

The consequences of that, Stott said, may be explosive. ‘If you take Darwin, the gap between the two just looks too big. ‘If that applies elsewhere, it’s going to get really interesting. It’s no longer going to be good enough for the Met Office and CRU to put the data out there. ‘To know we can trust it, we’ve got to know what adjustments have been made, and why.’

Last week, at the Copenhagen climate summit, the Met Office said that the Noughties have been the warmest decade in history. Depending on how the data has been adjusted, Stott said, that statement may not be true. Pielke agreed. ‘After Climategate, the surface temperature record is being called into question.’

To experts such as McIntyre and Pielke, perhaps the most baffling thing has been the near-unanimity over global warming in the world’s mainstream media - a unanimity much greater than that found among scientists. In part, this is the result of strongarm tactics. For example, last year the BBC environment reporter Roger Harrabin made substantial changes to an article on the corporation website that asked why global warming seemed to have stalled since 1998 - caving in to direct pressure from a climate change activist, Jo Abbess. ‘Personally, I think it is highly irresponsible to play into the hands of the sceptics who continually promote the idea that “global warming finished in 1998” when that is so patently not true,’ she told him in an email. After a brief exchange, he complied and sent a final note: ‘Have a look in ten minutes and tell me you are happier. We have changed headline and more.’

Afterwards, Abbess boasted on her website: ‘Climate Changers, Remember to challenge any piece of media that seems like it’s been subject to spin or scepticism. Here’s my go for today. The BBC actually changed an article I requested a correction for.’

Last week, Michael Schlesinger, Professor of Atmospheric Studies at the University of Illinois, sent a still cruder threat to Andrew Revkin of the New York Times, accusing him of ‘gutter reportage’, and warning: ‘The vibe that I am getting from here, there and everywhere is that your reportage is very worrisome to most climate scientists ... I sense that you are about to experience the “Big Cutoff” from those of us who believe we can no longer trust you, me included.’

But in the wake of Warmergate, such threats - and the readiness to bow to them - may become rarer. ‘A year ago, if a reporter called me, all I got was questions about why I’m trying to deny climate change and am threatening the future of the planet,’ said Professor Ross McKitrick of Guelph University near Toronto, a long-time collaborator with McIntyre. ‘Now, I’m getting questions about how they did the hockey stick and the problems with the data. ‘Maybe the emails have started to open people’s eyes.’

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The Hitlerettes of “SustainUS”

By Lord Monckton in Copenhagen -- responding to attacks from ecofascists

Here in Copenhagen, the “global warming” conference is hotting up despite the freezing weather. A couple of nights ago, a peaceful meeting of Americans for Prosperity was broken up by several dozen chanting preppie goons from SustainUS, a Hitlerian environmental pressure-group largely funded by US taxpayers. The thugs and thugettes were determined to exercise their right of free speech at the expense of ours.

These animals’ loutish assault on our meeting, and my conversation about it the next day, have gone viral on the internet as people realize – many for the first time – that, in today’s environmental movement, the intolerance, arrogance, and viciousness of Nazism is back – and this time it is worldwide.

A student at a British university did not like it when the members of our audience – reported by me on German television and subsequently worldwide - gave their opinions that the SustainUS thugs were no better than the Hitler Youth. Here, in full, is his complaint, and my reply.

Dear Lord Monckton, – I write, perhaps as one of many, with the deepest regret for your actions in Copenhagen this week. By resorting to ad hominem attacks on members of SustainUS you have sabotaged your own cause by reducing your credibility. I feel aggrieved that a person who takes such actions as you may still claim the title ‘Lord’.

Previous to your comments I disagreed with you on the issue of climate change but nonetheless followed your views and read your articles as a student of the topic. Now I feel you have crossed the line and shown that your arguments cannot stand alone without resorting to insults and patronising comments to those who wish to civilly discuss with you.

I am a member of the youth of this nation, and perhaps by my actions and opinions you might also call me a member of the ‘Hitler youth’. But make no mistake, the youth are the future and by your actions you have alienated them and inspired many more to oppose you.

Initially the opposition to you was about science. Now the opposition is to you as a person for your hateful remarks. Yours in disappointment, – A student.

Reply:

Dear Student, – Thank you for taking the trouble to let me know what you think. Perhaps a little background would be helpful. Some 50 robotically-chanting thugs invaded a meeting that some colleagues and I were holding, jostled and intimidated us, and did their best to interfere with our right of free speech for as long as they could get away with it. They showed not the slightest intention of engaging in civil discussion with us.

Three German and one Danish members of our audience were distraught. They said no attempt like this to prevent free speech had ever been seen in Copenhagen since the Nazis had occupied the city during the Second World War. The Hitlerettes had lied in order to get into the meeting, and had clearly been lavishly funded (by taxpayers, mostly, according to our enquiries for the police report) and had also been very carefully briefed. Peaceful protesters would have demonstrated outside, rather than violently breaking up our meeting in the manner all too familiar to those who know the mid-20th-century history of Europe.

I broadcast their remarks on German television and, the next morning, when I was visiting the stands operated by various (again almost exclusively taxpayer-funded) environmental organizations, several of them surrounded me and began saying how displeased they were that I had compared them to the Hitlerjugend. I explained my reasoning, and refused otherwise to have anything to do with any of them.

With my colleagues, I am considering at present whether we should report these gruesome louts to the police, who have been given very wide powers to prevent precisely this sort of violent intrusion into what had been, until they lied and cheated their way in, a peaceful meeting.

On YouTube, where the video these goons shot of my refusal to knuckle under to their intimidating terror tactics is displayed, to their horror the comments on the video are running at well over ten to one in my favour. And, though my comments have been publicly available for two days, you are the first and only person who has written to me as you have. Free speech is a precious commodity, and, whether you like it or not, I intend to speak out for it as clearly as possible while I still can.

For years, we who have been quietly conducting careful scientific research and publishing our counter-consensual results both in and out of the peer-reviewed journals have been subjected to daily accusations in the news media that we are climate “deniers” or “denialists”, with calculated and malevolent overtones of Holocaust denial. In short, we are regularly, and with no justification, subjected to exactly the opprobrium which, with full justification, I heaped upon the Hitlerettes of SustainUS, whose faces, bullying tactics, and incapacity to argue sensibly for their opinions are now rightly notorious round the world.

Therefore, I shall ask you two questions.

First, have you ever, at any time, written to any of those who have described scientific sceptics in these malicious terms to remonstrate with them as you have with me, or are you, perhaps, being selective in targeting me, either through prejudice or because you have simply become so inured to the foul insults that are so routinely hurled at those of us who are, in the words of Al-Haytham, the father of the scientific method, merely “seekers after truth”?

Know this. James Hansen, a paid public official of NASA, has publicly and repeatedly demanded that those of us who dare to question what is now known to be the serially unsound and dishonest pseudo-science of the UN’s climate panel and of the various national scientific institutions that contribute to it, should be put on trial for what he has called “high crimes against humanity”. He knows, and the Administrator of NASA knows, that the penalty for crimes against humanity is death. Hansen is asking for those of us who disagree with him to be tried by the Staatssicherheitsdienst and then killed, and the Administrator of NASA continues to allow him to get away with it.

So my second question is this. Have you ever, at any time, contacted Mr. Hansen or NASA to protest at his – and by implication their – demand that those who have genuine and well-founded doubts as to the magnitude of CO2’s warming effect should be tried and by implication executed, and, if not, why not?

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Half of NHS hospitals 'will have to significantly reduce MRSA rates next year'

Half of all hospitals in England will have to significantly reduce MRSA rates next year as part of a crackdown on the potentially deadly superbug. They have been told bring rates down to the national average or reduce the number of case by 20 per cent, whichever has the greater impact.

Ministers are trying to tackle the worst performing hospitals, after successfully halving the overall number of cases across the country.

A report earlier this year from the National Audit Office showed that while rates of the hospital-acquired infections are falling across the country MRSA cases were actually rising in one in 10 hospital trusts.

A spokesman for the Department of Health confirmed that hospitals would not face penalties for missing the target. However, he added, hospitals would continue have their infection rate figures published on the NHS Choices website and could see patients choose to go elsewhere if they consistently had a large numbers of MRSA cases.

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British children have never worked so hard and learnt so little

For all the time and money put in, the education system is fundamentally flawed, says Charles Moore

Exams in the summer are well known for high stress, but mid-December is the time of the school year when everyone is at their most tired. What John Donne called “the year’s midnight” coincides with the end of the longest term. Look at the strained, anxious faces of mothers on the school run. Look at the pale, exhausted children who totter out of school into the mid-afternoon darkness. Look at the teachers, writing reports, filling in forms, snuffling with incipient colds and trying to smile through the Nativity play (where “diversity” policy still permits it).

What is it all for? Never in history have politicians talked more about the importance of education. Never has it been more generally agreed that the modern world is a “knowledge economy”. The famous Clause Four of the Labour Party’s constitution referred to securing for “workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry”. Everyone realises that nowadays brain usually secures fuller fruits than hand.

And yet, does the average pupil end up knowing more or knowing things more deeply than, say, 50 years ago? Could the average pupil of today do long division, or speak French, or write an English paragraph, or explain the Great Reform Bill, or find Valparaiso on a map, or operate the laws of thermo-dynamics better than his or her equivalent half a century ago?

Perhaps not, the defenders of current education would say, but modern pupils know much more about saving the planet, safe sex, Eid, and challenging racism, not to mention things not even thought of in the 1950s, such as the internet. They learn more that is “relevant”. They also, modern educationalists argue, acquire more “skills”. Instead of being crammed with sterile facts, they know how to engage with a subject. They learn less mere “what”, but more “why” and “how to”.

This is not all rubbish. Looking back on my own (mostly good) education, both state and private, in the 1960s, I can see some of its deficiencies. We were not taught where history came from. It was just a series of facts and stories: no one taught me the idea of sources and evidence until I was about 15.

We learnt grammar – both Latin and English – well, but we never quite knew what grammar was. Grammar was considered so important that it gave its name to the best state schools in the country, but why was it considered so important? We were not really told. The aim of modern education to teach children to ask more questions, and not simply to stuff them with information, is surely right.

But that promise has been broken. We seem to have devised a system of curriculum and examination which pulls off the incredible double of being very hard work but very low quality. There are endless projects and modules, and endless ways of re-marking to upgrade one’s results, but no definite test of what is known and understood.

In this process, a strange thing has happened. For all the patter about diversity, education has become more hostile to things that are outside the immediate experience of the pupil. Much less pre-20th-century history or literature is taught. Fewer pupils learn foreign languages, let alone dead ones. Individual sciences have been conflated into the easier “dual science” paper. We heard this week that a quarter of primary schools never teach pupils the Lord’s Prayer, partly (presumably) because the words of a Jew who has been dead for 2,000 years are considered out of date.

Because of my current war against Andrew Marr’s TV history of The Making of Modern Britain, I went on the Today programme yesterday to argue with the historian Tristram Hunt. He said that 14-year-old London pupils who had watched Marr had pronounced it boring because, despite all Marr’s costume capers and silly accents, it was not relevant enough to them. Hunt wanted Marrxism squared – yet more japes to get the wandering teenage attention.

In the end, though, how can anything be taught if the test is whether pupils who know very little find it boring? One of the worst things about being badly educated is that you are easily bored. If somebody asks, “How could Jane Austen/Plato/Mozart/William the Conqueror/Einstein or whoever be relevant to inner-city kids?”, the answer is surely that it is the kids, not Jane Austen etc, who have the problem. It is the job of teachers to help them out of it.

There is a nice bit in Boswell’s Life of Johnson when Dr Johnson stops a poor boy and says, “What would you give, my lad, to know about the Argonauts?” “Sir, I would give everything I had,” the boy replies. But we have given up teaching poor boys about the Argonauts. We have despaired of the transformation which education can bring about.

Schooling is now effectively compulsory from the age of four to 18. But too often, the people who emerge from those long years have not learnt the “what” or the “how to” or the “why”. You can see this in the practical things of daily life. Huge numbers of drugs, it turns out, are wrongly administered in hospital because nurses have not followed the instructions precisely. No one taught them the habit of accuracy.

How many people can draft, unaided, a letter or email that coherently makes an argument? How many people can calculate their own tax, or work out whether they are choosing the right pension? How many people can begin to understand the legal system or argue successfully with a bureaucrat or comprehend with any accuracy what their doctor is telling them?

More important still, how can people enjoy the richness of our civilisation if no one has introduced them to its glories? It is possible to go to school now without ever learning why those large buildings in every town have plus signs on them, or to look at a pound coin and not to know why it says “D.G.REG.F.D” on it, or to catch a train at Waterloo station without knowing why it is so called.

None of this can improve so long as politicians are so heavily engaged in education. Ed Balls can no more work out what our children should be taught than he can bring them up for us. Education is essentially a contract between parents, who want their children to acquire knowledge, and teachers, who must have their own independent idea of what that knowledge should be. The role of the state is only to support it, not to order it.

And that, in embryo, seems to be the policy that the Tories are developing. I sometimes wonder if they really know how radical they are being, and therefore how fiercely the bureaucracy will resist them.

SOURCE



British Boy, 12, suspended for 'crisp dealing' in school that banned junk food

Definitely a kid with a future in business

A schoolboy has been suspended for 'crisp dealing' at a school which has banned fatty drinks and snacks. In sign of pupil disgruntlement over school meal reforms spearheaded by TV chef Jamie Oliver, 12-year-old Joel Bradley was caught allegedly selling a packet of Discos at a marked-up price of 50p. He was suspended from Liverpool's Cardinal Heenan High School because it was the second time he had been caught.

His father, Joe, said the boy had been 'victimised' for an enterprise which could earn him as much as £15 a day. 'I think the school has made a beeline for him because of what I've done,' he told the Liverpool Echo. Mr Bradley, from Liverpool's Norris Green district, admitted he too had once been caught selling canned drinks, chocolate bars and crisps from a van outside the school - saying he was filling a void left by the closure of a local shop.

But headmaster Dave Forshaw said parents and pupils must abide by the school rules or go elsewhere. 'We are a healthy school and proud of it,' he said. 'If parents are not happy then they are perfectly free to take their children to a school that allows pupils to sell these things and allows a father to sell them outside on the pavement.'

Mr Forshaw said pupils were caught around 'three or four times a week' selling snacks at the school. 'We have six to seven regular sellers we pinpoint', he said.

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13 December, 2009

Patients with a crippling gut condition 'could be made ill under British government plans to remove their drugs'

Something for Americans to look forward to under Obamacare

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) wants to restrict how long patients are given the drugs, which stabilise their illness and have been credited with allowing many to live a normal life. Under new proposals patients with Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBD), which includes Crohn's disease, will be guaranteed the treatment for just one year. They will only receive the drugs again if their condition worsens.

At the moment many patients are given the drugs permanently, to prevent relapses in their illness. But Nice insists that the drugs are too costly for the benefits that they provide to continue to prescribe them indefinitely. The new proposals come only a year after Nice sparked outrage by proposing to stop prescribing the drugs entirely if a patient’s condition appeared to stabilise, without even guaranteeing a year of treatment.

Michael Addelman, from Manchester, whose seven-year-old son Jake currently takes one of the drugs involved, Infliximab, said that to remove his son’s medication would “cruel”. “It would be immeasurably cruel to force somebody back into this hellish life,” he said. “The prospect of my son going back to a life of intense pain is extremely worrying.”

Richard Driscoll, chief executive of the National Association for Colitis and Crohn's Disease (NACC), said that the proposals were “madness”. He said: “We really don’t think the NICE Committee understands what this will actually mean for patients’ lives. “The treatment that has been keeping (patients) well and able to lead a near normal and productive life at college, or in work or in caring for their family will suddenly stop. “For many, their symptoms will then start to recur, interrupting work, education and family life. “They will be attending hospital again for assessment and treatment, and this will continue until they get ill enough to ‘requalify’ for the treatment.”

He added: “Just imagine how it would feel for a university student whose treatment has enabled them to complete their course, only to find that it is to stop a couple of months before their final exams – this is madness. “And is it really more efficient and cost-effective for the health service to have someone getting steadily more ill and needing a series of appointments and tests or even admission to hospital compared to having them on a planned programme of care that keeps them well?”

The two drugs involved are Infliximab, which Nice estimates costs £12,500 a year to prescribe, and Adalimumab, which costs £10,000 a year.

There are an estimated 250,000 sufferers of IBD in Britain. Symptoms often include severe weight loss, because the disease makes it difficult for patients to eat. Other signs can be extreme pain, diarrhoea, vomiting, and associated diseases like arthritis.

A spokesman for Nice said: "In making their provisional recommendations, the appraisal committee was unable to recommend adalimumab and infliximab in people with severe active Crohn’s disease for continuous treatment after 12 months due to a lack of long-term data and insufficient evidence identifying a patient group at high risk of relapse. "A further course of treatment with adalimumab or infliximab for another 12 months was recommended as an option for people whose disease relapses”.

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Mother died after NHS doctors missed infection

Civil servant Sarah Stitt, 36, went to her GP complaining of chronic earache and was given antibiotics for her pain. But another infection causing meningitis was missed despite further medical examinations - and spread to attack her brain. Mrs Stitt, mother to two sons, died from the brain virus just four weeks after first going to her doctor.

Ear specialist witness Desmond Nunez told the inquest: "Some things could have been done, it might have made a difference."

Mrs Stitt began suffering earache in January 2007. She visited her GP, spoke to an out-of-hours healthcare worker and went to hospital as she struggled to cope with the pain. Doctors diagnosed an infection and prescribed antibiotics and eardrops. But the inquest heard a second "extremely rare" infection called masked mastoiditis was missed before developing into meningitis.

Her husband, Sean, then took her to the Royal Gwent Hospital in Newport, South Wales where she died. Gwent coroner David Bowen yesterday recorded a narrative verdict, saying diagnosing the second infection would have pointed towards meningitis. He added: "Mrs Stitt wasn't a lady who easily complained. She had a very high pain threshold."

Speaking outside court, Mr Stitt, 40, of Magor, Gwent, said: "Sarah was so friendly, loving and generous. "I can't believe no-one spotted she was seriously ill until it was too late. "She was in extreme pain. The doctors failed to recognise the symptoms and just treated her for an ear infection."

Mr Stitt added: "I'm glad the coroner recognised there was a missed opportunity to save Sarah's life. "My family and I will have to live with the consequences of that missed opportunity for the rest of our lives. "I've lost a loving wife and my children have lost a devoted mother who can't be replaced. "Harry doesn't even remember his mum - he was only three when she died. Joseph still finds it painful."

A spokesman for Aneurin Bevan Local Health Board, which runs the Royal Gwent Hospital, said: "We fully accept the coroner's verdict in this tragic case. "There are lessons to be learned in respect of clinical management of such cases and appropriate action has already been taken." [Like what?]

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British hospitals 'face funding squeeze'

Hospitals face a four year long squeeze on their funding with the announcement that ministers will freeze the income they receive for procedures, in effect a real terms cut. Ministers insisted that the move would increase efficiency within the NHS. But health experts warned that the freeze, coupled with a goal to reduce management costs by almost a third, could mean cuts.

Ministers have committed to a freeze next year, but have said that there will be a “maximum” increase of naught per cent for the three years after that – suggesting that the payment rate, or tariff as it is known, might actually be cut.

Mr Burnham, the Health Secretary, insisted that the move would improve productivity within the health service, as he published a roadmap for the NHS for the next five years. He said: “There is no doubt and getting away from it, (this) is challenging, it is tough and let’s be honest about that. “But there is time to plan. “There are lots of things that we can do to spend money better and more wisely in the NHS.”

But health experts warned that the plan could lead to cuts which affect patients. Dr Jennifer Dixon, director of the Nuffield Trust, the health policy charity, said: ‘The scale of the challenge will be intense. “Without significant increases in productivity – the likes of which have not been achieved in the past – the health service will inevitably face real terms cuts in its budgets from 2011 onwards.”

The document also lays out plans for family doctors to be asked to make one per cent efficiency savings across the board. Hospitals’ incomes will also be linked to patient satisfaction for the first time. The NHS has previously set a target to make between £15 and £20 billion of efficiency savings by 2014.

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Lord Turnbull Questions UK Climate Policy In The House Of Lords

Good to see climate skepticism reaching the political level

House of Lords, 8 December 2009: Lord Turnbull: My Lords, on first reading the Committee on Climate Change's latest progress report, I found it an impressive document. It was broad in scope and very detailed. But the more I dug into it the more troubled I became. Below the surface there are serious questions about the foundations on which it has been constructed. There are questions in four areas-the framework created by the Climate Change Act 2008, the policy responses at EU and UK level, the estimate of costs and finally the scientific basis on which the whole scheme of things rests. I will consider each in turn.

Unlike many of those involved in the climate change field, I have no pecuniary interest to declare, but I am a founder trustee of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, which seeks to bring rationality, objectivity and, above all, tolerance to the debate.

I have long been in the camp of what might be called the semi-sceptics. I have taken the science on trust, while becoming increasingly critical of the policy responses being made to achieve a given CO2 or global warming constraint. First, let us look at the Climate Change Act, which has been highly praised, even today, as the most comprehensive and ambitious framework anywhere in the world-a real pioneering first for the UK. However, it has serious flaws. It starts by imposing a completely unworkable duty on the Secretary of State to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent by 2050, even though many of the actions required lie outside his control. It would have been better, as the noble Lord, Lord Crickhowell, and I argued, for the duty to be connected to what the Secretary of State can control, such as his own actions and policies, and not the outcome, which he cannot.

In the Act's passage through Parliament, the target was raised from 60 per cent to 80 per cent, with little discussion of its costs or feasibility. It is a simple arithmetic calculation to show that if the UK economy continues to grow at its historic trend rate, we will need, only 40 years from now, to produce each £1,000 of GDP with only 8 per cent of the carbon we use today. That is a cut of [92] per cent. Many observers think that this is implausible. A recent report by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers reported that the rate of improvement in carbon intensity/productivity would need to quadruple from the 1.3 per cent achieved in the five years up to the recession to around 5.5 per cent. It would need to be even higher at the end of the period to make up for what the noble Lord, Lord May, calls falling behind the run rate.

Professor Dieter Helm has pointed out that the measurement system used in the Kyoto framework and in the UK's carbon accounts is a misleading guide to what is really being achieved. The carbon accounts use the territorial method-that is, the emissions from UK territory. In this way, the UK is able to claim that CO2 emissions have been reduced, but that is a misleading way of measuring a nation's carbon footprint and its impact on the world. It should include the carbon in its imports. If this was done it would show that we are going backwards, since we would be forced to take responsibility for the manufacturing that we have outsourced to such countries as China but are still consuming. The current method is, of course, politically very convenient as it allows us to label China as the world's largest emitter. The embedded carbon calculation is, I accept, far more complicated, but it is far more honest.

Another flaw in the framework is that the targets are unconditional. It is a legal duty, irrespective of what other countries achieve. Some, including me, argue that there should be two targets: one of which is a commitment, and a higher one which we will argue for internationally but only undertake as part of an agreement. Ironically, this is precisely the approach that the EU is taking with its 20 per cent reduction target by 2020, which would be raised to 30 per cent as part of an international agreement. The danger is that by going it alone we could face a double whammy, paying for decarbonising our own economy, yet still having to pay for the costs of raising our sea defences if others do not follow suit.

Secondly, let us consider the specific policies that have been adopted. Current EU policy follows two inconsistent paths. On the one hand, the ETS seeks to establish a common price for CO2, against which various competing technologies can be measured. The market share of each is determined by the relative costs. This is attractive to economists, since it allows the cost per tonne of CO2 abated to be equalised at the margin, thereby ensuring that the cost of achieving any CO2 target is minimised. The problem is that, despite its theoretical attractions, the ETS is failing. It provides no clear signal on the price of carbon on which investors can base their decisions. The committee, in this report, estimates that the ETS CO2 price in 2020 will be around €22 per tonne. The committee has rightly identified the central contradiction in its own report: the carbon price will be too low and too uncertain to stimulate the low-carbon investments needed to validate the committee's projections.

At the same time, the EU is following a different approach under its 20:20:20 plan-to achieve a 20 per cent reduction in CO2 by 2020, with 20 per cent of energy coming from renewables. In this way, it predetermines a market share for a technology-renewables-rather than letting the merit order decide. The danger is that in pressing to achieve this target, which implies that over 30 per cent of electricity generation will come from renewables, some renewables capacity will be created which will be more expensive than other responses.

There is also a lack of clarity about the true cost of wind power, once we factor in the cost of retaining a large amount of underutilised conventional capacity, and the extension of the grid. The noble Lord, Lord Reay, has said more than enough on that so I do not need to follow that line of argument.

There is illogicality in the treatment of nuclear energy in the climate change levy. It is ridiculous that nuclear power, as a low-carbon source, is still in the taxable box. For 50 years, a major experiment has been conducted just 20 miles off our coast. France has generated three-quarters of its electricity from nuclear power. The French believe that it has been a huge success, delivering electricity which is secure, cheap and stable in price. France's carbon intensity is 0.3 of a tonne per $1,000 of GDP, compared to 0.42 in the UK, 0.51 in Germany-so much for it being a market leader-and 0.63 in the US. However, the French option has barely been considered in this country.

As part of the EU plan, 10 per cent of road fuel is mandated to come from biofuels, but by the time this was enacted the credibility of first-generation biofuels had collapsed. Finally, our policy framework lacks balance. It is almost exclusively focused on mitigation through CO2 reduction, The Institution of Mechanical Engineers has argued for what it calls a MAG approach, with effort being committed not just to mitigation but to adaptation and geo-engineering.

Thirdly, there is the issue of cost. All we had to go on at the time when the target was set more ambitiously was the estimate by the noble Lord, Lord Stern, of 1 per cent of GDP. Many people were sceptical at the time and probably even more are now, including, it seems, the noble Lord, Lord Stern, himself. It was reported in the press last week that he now thinks that it might be 2 per cent, but could rise to 5 per cent. I hope he will clarify this when he speaks to us shortly.

In the document that we have before us, the committee says that it previously estimated that costs in 2020 would be about 1 per cent of GDP. That is consistent with its view that it might get to 2 per cent by 2050. In the new report it simply reaffirms the 1 per cent figure in just one paragraph in 250 pages. That is it. I have to say to the noble Lords, Lord Krebs and Lord May, that I do not think that that is adequate. It is difficult to relate these figures to what we are observing on the ground about the difficulties and costs of bringing on stream different technologies such as offshore wind and CCS.

One of the problems bedevilling the debate is the lack of transparency over the huge cross-subsidies that are being created by the renewables obligation and the regime for feed-in tariffs. There is no assurance that their extent is commensurate with the benefits in CO2 abated. My electricity costs me 11p per kilowatt hour. If I erected a wind turbine, I could sell the power I produced to the grid for a whopping 23p. I think I would go out and buy a gizmo which linked my inward meter to my outward meter. That excess cost is averaged over the bills of consumers as a whole, but how much is it in total, or for individual consumers? Here I differ from the noble Lord, Lord May. The whole issue of cost must be given far more attention. The Government cannot ask people to make radical changes to their lifestyle without being more open about the costs that they are being asked to bear.

I accept that "do nothing" is not the right option. Some measures, such as energy efficiency, heat recovery from waste and biomass, and stopping deforestation are probably justified on their own merits. More nuclear power which, in turn, would open the way for electrification of our transport fleet would enhance security of supply. Other measures may be justified as pure insurance, given the uncertainty that we face. But what is badly needed is a consistent metric that allows us to judge whether any given objective is being achieved at minimum cost. The recent book by Professor MacKay, the newly appointed scientific adviser at DECC, provides an excellent starting point. I also very much welcome the intervention by the noble Earl, Lord Selborne, debunking the waste hierarchy and the act of faith that that embodies.

There is the issue of the science, which I had previously taken as given; but many people's faith is being tested. We are often told that the science is settled. I suppose that is what the Inquisition said to Galileo. If so, why are we spending millions of pounds on research? The science is far from settled. There are major controversies not just about the contribution of CO2, on which most of the debate is focused, but about the influence of other factors such as water vapour, or clouds-the most powerful greenhouse gas-ocean currents and the sun, together with feedback effects which can be negative as well as positive.

Worse still, there are even controversies about the basic data on temperature. The series going back one, 10 or 100,000 years are, in the genuine sense of the word, synthetic. They are not direct observations but are melded together from proxies such as ice cores, ocean sediments and tree rings.

Given the extent to which the outcome is affected by the statistical techniques and the weightings applied by individual researchers, it is essential that the work is done as transparently as possible, with the greatest scope for challenge. That is why the disclosure of documents and e-mails from the Climatic Research Unit is so disturbing. Instead of an open debate, a picture is emerging of selective use of data, efforts to silence critics, and particularly a refusal to share data and methodologies.

It is essential that these allegations are independently and rigorously investigated. Naturally, I welcome the appointment of my old colleague, Sir Muir Russell, to lead this investigation; a civil servant with a physics degree is a rare beast indeed. He needs to establish what the documents really mean and recommend changes in governance and transparency which will restore confidence in the integrity of the data. This is not just an academic feud in the English department from a Malcolm Bradbury novel. The CRU is a major contributor to the IPCC process. The Government should not see this as a purely university matter. They are the funders of much of this research and their climate change policies are based on it.

We need to purge the debate of the unpleasant religiosity that surrounds it, of scientists acting like NGO activists, of propaganda based on fear, for example, the quite disgraceful government advertisement which tried to frighten young children-the final image being the family dog being drowned-and of claims about having "10 days to save the world". Crude insults from the Prime Minister do not help.

The noble Lords, Lord Krebs and Lord May, and their eminent colleagues on the CCC have a choice. They can take the policy framework as given, the policy responses as given, the costs as given, and the science as given, and then proceed to churn out more and more sophisticated projections, or-as I hope-they can apply the formidable intellectual firepower they command and start to find answers to many of the unsolved questions.

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BEYOND DEBATE?

By Martin Cohen, writing in "Times Higher"

Is belief in global-warming science another example of the "madness of crowds"? That strange but powerful social phenomenon, first described by Charles Mackay in 1841, turns a widely shared prejudice into an irresistible "authority". Could it indeed represent the final triumph of irrationality?

After all, how rational is it to pass laws banning one kind of light bulb (and insisting on their replacement by ones filled with poisonous mercury vapour) in order to "save electricity", while ploughing money into schemes to run cars on ... electricity? How rational is it to pay the Russians once for fossil fuels, and a second time for permission (via carbon credits) to burn them (see box page 36)? And how rational is it to suppose that the effects of increased CO2 in the atmosphere take between 200 and 1,000 years to be felt, but that solutions can take effect almost instantaneously?

Whether rational or not, global warming theory has become a political orthodoxy. So entrenched is it that those showing any resistance to it are described as "heretics" or even likened to "Holocaust deniers".

Paul Krugman, the Nobel prize-winning economist, professor of economics and international affairs at Princeton University and columnist for The New York Times, has said: "Is it fair to call climate denial a form of treason? Isn't it politics as usual? Yes, it is - and that's why it's unforgivable ... the deniers are choosing, wilfully, to ignore that threat, placing future generations of Americans in grave danger, simply because it's in their political interest to pretend that there's nothing to worry about. If that's not betrayal, I don't know what is."

Another columnist, this time for The Boston Globe, has written: "I would like to say we're at a point where global warming is impossible to deny. Global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers, although one denies the past and the other denies the present and future."

Such pronouncements from these commentators and from other people highly placed in government, international organisations, the press, academia and science make the debate seem closed and the conclusion beyond dispute. Yet the plain fact is that there is something deeply unscientific about the theory of global warming. Despite this, it has gained such widespread, uncritical acceptance that any scientist expressing a doubt often finds his or her actions tarred with accusations of the rankest political and personal motivations.

How this situation came about says much about how science is co-opted to sway public opinion. The case is built, deliberately or not, on misleading images and interpretations that have been perpetuated by parties with a vested interest. It morphs into a tool for governments to intimidate their populations into passive acceptance of very real changes: from the tiny, such as accepting miserable fluorescent light instead of the incandescent light we've been used to; to the major, like welcoming nuclear power plants and obliging rainforest tribes to make way for biofuel plantations.

Indeed, much of what is presented as hard scientific evidence for the theory of global warming is false. "Second-rate myth" may be a better term, as the philosopher Paul Feyerabend called science in his 1975 polemic, Against Method.

"This myth is a complex explanatory system that contains numerous auxiliary hypotheses designed to cover special cases, as it easily achieves a high degree of confirmation on the basis of observation," Feyerabend writes. "It has been taught for a long time; its content is enforced by fear, prejudice and ignorance, as well as by a jealous and cruel priesthood. Its ideas penetrate the most common idiom, infect all modes of thinking and many decisions which mean a great deal in human life ... ".

But call it what you will, as long as you don't think that by calling it "science" it becomes irrefutable. Because that it ain't.

More HERE



It really WILL be a hot summer next year say British weathermen... But where have we heard that before?

After the fiasco of this year's 'barbecue summer' prediction, you might have thought the Met Office would have hesitated before making such grand statements again. But yesterday it declared that 2010 will be a 'barbecue year'. Forecasters say it is likely to be the hottest year globally since records began nearly 160 years ago.

The prediction follows the announcement that the 'noughties' were the warmest decade on record, while 2009 was the fifth warmest year. But sceptics accused the Met Office of political lobbying and timing the release of climate data and forecasts to influence the United Nations climate change talks in Copenhagen.

The Met Office's Vicky Pope said global temperatures next year were expected to average 14.58C (52.24F) - around 0.06C warmer than the previous record of 1998. This is partly due to El Niño, the weather phenomenon which has seen warmer than usual water in the Eastern Pacific in recent months. El Niño is forecast to last until May, affecting weather around the world.

The Met Office claims its track record on global weather forecasts is good, with predictions right to within 0.06C over the last decade. But it conceded that the outlook was not guaranteed. 'A record warm year in 2010 is not a certainty-especially if the current El Niño was to unexpectedly decline rapidly near the start of 2010 or if there was a large volcanic eruption which would cool the planet,' it said.

Three years ago, Met Office scientists predicted that 2007 was likely to be the warmest year on record globally. It turned out to be the sixth warmest. Then in April, its longrangeforecast said it was 'odds on for a barbecue-summer'. Although temperatures were warmer than average, the balmy weather implied in the forecast failed to materialise. And despite a brief heatwave in June, much of the summer was grey and damp - with 40 per cent more rain than normal.

The predictions take into account levels of greenhouse gases, volcanic activity, sun activity, sea surface temperatures and El Niño.

The Global Warming Policy Foundation - a sceptical think tank set up by former Chancellor Lord Lawson - has accused both the Met Office and the World Meteorological Organisation of playing politics over their predictions on the warmest years. Although the final temperature data for 2009 will not be made available until March, the estimates were released early in time for the climate change talks in Copenhagen. 'We are very concerned that both agencies have overstepped their scientific remits, which are supposed to provide balanced advice and empirical data,' Dr Benny Peiser, the director of the GWPF said.

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Official Britain's hatred of photography

Real crooks are too difficult for the British police but cameras are a gladly-seized excuse to harass ordinary people

On Tuesday morning, a sunny day in London, Grant Smith decided to make use of the good light and set out to take some photographs of Christ Church on the corner of Newgate and King Edward Street. Australian-born Smith has lived in the capital for more than 25 years. He is an award-winning architectural and construction photographer, but this was a personal project.

'I've been making a study of the Wren churches in the City,' he explains. 'The church was rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren in the late 17th century after being destroyed in the Great Fire. 'It was heavily damaged during the Blitz, so all that remains are two walls and a steeple - there's a public garden where the rest of the church once stood - and it's beautiful.'

But not everyone approved of this innocent activity. Smith was standing on the corner with his cameras when he was approached by a security guard from the neighbouring Bank of America Merrill Lynch building. 'He asked me for ID,' says Smith. 'I politely explained that I didn't need to provide ID as I was standing in a public place. Then another, more senior, security guard came out. 'Again, I said that I didn't have to say who I was, and withdrew to the other side of the road.'

Smith was then approached by a Police Community Support Officer (PCSO) who demanded to know what he was doing. Their conversation was cut short by the noisy arrival of blaring police sirens bearing down from the east and west. As Smith watched in astonishment-three police cars, lights flashing frenetically, as well as a police riot van containing armed police officers, swerved into view and pulled up to investigate the 'incident' - which consisted of nothing more than a man taking pictures of a church in the capital in broad daylight.

Fortunately, as a professional photographer, Smith knew exactly what was going on, so he was more angry than distressed. This had, after all, happened to him before. Nor is he the only one. Up and down the country, every day, people whose only 'crime' is to be carrying a camera and using it to take harmless snapshots of landmarks - or even, in one extraordinary case, a fish and chip shop - are being stopped, questioned by the police and asked to give their personal details. Sometimes, they are told (wrongly) that they are not allowed to take photographs - despite being in a public place. On occasion, the police have even (illegally) asked people to delete photographs from their camera. This is happening to tourists, day-trippers, sightseers and amateur photographers, as well as professionals.

The reason for this absurdity is a controversial piece of legislation known as Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000. Section 44 gives police the right to stop and search anyone within certain geographical areas without the usual requirement of reasonable suspicion. It was brought in as a counter-terrorism measure. But, increasingly, members of the general public are complaining that because of it they are being treated like potential terrorists on reconnaissance missions.

'It's an issue that has affected our readers a lot,' says Chris Cheesman, news editor of Amateur Photographer magazine. 'Some of the reports that come in are bizarre. 'One man from Kent, for example, was visiting relatives in Hull and while he was there decided to have a wander in the city centre. He was taking pictures when he was stopped and told not to, on the grounds that some of the buildings were sensitive.'

Jeff Moore, chairman of the British Press Photographers Association (BPPA), concurs. 'It's a constant thing. It's particularly prevalent in London and around Westminster. 'I'm asked to speak at lots of events across the country and this subject comes up again and again. I hear about it from landscape photographers, members of the public, reams of people - anyone of any description who might have a camera. 'There was one case of a professor of history who was stopped because he was taking a photograph of a park bench in South London, for goodness sake.'

The thinking behind Section 44 was that by giving each force the opportunity to designate entire areas of their region as 'stop-and-search-zones' it would help police protect places considered to be vulnerable to terrorist attacks - for example, railway stations, power plants and government buildings. The trouble is, because areas covered by Section 44 are often kept secret - for fear that it would help terrorists plan attacks - it is impossible to know whether you are in one or not. Indeed, we are not even allowed to know how many such areas there are nationwide, nor how many square miles they cover.

Many feel there is also a problem with over-zealous policing, particularly by Community Support officers and junior police officers; others blame the imprecise legislation. Two campaign groups, www.notacrime.com and 'I'm a photographer not a terrorist', set up to provide information for those uncertain of their rights, have each attracted support from several thousand people over the past few months.

There is certainly no shortage of ridiculous examples of innocent photographers being stopped and questioned in a way that many find intimidating. Two weeks ago, BBC photographer Jeff Overs was standing outside the Tate Modern by the Thames in London, taking pictures of sunset over St Paul's Cathedral, when he was approached by a policewoman and a community support officer who said they were 'stopping people who were taking photographs as a counter-terrorism measure'.

Overs was asked to give his name, address and date of birth and issued with an anti-terrorism stop-and-search form - this in a place full of people enjoying a classic view of the capital, many of them recording it on their camera or mobile phone. 'I was outraged at such an infringement on my liberty,' says Overs. 'Foreign tourists must think Britain has become a police state.'

Indeed. In April, two Austrians were taken aback when they were stopped at Walthamstow bus station in East London where, like so many millions of other visitors to Britain before them, they had been taking pictures of London's famous red buses. They were asked to delete their pictures and, unaware that police have no authority to enforce this without a warrant, they complied. If they had not, there is no guarantee that their perceived hostility would not have got them into a tighter corner.

Alex Turner, from Kent, discovered the cost of questioning police authority in the summer, after he was stopped by two men on Chatham High Street while taking a picture of a fish and shop called Mick's Plaice. According to Turner's account the men refused properly to identify themselves. When he continued to question their authority, they summoned uniformed police. He took pictures of the two officers as they approached him - and was then arrested, held handcuffed in a police van for more than 20 minutes, searched, and interviewed by two plain-clothes officers.

As Andrew White, from Brighton, points out, it all seems a terrible waste of resources at a time when public services are already stretched to the limits. Mr White was taking photographs of the Christmas decorations in Burgess Hill, West Sussex, as he walked to work when he was stopped and asked for his details. He says: 'I don't think taking too many photos in the street warrants being considered as some kind of terrorist threat. Surely the money spent on getting PCSOs to harass me in the street could be better spent elsewhere.'

The situation is all the more ridiculous when you consider that many of those who are stopped are taking pictures of streets or buildings that are already documented and available to anyone to search online, thanks to Google's photographic 'Streetview' project. Google sent a fleet of vehicles to take pictures of every street in major cities.

Austin Mitchell, MP for Grimsby, tabled an Early Day Motion condemning police action against lawful photography in public places. 'This is pure officiousness,' he says. 'Photography is a joy and a pleasure, not something to feel furtive and persecuted about. People have the right to take photographs and particularly of historic landmarks and buildings. 'Here we have PCSOs and also junior constables inhibiting people from taking them. It's nothing to do with terrorism, it's just a desire to throw weight around.' Mitchell also blames the law: 'If you pass legislation like that, you get silly consequences.'

A Home Office spokesman insists: 'We have no intention of Section 44 or Section 58A being used to criminalise ordinary people taking photos or legitimate journalistic activity. 'We have issued guidance to all police forces, advising that these offences should not be used to capture an innocent member of the public, tourist or responsible journalist taking a photograph of a police officer. These offences are intended to help protect those in the frontline of our counter-terrorism operations from terrorist attack.'

But Shami Chakrabarti, the director of civil rights pressure group Liberty, believes the law needs to be reassessed. 'Section 44 stops are not based on reasonable suspicion,' she says. 'And we know that less than one per cent result in arrest. 'Hassling photographers and preventing them from carrying out perfectly ordinary assignments helps nobody, but blame must rest squarely with Parliament. It is time for this blunt and overly broad power to be tightened.'

Some fear that if the situation continues, a gradual process of attrition will mean that in a few years' time people will feel too nervous about what they are and are not allowed to do, and that they will stop taking photographs of public buildings altogether. 'There is a danger to journalism,' says the British Press Photographers Association's Jeff Moore, 'because this is impeding the way we can report. And what about our pictorial history?

'When we think of the past, we think of iconic images, like the one taken by Bert Hardy of two women sitting on railings on the seafront with their skirts blowing around their waist. But if things go on, we run the risk that the visual history of our country will not be recorded. 'We won't have anything like that in future. It will only be recorded by the state, through police pictures, or security firms, through CCTV cameras.' Then Big Brother really will have triumphed.

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The marigold extract that appears to have saved one man's sight

Worth a try in the absence of anything else, I suppose. Could be a spontaneous remission though

As a retired optician, Harry Marsland knew better than most how serious it was when he was diagnosed with an untreatable eye condition. But his tale of despair has turned into an astonishing story of recovery - thanks to the marigold plant. Mr Marsland, who at one stage needed help just to walk, could be the first person in the UK to have recovered from a devastating condition that causes blindness.

Within months of starting to take a food supplement containing marigold extracts he is driving a car again, reads without a magnifier and has near-perfect vision in the affected eye.

Mr Marsland, 73, suffered from age-related macular degeneration, which is responsible for half the cases of blindness in the country. After a number of standard vitamin treatments, which can only slow decline anyway, failed to work, he was handed a flyer that had been gathering dust in a doctor's drawer for almost a year. It promoted a vitamin supplement called Macushield, which contains mesozeaxanthin, derived from marigolds. 'I now know, professionally that I have recovered almost completely from the effects in my left eye,' he said yesterday. 'I am the first person to have such good fortune.'

Mr Marsland, from Oundle, Northamptonshire, started taking a 2mg capsule daily in April 2007. He paid £150 for it as it is not available on the NHS.

He has been blind in one eye since gambling on an experimental laser treatment in 2001, but the vision in his other eye is now 95 per cent as good as it was before. 'It was in August my wife Nina picked up my magnifying glass and realised it was dusty,' he said. 'She was the first to realise I no longer needed to use it. 'A few months later we were walking in the dark and I suddenly realised I was no longer holding on to my wife. It's miraculous, considering at one point I was literally blind in the dark.' Dry age-related macular degeneration happens when light-sensitive cells slowly break down.

SOURCE



Swine flu panic subsides

Like many similar panics before it

The swine flu pandemic is "considerably less lethal" than feared, with a death rate lower than 0.1 per cent, research by England's chief medical officer showed today. Twenty-six people have died for every 100,000 cases in England, an analysis of deaths to November 8 revealed. About 1per cent of the population in England has had swine flu with symptoms, of which 0.026 per cent died, the research added.

Sir Liam Donaldson, the Government's chief medical officer for England, led the study, published online in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), which described the low death rates as "fortunate". His study concluded: "The first influenza pandemic of the 21st century is considerably less lethal than was feared in advance."

Sir Liam wrote, however, that a lower impact than feared was not justification for "inaction". It was right to vaccinate people at risk - such as those with asthma, diabetes, heart disease and pregnant women - and to extend the programme, he went on.

"Viewed statistically, mortality in this pandemic compares favourably with 20th century influenza pandemics," he said. "A lower population impact than previous pandemics, however, is not a justification for public health inaction. "Our data support the priority vaccination of high risk groups. "Given that a substantial minority of deaths occur in previously healthy people, there is a case for extending the vaccination programme and for continuing to make early anti-viral treatment widely available."

The paper showed the estimated death rate was lowest among children aged five to 14, with around 11 deaths per 100,000 population. It was highest for those aged over 65, with 980 per 100,000. In the 138 people in whom the confirmed cause of death was pandemic flu, the typical age at death was 39. The analysis showed many of the patients who died were high risk and would have been eligible for vaccination.

"Two thirds of patients who died (92 or 67%) would now be eligible for the first phase of vaccination in England. "Fifty (36%) had no, or only mild, pre-existing illness. "Most patients (108, 78%) had been prescribed anti-viral drugs, but of these, 82 (76%) did not receive them within the first 48 hours of illness."

Sir Liam compares the pandemic with previous ones, saying "improvements in nutritional status, housing and health care availability might explain some of the apparent decrease in case fatality from one pandemic to the next". He added: "Since the most recent pandemic there have been major advances in intensive care medicine. "Many more patients may have died in England without the ready availability of critical care support, including mechanical ventilation."

SOURCE



Greenie thug "offended" by an accurate comparison

Behave like a 1930s German street thug and it is entirely just that you be compared to one

"A former Conservative peer has become embroiled in a row after he branded a Jewish climate change protester a member of the “Hitler Youth”. Lord Monckton, a global warming sceptic and former economic adviser to Margaret Thatcher, made the controversial comments during the Copenhagen climate change talks this week.

The Viscount was speaking at a fringe meeting held by lobby group Americans For Prosperity on Wednesday night when a group of youth delegates interrupted and started chanting.

The 57-year-old peer was said to be so outraged by the interruption from American sustainable development group SustainUS that he started calling the protesters the “Hitler Youth”. Lord Monckton continued to use the phrase during a lengthy exchange with the youngsters the following morning, when he confronted them at a separate event.

When Mr Wessel informed Lord Monckton he found the comment offensive and that his grandparents had “escaped the Nazis growing up in Germany”, Lord Monckton replied: “Because of the biofuel scam, world food prices have doubled. That it because of the global warming scare, which you won't look at the science of.

“As a result of that, millions are dying in third world countries because food prices have doubled because of the biofuel scam, because of the global warming scare.

Source

Breaking up the meetings of other political groups was a prime activity of the Nazi street thugs of the 1920s and 1930s





12 December, 2009

Black crime in Britain: Stop shooting messengers and face the truth

Sometimes knowledge is uncomfortable. But it is the mark of a civilised society that we do not sweep it under the carpet

In 413BC a traveller sat down in a barber’s shop in Piraeus, the Athenian port, and readied himself for a shave. He commiserated with the locals for the loss of their recent military expedition to Syracuse. The horror dawned; the traveller was first with the news. The barber flung down his tools and ran to the city, crying the news. His reward? The Athenians refused to believe that their navy had been destroyed, that their sons and brothers were dead or working as slaves in Sicilian mines. As Plutarch tells us, the barber was “fastened to the wheel and racked”.

This is how we so often treat those who tell us the truth we do not want to hear. History is littered with examples of messengers being shot, tortured and pilloried, literally and metaphorically. To quote Sophocles’ Antigone: “No one loves the messenger who brings bad news.” To misquote Corporal Jones: “We don’t like it up us.”

We assume that we are different from our forefathers; more tolerant and more willing to allow uncomfortable truths to be aired. We have a liberal democracy and we congratulate ourselves on a commitment to freedom of speech. Yet when the truth sits uncomfortably with our notions of what is right, when it clashes with our dearly held notions of tolerance, we are as squeamish as any of our ancestors. Few are as intolerant as the self-consciously tolerant.

Vitriol, if not bodily torture, awaited the columnist Rod Liddle who wrote on a blog for The Spectator this week: “The overwhelming majority of street crime, knife crime, gun crime, robbery and crimes of sexual violence in London is carried out by young men from the African-Caribbean community.”

A predictable storm engulfed Liddle, with accusations of racism flying. Yet here are the statistics from the Ministry of Justice. Some 12 per cent of London’s population is black. In 2007-08 black people accounted for 31.2 per cent of arrests for violence against the person; 31.4 per cent of arrests for sexual violence; 58.1 per cent of arrests for robbery; 29.8 per cent for theft and handling; 39.8 per cent for fraud and forgery 22.1 per cent for criminal damage, 38.7 per cent for drugs.

Liddle’s phrase “overwhelming majority” may be a distortion for effect, but there is undoubtedly some awkward reading in these figures for a society that wants to be colour blind, and has honed its righteous anti-racism. But what do we do with these figures? Stick our fingers in our ears and hum the National Anthem? Ignoring the truth is an insult to the victims and the perpetrators of these crimes. Both are products of something rotten in the state of urban black culture. Only by confronting the truth can we hope to address it.

But we draw away, afraid of the consequences of acknowledging the bald statistics. Truth meets our preconceptions and quails. In science, Mark Walport, director of the Wellcome Trust, describes this as “uncomfortable knowledge”: the idea that research can cause us to question how we order our society.

There is much uncomfortable knowledge to be found in genetics, and in our increasing understanding of the brain’s miraculous workings. Take the notion that men and women’s intelligence is different: women cluster around the average where men display more extremes of intelligence. Helena Cronin, a philosopher at the London School of Economics, calls it the “more dumb-bells, more Nobels” effect. I shudder at being the average shadow of more brilliant men, but I have no wish to shuffle the theory under a carpet and sit on it.

Our ever-deepening understanding of behavioural genetics throws up uncomfortable knowledge. It’s the old nature-nurture argument writ large, but with the implication that we are prisoners of our genes.

There is growing evidence, for example, that genes play a role in criminality: an idea that smacks dangerously of the determinism of Victorian phrenologists. A range of behavioural traits from depression to aggression has been linked to genes. A study in Nature this month found that obesity can be linked to a specific genetic defect.

Genetic research is in its relative infancy, and there is much still to understand about the interaction of our genes with our environment. But the implications are obvious and extreme. If intelligence is written in our genes, why aim for equal opportunities? Can criminals be culpable if they are genetically predisposed to be criminals? If genes are so dictatorial, what is free will? If fat is a genetic issue, sod it, I’ll have a Crunchie.

But there is a difference between the possession of uncomfortable knowledge and what we do with it. We can rise above our genetic inheritance and choose to have a society that celebrates the acquisition of knowledge, and the airing of truth, even when it hurts.

There seems to be a rising acceptance that unpalatable truths should be aired. Speech must be free, even where it is impolite to speak. A judge this week dismissed a case against a Christian hotelier couple accused of verbally abusing a Muslim guest. Their remarks were offensive, but not criminal. Sharon Vogelenzang told Ericka Tazi that her Islamic dress was a form of “bondage and oppression”. Less an uncomfortable truth, more an uncomfortable opinion, but one widely held.

We must fight against the type of dogma that does not allow itself to be challenged; whether it is of an isolationist Islam or Western middle-class cultural relativism. We must be braver about facing the truth, wherever it is found. A racist can look at the crime statistics and reach an abhorrent conclusion. A liberal can look at the same statistics and wonder how we can change them. Only a fool ignores them.

SOURCE



British Court Declares Judaism "Racist"

Given my frustration with First Things magazine’s registration problems, I probably should wait until this essay comes out from behind the registration wall to tell you about it. However, my disgust at the British Court’s recent rulings against Jews trumps my aggravation at First Things clunky on line registration glitches.

I have received the print edition for January 2010. Having read this appalling news, I am compelled to let you know about it. I can’t provide a URL for this essay, but next month it should be available (and by then I’ll be no less apoplectic about the UK court but perhaps the website issues of First Things) will have been resolved. David Goldman writes (and I am forced to transcribe by hand):

Since Oliver Cromwell allowed Jews to settle in England in 1656, Britain’s Jews have often suffered indignities, but have they ever undergone a legal assault on the practice of their religion within their own institutions? Certainly they have now.

On June 26, a British court of appeals labeled “racist” a founding premise of Judaism: the election of Abraham and his descendants and the determination of Jewish status by matrilineal descent. That the court’s decision is preposterous is the least of the matter. Not since the Middle Ages have Jews had to defend their religion before state authorities. And not since the Treaty of Westphalia have states claimed the right to compel changes in religious doctrine. For the first time in many years, a secular liberal state has arrogated to itself the right to determine the legality of millennia-old practices of a monotheistic religion.

Britain’s chief rabbi, Jonathan Sacks, was apoplectic, declaring, “An English court has declared [the religious definition of Jewish status] racist, and since this is an essential element of Jewish law, it is in effect declaring Judaism racist. To be told now that Judaism is racist is distressing. To confuse religion and race is a mistake.”

The leaders of the various forms of Judaism - Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform - have joined Rabbi Sacks in his condemnation of this ruling.

The Catholic Education Services of England and Wales gave public support to their Jewish colleagues. Oona Stannard, the director, said:

It is important that the right to determine who is a member of any religions ought to lie with the religious…I am extremely dismayed that the ruling has so far gone against our Jewish colleagues/providers of schools with a religious character. England’s chief Catholic prelate…fully backs the CES statement.

So what does the Archbishop of Canterbury say? Birds chirp in the bare, ruined choirs. Silence. They won’t be issuing a statement is what they said.

Meanwhile, that segment of Judaism known as the suicidal Jews (probably with a few Unitarians thrown in for good measure) hailed the ruling (warning: barf bag moment coming up here) because it would make Judaism “more inclusive”. There goes the idea of God’s chosen people, right down the chute with the rest of those who would attempt to differentiate themselves. Lovers of their own culture, nationalists, believers in sovereignty, those who thought the wall between Church and State was pretty well established...Forget it; we’re all racist hamburger now.

Except the Muslims, of course. They can continue to make their arrogant, in-your-face demands for their religious tenets. No pork, no Christmas, disruptive five-times-a-day prayer (wherever), separate schools, separate hospitals, separate pools, different rules, public threats to destroy the UK…that all pales beside the Jewish law regarding matrilineal descent.

This is a new low-water mark for British jurisprudence. You can read the full essay shortly, when it becomes the “current issue” on line at First Things. Meanwhile, I’ll close with Mr. Goldman’s final statement:

More than any other major Jewish population in the Diaspora, Britain’s Jewish community has attempted to steer clear of controversy - for example by keeping its distance from the state of Israel…but much as Britain’s Jews have tried to avoid trouble, trouble has come looking for them.

There is a moral in that somewhere…one that I hope Israel considers very carefully before it hands over any flu vaccines to Gaza. Just one Muslim death and the bombs will be flying, Jews will be dying.

Such perverted altruism has to stop before it gets any more people killed. Just as the rest of the world, particularly America, has got to take off its blinders regarding zombie jihadists like Major Hasan. We knew with fair certainty he was psychotic, but in the name of saving his superiors’ precious careers, we let him go on his merry way, until he had killed enough of us for people to take notice. Even then, it’s “shush, shush, can’t say it aloud/killing kufar makes the Jihadist proud”. No, the mantra is, instead: “wrong, wrong, you Islamophobes. The Religion of Peace shall rule the globe.”*

Close your eyes, cover your ears, yell real loud. Then when the blade is on your throat, or the bullet lodged in your son’s heart, you won’t be able to feel it till everything is over. Painless, right?

What a price to pay for a deeply false sense of security: a paralyzed fear that cannot speak its name.

SOURCE



The real "ClimateGate" scandal is in the CRU computer code

The emails and programmer comments have the advantage that anyone can understand them but -- as damning as the emails and comments are -- the real "smoking gun" evidence of fraud lies in the computer code used to produce the "statistics" that the CRU has published. They are not even "cherrypicked" statistics. They are a straight fraud. It's only by adding completely arbitrary and artificial "adjustments" to the data that they got their "hockey stick" -- thus making the CRU warming claims a complete and deliberate fraud -- an out-and-out hoax

It is fascinating to watch the mainstream media in America duck (and/or make excuses for) the greatest scam in modern history: the "science" behind man-made global warming. Even more entertaining, and far more enlightening, is to follow the analyses by the experts in computer programming of the recently disclosed methods used by the Climate Research Unit (CRU) from the University of East Anglia.

Most commentators in the media have been talking about the "REM" statements in the purloined e-mails and computer codes from the CRU [i]. True believers in anthropogenic global warming (AGW), especially those in the mainstream and "scientific" media, are pooh-poohing such words as "tricks" or "hide the decline" as interoffice slang that had no real impact on how the science was conducted.

But the real action (and the evidence for chicanery) is in the computer code obtained from the CRU. Our own computer guru Marc Sheppard, writing for American Thinker here and here, was one of the first to offer an accurate diagnosis of this fraudulent method of computer programming. Analyzing the code, as Marc has indicated in his work, is a complex business. As he pleads in one article, "please bear with me while I get a tad techie on you."

For the layman readers of American Thinker, I want to explain in a simple manner what went on in the construction of one piece of the controversial programming.

A bit of background: The cornerstone of the evidence for global warming presented by Al Gore and the AGW crowd was a notorious graph that became known as "the hockey stick graph." The graph is based on computer models that supposedly prove our planet has heated exponentially in the last half-century due to increasing amounts of man-made CO2 released into the atmosphere. Proponents further claim (and the computer models purport to show) that temperatures will continue to increase exponentially. The implication is that unless we drastically curtail human output of CO2, the "escalation" in temperature is going to get even worse even faster.

Turns out that these claims are absolutely false, and the computer models have been rigged.

Here is one version of the famous "hockey stick" graph:

Now that is scary [ii]! According to the now-debunked myth, global temperatures started going through the roof about sixty years ago. They will to continue to rise and bring unimaginable disaster. Except they haven't, and they probably won't.

Now to the CRU code that maintains these fictional monstrosities. Pay particular attention to the black line at the far right of the "hockey stick" in Graph 1. The black line starts at about 1900. (This is the same period of time addressed by the code we will examine.) The black line looks something like this very simplified version:

The x-axis (horizontal) shows time. The y-axis (vertical) shows temperature. In the last few decades, the temperature, according to AGW enthusiasts, has been climbing off the charts.

Marc Sheppard discovered and showed us this bit of programming taken from the CRU documents:

yrloc=[1400,findgen(19)*5.+1904]

valadj=[0.,0.,0.,0.,0.,-0.1,-0.25,-0.3,0.,-0.1,0.3,0.8,1.2,1.7,2.5,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6]*0.75         ; fudge factor

The long string of bold numbers in the second set of brackets is the "fudge factor" applied (supposedly) to the raw data [iii]. This string of numbers "adjusts" the raw data from 1904 to 1994 in five-year increments. Here is what these nineteen numbers roughly look like on a simple graph (each bar below represents a number in bold above):

I have left a space between the bars that represent each number so the reader can compare the temperature line to the numbers from the program. Time is once again indicated by the x-axis (horizontal). Temperature is portrayed on the y-axis (vertical).

The numbers in the code indicate a degree of cheating that is actually much larger than I was able to show with the bars in Graph 3 [iv].

We can now prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the hockey stick is an absolute ruse. The hockey stick graph cannot possibly be based on the actual data. (...Wherever and whatever that data might have been, that is. The CRU has admitted destroying the raw data.)

Even if the numbers in the program were not added to the aggregate temperatures (of each preceding period [v]), the numbers in the code plot like this:

Graph 4 this still looks an awful lot like the "hockey stick." In short, no matter how you read the code, it was designed to create a phony outcome.

But don't take my word for it. Computer experts everywhere are all over this particular con game, and many other deceptions, that came out of the CRU files.

Many years ago, I was an instructor in logic at the university level. Some of my best students were young people who planned on entering the new, exciting, rapidly expanding, and lucrative fields of computer science and computer programming.

A solid grasp of logic was, and still is, a great way to start an education in the computer sciences -- since computer programs are grounded in the basic rules and the syntax (sometimes slightly adjusted) of Boolean logic.

Computer programmers are often referred to as "nerds." In fact, they are meticulous; they have to be. Their programs don't work if they're lazy, or skips a step, or ignores the rules of logic and syntax that make computers do the job they are supposed to do. This is why competent computer programmers can spot a phony and a cheater from a mile away.

Writing the beautiful and logical structure of a computer code is almost like writing music. It is very easy for a skilled computer programmer to detect code that is "out of tune." Computer nerds are literally shouting about the audacity of the obviously contrived bit of code we have just examined. They are screaming in Germany, in America, and in lots of other places. Read the comments to these postings -- there are some good ones. (There are also efforts by true believers to justify the code. Try following the logic of the post in that last link.)

The bottom line is that if this kind of code were to be used by, say, an insurance actuary -- or by someone writing banking software or for tracking the stock market -- the programmer would immediately be fired...and probably face criminal prosecution.

The truth about the hockey stick hoax is slowly leaking out. New Zealand climate scientists released a similar doctored graph (for temperatures in New Zealand) that looked like this:

The scientists in New Zealand didn't destroy the raw data. (Oops.) The raw temperature data from New Zealand, when fed into a computer without a "fudge factor," looks like this:

In short, New Zealand has not heated up in the last 150 years. Not a bit. Zealous scientists promoting AGW (not the actual weather) caused the "warming" in New Zealand.  (Notice how closely the doctored Graph 5 from New Zealand resembles doctored Graph 1 and the code from the CRU we have examined.)

Any computer programmer worth his or her salt will tell you, "Garbage in, garbage out." The garbage in the AGW debate turns out to be the scientists who are writing fraudulent computer codes. Time to take out the trash.

SOURCE



Another "trust us" claim

Not a single scientific fact is referred to below. This is bureacracy, not science

The Met Office has embarked on an urgent exercise to bolster the reputation of climate-change science after the furore over stolen e-mails.

More than 1,700 scientists have agreed to sign a statement defending the “professional integrity” of global warming research. They were responding to a round-robin request from the Met Office, which has spent four days collecting signatures. The initiative is a sign of how worried it is that e-mails stolen from the University of East Anglia are fuelling scepticism about man-made global warming at a critical moment in talks on carbon emissions.

One scientist said that he felt under pressure to sign the circular or risk losing work. The Met Office admitted that many of the signatories did not work on climate change.

John Hirst, the Met Office chief executive, and Julia Slingo, its chief scientist, wrote to 70 colleagues on Sunday asking them to sign “to defend our profession against this unprecedented attack to discredit us and the science of climate change”. They asked them to forward the petition to colleagues to generate support “for a simple statement that we . . . have the utmost confidence in the science base that underpins the evidence for global warming”.

Met Office reports on temperature changes draw on the work of the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, from which the e-mails were hacked. Phil Jones, unit director, has agreed to stand down while an investigation takes place into claims that he manipulated data to exaggerate the warming trend and tried to block publication of alternative views.

One scientist told The Times he felt under pressure to sign. “The Met Office is a major employer of scientists and has long had a policy of only appointing and working with those who subscribe to their views on man-made global warming,” he said.

Professor Slingo denied that the Met Office had put anyone under pressure. “The response has been absolutely spontaneous. As a scientist you sign things you agree with, not because you are worried about what the Met Office might think of you,” she said.

The 1,700 signatories, a fraction of the research scientists working in Britain, include Sir John Houghton, former chairman of the science working group of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Sir Brian Hoskins, head of the Grantham Institute at Imperial College, and Professor Lord Hunt of Chesterton, a climate scientist at University College London.

Professor Slingo said the statement was carefully worded to avoid claiming all climate scientists were beyond reproach. It says the evidence for man-made global warming is “deep and extensive” and comes from “decades of painstaking and meticulous research by many thousands of scientists across the world who adhere to the highest levels of professional integrity”.

Benny Peiser, of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, which claims man-made climate change has been exaggerated, said the petition showed that the Met Office was rattled.

SOURCE





11 December, 2009

Newborn baby died after staff at 'chaotic' British government hospital ruled out caesarean

A newborn baby died after receiving 'chaotic' care at an understaffed maternity unit, an inquest heard yesterday. Ebony McCall died shortly after she was born after medical staff failed to spot her erratic heartbeat, it was alleged.

Her mother, Amanda McCall, 18, had been admitted in severe pain to the Milton Keynes General Hospital's maternity unit the day before she gave birth.

Doctors missed two chances to save Ebony's life at the hospital - which was criticised earlier this year for blunders which led to the death of another baby. Miss McCall and her parents had asked for an emergency surgical delivery because of the pain she was in, but doctors ruled against it. Then they failed to spot Ebony's erratic heartbeat and so did not order an emergency caesarean.

Staff were overstretched as 12 mothers gave birth at the unit that night - and only four midwives were on duty, the court heard. Miss McCall was only given a caesarean section after her mother Breda became so concerned about the heart monitor reading that she pressed a panic button. Ebony was born at 3.21am on May 9 this year weighing 7lbs 4oz. She died at 3.54am from lack of oxygen.

Miss McCall was 40 weeks pregnant when she was admitted to the hospital with abdominal pain, the inquest in Milton Keynes heard. After her admission she, her mother and her father Terry, a police sergeant, begged doctors for a caesarean because of the pain. Midwife Tamara Jackson agreed as Miss McCall's state was 'distressing for the baby'. But doctors decided it was not strictly medically necessary, the inquest heard.

After the baby was born, only to die shortly after, Miss McCall's mother confronted Dr Nandini Gupta in the delivery room. Glenna Murray, a senior nurse, recalled: 'She kissed the baby and told the baby it wasn't her [the baby's] fault. She then asked Dr Gupta why didn't she have a caesarean section when she asked for it. 'Dr Gupta said she had spoken to her consultant colleagues and said there was no indication for caesarean section at that time.'

Paul Wood, a consultant obstetrician, reviewed notes of the labour as an expert witness. He said Miss McCall should have been 'the highest priority' due to her health problems including a faulty heart valve, only one working kidney and curvature of the spine. Mr Wood said Miss McCall should have had a midwife by her at all times and one-to-one care would 'probably' have saved Ebony's life.

By 10.30pm, Miss McCall was diagnosed as in labour and 'she was rolling in pain'. Mr Wood said: 'At that point, due to the pressures on the maternity unit, the management of labour from there on was somewhat chaotic.'

An official report earlier this year criticised the hospital for low staffing levels which led to the death of another baby, Romy Feast, in 2007.

SOURCE



Simple test shows whether cancer drug will work - but NHS does not use it

British cancer patients are missing out on the latest and best drugs because the NHS lacks the capacity to exploit them, one of the country’s most senior medical scientists has told The Times.

The introduction of a new generation of powerful cancer therapies is being held up by poor access to critical genetic tests, according to Sir John Bell, Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford University and President of the Academy of Medical Sciences. The new medicines, such as Iressa (gefitinib) for lung cancer and Erbitux (cetuximab) for colorectal cancer, can be highly effective, but against tumours only with a particular genetic profile. DNA tests are needed before they can be prescribed.

While several of these drugs are licensed in Britain, they are rarely used by the NHS because there is no system for commissioning the genetic tests, Sir John said. The science and technology were “ready to rock’n’ roll” and it was time for ministers to “get with the programme”.

“Genomic medicine is going to change the way we use drugs and that’s already starting with cancer,” he said. “We’re increasingly able to define cancer by its molecular pathology rather than its site of origin, and to prescribe drugs accordingly. That’s taking us from drugs that are effective in 10 per cent of patients, to drugs that work in 80 to 90 per cent of the population with a particular genetic type. “The big question is where is the NHS in all of this. Mostly, it is unprepared. It doesn’t have the testing capacity. With all these drugs coming through, you would imagine that all the clinical genetics labs would be ready to offer the tests they require. None is.”

Sir John’s criticisms come six months after a House of Lords inquiry found that the NHS was not ready to take advantage of genetic advances in healthcare. He said that scientific developments since the report was published had made action more urgent.

Iressa was licensed this summer after trials showed impressive results against lung cancers that carry a mutation in a gene called EGFR. As it does not work against tumours without that mutation, a test is required before it is used.

Another example is Erbitux, which can be effective against bowel and head and neck tumours but fails to work when a gene called KRAS is mutated. A test for the gene costs about £150. Erbitux is approved by the National Institute for Health and Clinical excellence, though Iressa will not be appraised until next year.

Glivec (imatinib), which has transformed chronic myeloid leukaemia from an incurable to a treatable disease, has been found to work against gastrointestinal stromal tumours with a particular genetic profile. Early trials of a drug made by the company Plexxikon have also suggested marked effects against malignant melanomas with a certain mutation in the BRAF gene.

These discoveries run counter to ministers’ claims that the benefits of genomic medicine lie in the future, Sir John said. “The past six months have proven that to be so wrong. We are running into this now. All the big centres in the US have got this sort of molecular profiling in place, but it doesn’t happen here. Come on guys, let’s get with the programme.

“There are some very talented people in the NHS, but it needs to get powered up. We are so in a position to do this. We’ve got the technology base and the scientific underpinning to do this, we’re ready to rock’n’ roll. The real problem is it runs into the sand because the commissioning isn’t right, or because of lack of willingness to accept the unknown.”

Sir John’s criticisms were supported by Peter Johnson, chief clinician for Cancer Research UK. “The provision of testing is fragmentary. There are some private labs doing it, there are some research laboratories doing it, and there are some NHS pathology departments doing it. But it isn’t at the moment subject to any overarching plan or co-ordination, which means that although it can be done, it’s more difficult than it needs to be. As is often the case, moving from research to routine practice is proving awkward. “There is definitely a need for a concerted programme to put in place testing for the things we know about, and to get ready for things we haven’t yet discovered but are about to,” he said.

The Department of Health said: “Our response to the House of Lords report on genomic medicine will address this. We know that the ability to develop sophisticated diagnostic approaches, and use them well, is central to achieving ever better outcomes for patients.”

SOURCE



Migrant numbers double in 30 years: One in ten living in the UK is now foreign-born

The number of immigrants living in Britain has almost doubled in less than three decades, official figures show. More than 10 per cent of the population - 6.7million - were born abroad, the Office for National Statistics has found. The analysis shows that the count of those born abroad - now agreed to be the best figure for measuring the rate of immigration - is two million higher than it was just eight years ago. And the figure is nearly double the 3.38million people born abroad who were recorded as living in Britain in 1981.

The scale of immigration over the past few years was set out in a breakdown by National Statistician Jil Matheson, the recently-appointed head of the Government's Office for National Statistics. She said that there are 689,000 migrants from Eastern Europe in Britain, an increase of 522,000 since Poland and seven other Eastern European countries joined the EU in 2004. But these make up only one in ten of the foreign-born population of the country, Miss Matheson found.

She also endorsed the ONS projections that say that the UK population will hit the politically sensitive 70million mark in 2029. She added the recession is likely to have only a small impact on the record levels of immigration since 2001.

The ONS report found that Eastern Europeans have begun to emigrate as well as to arrive in Britain, and overall 20,000 more Eastern Europeans came to this country than left it in 2008. Current research, Miss Matheson added, suggests that 'a short-term period of falling immigration can be expected, before immigration levels rise again to pre-recession levels'. She concluded: 'The current recession is likely to have a small and temporary effect on net migration.'

Her findings run counter to assurances from Gordon Brown and Immigration Minister Phil Woolas that the new Home Office points-based immigration system will curb numbers coming into the country and the 70million population mark will never be reached.

Sir Andrew Green, of the Migrationwatch think-tank, said: 'This report confirms the massive impact of immigration on our population under the present Government. 'It must be brought under control, but so far Government policies are completely inadequate for the purpose.'

However, Border and Immigration Minister Phil Woolas said: 'These population projections do not take into account the impact of future government policies or those Eastern Europeans who came here, contributed, and are now going home. 'Projections are uncertain. For instance in the 1960s they said our population would reach 76million by the year 2000, this was off target by 16million.' He added: 'And let's be clear the category "foreign-born mothers" includes British people born overseas - such as children whose parents are in the armed forces or those who come to Britain at a very early age.'

Previous research counted the number of foreign passport holders, but with many being granted British citizenship counting those who are foreign born is now thought to give the most accurate figure.

The findings on the scale of immigration follow evidence that the arrival of large numbers of migrant workers has pushed down wages and living standards for low-paid workers. A report last week by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation charity found that the poorest-paid working families have been getting poorer and suffering greater unemployment not since the onset of recession, but from 2004 onwards during a time of economic boom.

SOURCE



Climategate: ordering a better scare for the colonials

The exchange and comments presented below by Andrew Bolt include something that is really explosive for anyone with the most basic knowledge of statistics. The Warmist scientist has undertaken to present changes that are not statistically significant (i.e. random changes) as if they WERE statistically significant. See the update at the foot of the article. Once again we see a total lack of scientific integrity among Warmists. The UEA is just a propaganda institution. It's not a real university's anus

CSIRO alarmist Barrie Pittock tells off Climategate scientist Mike Hulme of the University of East Anglia for not presenting material that’s scary enough for green groups:

I would be very concerned if the material comes out under WWF auspices in a way that can be interpreted as saying that “even a greenie group like WWF” thinks large areas of the world will have negligible climate change. But that is where your 95% confidence limit leads. Sorry to be critical, but better now than later!…

Dr A. Barrie Pittock

Post-Retirement Fellow*, Climate Impact Group

CSIRO Atmospheric Research

Hulme agrees to help, up to a point, to hide some doubts:

My reason for introducing the idea of only showing changes in T and P that *exceed* some level of ‘natural’ variability was a pedagogic one, rather than a formal statistical one (I concede that using ‘95% confidence’ terminology in the WWF leaflet is misleading and will drop this). And the pedagogic role of this type of visual display is to bring home to people that (some, much or all of) GCM simulated changes in mean seasonal precip. for some regions do *not* amount to anything very large in relation to what may happen in the future to precip. anyway…

The point behind all this is to emphasise that precip. changes are less well-defined than temp. changes *and* that we should be thinking of adaptation to *present* levels of precip. variability, rather than getting hung up on the problems of predicting future precip. levels. This pedagogic thinking is hard to communicate in a short WWF brochure.

Your concern about my message is well taken, however, and I intend to remove any reference to 95% confidence levels, to re-word the text to indicate that we are plotting precip. changes only ‘where they are large relative to natural variability’, and to reduce my threshold to the 1 sigma level of HadCM2 control variability (e.g. this has the effect of showing precip. changes for the majority of Australia even in the B1 scenario).

But I do not intend to abandon the concept. I think it important - even for Greenie groups - to present sober assessments of magnitudes of change. Thus making it clear that future changes in T are better defined that future changes in P, and also to point out that future emissions (and therefore climate change) may be as low as the B1 scenario (is B1 climate change negligible? I almost think so), whilst also being possibly as high as A2 is I think very important.

The alternative is to think that such a more subtle presentation is too sophisticated for WWF. But I think (hope) not. Thanks again Barrie for forcing me to think through this again.

Pittock then explains why he’s so keen to “improve” this material - and also illustrates just how close green groups are to the CSIRO (whose climate change risk expert Penny Whetton is married to a Greens politician):

I should perhaps explain my delicate position in all this. As a retired CSIRO person I have somewhat more independence than before, and perhaps a reduced sense of vested interest in CSIRO, but I am still closely in touch and supportive of what CAR is doing. Also, I have a son who is now a leading staff member of WWF in Australia and who is naturally well informed on climate change issues. Moreover, Michael Rae, who is their local climate change staffer, is a member of the CSIRO sector advisory committee (along with some industry people as well) and well known to me. So I anticipated questions from WWF Australia, and from the media later when the scenarios are released...

Hulme then alerts another colleague to this exchange, under an interesting header, as an example of the massaging of their message to fit an audience:

From: Mike Hulme

To: Jennifer F Crossley

Subject: Re: masking of WWF maps

... it illustrates nicely the nuances of presenting climate scenarios in different Fora

Word sure had got around the green traps about how helpful the University of East Anglia was prepared to be to green campaigners. Here is an email from green entrepreneur Adam Markham to Hulme, asking for “beefed up” scares and directing him to Pittock’s more alarming scenarios, as and example of what WWF likes:

From: Adam Markham

Subject: WWF Australia

Date: Thu, 29 Jul 1999 09:43:09 -0400

Hi Mike,

I’m sure you will get some comments direct from Mike Rae in WWF Australia, but I wanted to pass on the gist of what they’ve said to me so far. They are worried that this may present a slightly more conservative approach to the risks than they are hearing from CSIRO. In particular, they would like to see the section on variability and extreme events beefed up if possible. They regard an increased likelihood of even 50% of drought or extreme weather as a significant risk. Drought is also a particularly importnat issue for Australia, as are tropical storms.

I guess the bottom line is that if they are going to go with a big public splash on this they need something that will get good support from CSIRO scientists (who will certainly be asked to comment by the press). One paper they referred me to, which you probably know well is:  “The Question of Significance” by Barrie in Nature Vol 397, 25 Feb 1999, p 657

Let me know what you think. Adam

UPDATE

Reader Grant:

There is an explosive admission in this exchange that needs to be drawn out and it is to do with the following comment:

Your concern about my message is well taken, however, and I intend to remove any reference to 95% confidence levels, to re-word the text to indicate that we are plotting precip. changes only ‘where they are large relative to natural variability’, and to reduce my threshold to the 1 sigma level of HadCM2 control variability (e.g. this has the effect of showing precip. changes for the majority of Australia even in the B1 scenario

In statistics this is important because any 1st year undergrad is told that the scientific approach for testing for significance is a 2-sigma test; ie the 95% confidence interval. Results that are significant at no more than 1-sigma significant are as good as meaningless in the sense that they are no different to sheer randomness and would be laughed all the way out of a 1st year course on stats.

SOURCE



How it all works out in the weird world of Warmism

The EU Referendum blog has a fascinating story on how Cap'n Trade--or, as it's called in Europe, the "emission trading scheme"--works. It seems that the Corus Group, a London-based steel maker that is a subsidiary of India's Tata Group, is shutting down one of its plants--a plant the company bought just two years ago "as part of its strategy to give it better access to European (including UK markets) [sic]."

Closing the plant, the site explains, will give the company an ETS jackpot:

With redundancy and decommissions costs, very little of that can actually come from the process of closing down the Redcar plant. But, with a capacity of 3,000,000 tons of steel, closure of the plant will deliver further "savings" over 6 million tons of carbon dioxide, worth an additional £80 million per annum at current rates but around £200 million at expected market levels.

This, even for a company the size of Tara steel, is a considerable windfall, over and above the money it will already make from the EU scheme. But, with a little manipulation, the company can still double its money. By "offshoring" production to India and bringing emissions down – from over twice the EU level--to the level currently produced by the Redcar plant, it stands to make another £200 million per annum from the UN's Clean Development Mechanism.

Thus we see Indian plants being paid up to £30 a ton for each ton of carbon dixoide "saved" by building new plant, while the company which owns them also gets gets paid £30 for each ton of carbon dioxide not produced in its Redcar plant. That gives it an estimated £400 million a year from the closure of the Redcar plant up to 2012--potentially up to £1.2 billion. And that is over and above benefitting from cheaper production costs on the sub-continent.

So the company gets a windfall for moving jobs from Britain to India, and the new plant will produce no less carbon than before. Brilliant, isn't it? We can't wait till America has such a policy.

SOURCE



'Freedom of speech' victory as Christian hoteliers are CLEARED of insulting Muslim woman

Aggressive accuser attempts to play the "Muslim card" -- but is unconvincing

Christian hoteliers accused of insulting a Muslim guest for wearing the hijab and berating her for her beliefs were dramatically cleared this afternoon. Benjamin and Sharon Vogelenzang denied using threatening, abusive or insulting words which were religiously aggravated against white British Muslim convert Ericka Tazi, 60.

District Judge Richard Clancy, who heard the case in the absence of a jury, told the couple that religion and politics was the 'tinderbox which set the whole thing alight and it would appear because of strongly entrenched positions that is what has happened here'. Explaining his reasons for dismissing the case, he said Mrs Tazi's claim that she was verbally attacked by the couple for up to an hour had not been borne out by other prosecution witnesses, who suggested that any discussions lasted around seven minutes.

Judge Clancy also highlighted Mrs Tazi's use of language. When describing how she was provoked by the couple about her hijab she used words to the effect of: 'Would you prefer it if I got my tits out?' He said: 'I mention this because when I read that together with what she said about 'them taking the piss' it doesn't quite form the same religious view that was put to me on the stand'. Judge Clancy said: 'I'm not satisfied on the facts that this case has been made out.'

His decision was greeted by prolonged applause from the couple's supporters in the public gallery. Outside, Sharon Vogelenzang told reporters: 'We've been found innocent of any crime. It has been a very difficult nine months and we are looking forward to rebuilding our business and getting on with our lives. 'We would like to thank all those who have supported us, our family, our friends, our church and Christians all around the world, and non-Christians. 'And as Christmas approaches we wish everybody peace and goodwill.'

Mrs Tazi told the court yesterday that she was left traumatised after being insulted by the couple while a guest at The Bounty House Hotel in Aintree, Liverpool, on March 20. She said they laughed at her when she came down wearing a hijab on her final day at the hotel and shouted at her, saying her Islamic dress was a form of bondage and that she had provoked an argument by wearing it.

Mrs Tazi, who converted to Islam when she married a Muslim 18 months ago, was staying at the hotel while she attended a pain management clinic at Aintree Hospital for her fibromyalgia. She claimed Mr Vogelenzang called the prophet Mohammed a murderer and a warlord and likened him to Saddam Hussein and Hitler. But the couple denied her version of events and claimed Mrs Tazi told them Jesus was a minor prophet and that the Bible was untrue.

Earlier, the court heard how the Vogelenzangs' B&B had suffered as a result of the case. Benjamin Vogelenzang, 53, accused Mrs Tanzi of trying to ruin his business during heated scenes in court. The hotelier raised his voice and thumped the witness box before he was told to behave by Judge Clancy. His 54-year-old wife, Sharon, told the court that takings were down by 80 per cent since they were prosecuted for a public order offence.

Benjamin Vogelenzang told prosecutor Anya Horwood in cross examination: 'At the time I was persuaded she (Ericka) was quite a nice person.' Raising his voice, and thumping the witness box for emphasis, he continued: 'I was mistaken, you know why? She wasn't a nice person, she wasn't a loving person, she ratted to the police and is trying to make us lose our business.' His outburst prompted Judge Clancy to tell him: 'Behave yourself please.' When Mr Vogelenzang returned to the dock to sit alongside his wife he bowed his head and cried.

The court heard that the couple, who have five adopted children and have fostered a Muslim boy, returned to the hotel after a holiday in Scotland three days before the alleged incident on March 20. They learned from the hotel manager that guests had engaged in robust debates about religion over the dinner table, with Mrs Tazi and a self confessed 'happy clappy Christian' taking the lead.

Mr Vogelenzang told his defence counsel, Hugh Tomlinson QC, that, on the morning of March 20, he spotted Mrs Tazi wearing the hijab, the traditional Islamic dress, and told her: 'You look tiny' before walking off. He said that, when he next saw her, she was talking to his wife and told the court he overheard the following conversation: 'Her wording was, in essence, 'I've tried all the religions, I've tried Jesus, it didn't work for me but the Bible is untrue anyway and Jesus is a minor prophet'. 'She called Our Lord a minor prophet. My reaction was 'You haven't prayed alone and asked God to prove himself to you'. 'Because she was a small person I sat next to her and just gently said that to her.'

He admitted that his wife may have referred to the hijab as a form of bondage and said Mrs Tazi replied: 'My husband doesn't even want me to wear it, but I wear it as I love Allah.' He told the court: 'Great, that's fine. At least she wears it because of the love she has.'

Mr Vogelenzang said Mrs Tazi then went off into the dining room and he belatedly went after her to make light of the situation. He told the court he reeled off a list of historical figures, including Caesar, Nero, Hitler, Mao and Saddam Hussein. Mr Vogelenzang said: 'She took the examples of history and she started provoking me by saying 'Oh, will you tell me then that I'm a murderer, that I'm a Nazi? You're telling me I'm a terrorist?' 'I never meant it this way.' He denied shouting at her or referring to the prophet Mohammed as a warlord.

Mr Vogelenzang told Ms Horwood that Mrs Tazi was not in tears but left the hotel 'as cool as a cucumber' and that he had the ability 'not to take offence'.

Mrs Vogelenzang told the court that Mrs Tazi seemed determined to get a response from her about her hijab. She said the guest approached her and said: 'You didn't know I was a Muslim, did you?'' The hotelier replied that she had known, the court heard. Mrs Vogelenzang said Mrs Tazi then came up to her and said she 'was still the nice, kind Ericka you know'.

She said she was 'stopped in her tracks' when she heard Mrs Tazi say to her husband that, 'Jesus was a minor prophet and the Bible was not true'. She told her: 'I'm afraid we'd have to disagree with you there. We believe Jesus died on the cross for our sins.'

Mrs Vogelenzang said Mrs Tazi told her: 'It's my choice to put this outfit on' and said she replied: 'I can't understand why you would want to put yourself into bondage.' She explained that she used the phrase 'bondage' because she understood that Muslim women lacked the freedom to make many choices in their lives.

Mrs Vogelenzang also told Mr Tomlinson, her defence counsel, that she went into the dining room after hearing raised voices and, when Mrs Tazi spotted her, 'she charged towards me with her hand thrust up at my face and said 'Get away from me, get out of my face''.

Yesterday, Christians gathered outside Liverpool magistrates' court to support the couple.

Mrs Tazi, who suffers from the chronic pain condition fibromyalgia, spent a month at the hotel earlier this year while attending a course of therapy at a nearby hospital. The former Roman Catholic from Warrington, who converted to Islam last year, gave evidence after swearing an oath to Allah and kissing the Koran. She wore a hijab and ankle-length gown in court similar to the outfit she was wearing on the day of the alleged confrontation. She told the court she had worn Western clothes until the final day of her course.

SOURCE



British schools use "dirty" tricks to attract best pupils, research finds

State secondary schools are "gazumping" each other to attract the best pupils, research published today on school admissions has revealed. Headteachers are employing underhand tactics, such as courting the parents of very bright children and manipulating waiting lists, academics from the London School of Economics said.

The findings came as the chief schools adjudicator warned that the government's new code on school admissions provided a "bonanza" for lawyers being hired by parents, schools and local authorities.

Ministers hoped the stricter code, which came into force in February, would make admissions fairer, but the LSE study of five local authorities found that the code was not enough to stop schools tricking one another, and that it was "not difficult to find schools that fell foul of the code".

Researchers were told that the headteacher of a school with surplus places had contacted parents to persuade them to reject offers from a more popular school. Another school was said to rank children on its waiting list according to its own criteria rather than the official rules which put children with special needs before others. Another was said to have picked pupils according to how near their homes were to a building half a mile from the school, in an attempt to upgrade its intake. A secondary school had tried to impress parents by naming one primary as a "feeder" school, without telling the primary school.

These dubious practices can leave some families in "dead zones" – neighbourhoods where children stand little chance of an offer from any popular school in their area, the academics told a conference on fair school admissions in London today.

"Major concerns remain about school admissions, raising questions about fairness," Philip Noden, an education research fellow at the LSE and one of the study's authors, said. The study said: "While most admissions authorities were thought to operate their admission arrangements in accordance with the relevant rules, there was some evidence of a small number of schools breaking admissions rules or adopting practices that would be unlikely to be supported by regulatory authorities." "There is a world of suspicion out there," Noden said. People were "very doubtful about the motives" of some schools. "While the code states that it is 'necessary to improve the chances of more disadvantaged children getting into good schools', it is clear that those interpreting the code are not taking advantage of all opportunities to improve those chances," he said.

The study found that many of those who decide a school's admissions policy struggle to understand the new code. Even those "working day-to-day on admissions stated that they found the code a difficult document". Rather than tighten the rules, ministers should give local authorities more control over the administration of school admissions, the researchers suggest. This would include faith schools and academies, which have their own admissions arrangements.

Last year, the education secretary, Ed Balls, revealed that some state secondary schools in England had been caught charging parents for the privilege of being given a place. Now competition at top state schools is fiercer than ever as middle-class families seek to save on private school fees in the recession.

Meanwhile, the chief schools adjudicator for England, Ian Craig, told the conference that lawyers were cashing in on the complexity of the code as more parents, local authorities and schools hired them. He said: "Unfortunately, the more complex the code, the more lawyers are earning their money trying to find ways to around it. There will be more challenges in the high court on admissions issues. I'm convinced of that."

SOURCE





10 December, 2009

Britain has some of the worst health outcomes in Europe

Heart and cancer survival rates among worst in developed world

British health care is little better than that of former Communist countries, which spend a fraction of the billions poured into the NHS. A survey published yesterday by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development sees Britain languishing with the Czech Republic and Poland in international league tables on health.

The OECD - which represents developed Western countries, some former Soviet nations, Mexico, Japan and South Korea - compared healthcare standards among its 30 members and found that we lag even further behind the wealthiest nations, such as France, Sweden and Germany. The figures showed:

* British cancer and heart attack victims are more likely to die than almost anywhere in the developed world;

* Asthma and diabetes patients are more than three times as likely to end up in hospital as their neighbours in Germany;

* Life expectancy in Britain - 79 years and six months for a man - is far worse than in France, where men expect to live until 81. The deficit is similar for women.

Britain performed only marginally better than former Communist states whose governments spend only half as much on healthcare.

Last night critics seized on the league table as an indictment of Labour's failure to improve the Health Service over 12 years - despite tripling NHS spending to more than £100billion a year. But ministers insisted the figures were out of date and that significant improvements have occurred since.

Among the OECD's most worrying findings were Britain's five-year survival rates for cancer between 2002 and 2007. A shortage of cancer specialists and the lack of access to life-saving drugs is thought to be behind our poor showing.

On the positive side, the survey shows British healthcare is much more equitable than most other countries. Just 9 per cent of low income homes say they have unmet care needs, compared to 52 per cent in the U.S. and 24 per cent in Germany.

Britain also has more nurses than many countries. There are ten nurses for every 1,000 people here. That's higher than the OECD average of 9.6 and the French figure of 7.7.

But the picture of cancer survival in this country remains bleak. The survey found that in Britain, a woman diagnosed with breast cancer had a 78.5 per cent likelihood of being alive five years later. But in France, the figure was 82.6 per cent, in Sweden 86.1 per cent and in the U.S., 90.5 per cent.

The situation is even worse for those with bowel cancer. In these cases, Britain was the second worst country of the 30 member states.

Much of the blame for Britain's poor showing is attributed to the fact that patients and GPs fail to spot cancer signs early enough. A lack of access to life-saving cancer drugs, a shortage of specialists, and a lack of MRI scanners are also factors. The report found that in Britain there are 8.2 scanners per million people: much lower than the OECD average of 11. There are also far fewer doctors in Britain: 2.5 per 1,000 population, compared to 3.4 in France.

The survey also found that British heart attack patients were more likely to die in hospital than others in the Western world. In 2007, 6.3 per cent had died within 30 days of admission - compared to 4.9 per cent across the OECD, and 2.9 per cent in Denmark. Britain also performed poorly on keeping asthma and diabetes sufferers out of hospital - reflecting badly on the quality of GPs.

In Britain, 75 out of 100,000 people ended up in hospital with asthma in 2007. In France the figure was 43 and in Germany, just 21.

The report found that Britain spends more than the average OECD nation on healthcare: just short of $3,000 (£1,850) per head of population. This compares to $1,626 (£1,000) in the Czech Republic, where cancer survival rates are almost as good. However, the OECD acknowledged that healthcare had improved over the past decade.

Last night Health Secretary Andy Burnham said the data showed 'the enormous progress' that had been made.

SOURCE



Uncaring British health bureaucrats kill nurse

A midwife was found hanged after a hospital failed to tell her she was not to blame for a baby's death, an inquest heard yesterday. Theresa Naish, 28, feared she would be struck off because she had failed to tell doctors that the premature baby had had a balloon placed in his throat during his mother's pregnancy to help his lungs develop.

A colleague had been in charge of the baby boy but had gone to lunch leaving Miss Naish, who had just started her shift, to provide cover. The balloon would have prevented the child from breathing. But the baby's health was so poor he would not have survived anyway, Croydon Coroner's Court heard.

Following the incident, distraught Miss Naish went on two weeks' leave, which had been booked previously. During her time off the hospital cancelled two overtime shifts she had been scheduled to work.

The inquest heard she received a series of voicemails asking her to come in to meet hospital managers, but they failed to say she was not facing suspension and was not responsible for the death of the boy.

Her father Thomas Naish criticised the hospital during the hearing for not giving her any reassurance. 'Theresa was just sent home and her shifts were cancelled,' he said. 'There is no umbrella of care within the NHS for the people who work within it - the people who do the caring.'

Miss Naish's sister Cherry, 25, told the inquest: 'The effect this whole thing had on her was that she went home thinking, "They are going to disbar me".'

A couple of days before Miss Naish was due back to work at King's College Hospital in South London colleagues became concerned that they had not heard from her. Senior midwife Linda Sherratt had arranged to have a meeting with her. But Miss Naish did not turn up and suddenly stopped answering her phone. Police forced their way into her flat in Upper Norwood, South London, in the early hours of January 28 where they found her hanging in the bathroom.

The final two internet searches on her laptop had been for 'disbarred midwives' and 'ten ways to commit suicide'. Pathologists believe she probably died three or four days earlier.

Miss Naish had been registered as a midwife for a year and had graduated a few weeks before her death.

In cases where unborn babies' lungs are not developing properly, a technique has been developed where a small balloon is inserted into the throat. Since the placenta provides the oxygen for the foetus in the womb, the balloon does not interfere with foetal breathing. But before birth the balloon must be removed in order for the baby to be able to breathe after birth.

Mrs Sherratt told the court: 'She did amazingly well to get the mother to the labour ward as quickly as she did. 'We discovered that the baby would have stood a very, very minute chance of survival anyway because his condition was so bad, even if the balloon had been taken out. 'Theresa may have felt she contributed to his death by not passing on crucial information. 'I was in charge of the investigation into the incident. My first concern was for Theresa. 'There were all sorts of rumours going around but it was never the case that she would be suspended. 'The really very sad thing about this whole business is that I never got a chance to speak to her.'

At the time of her death, Miss Naish was one and a half times the drink drive limit. Coroner Dr Roy Palmer found that this was enough to give him 'a tiny bit of doubt' about whether Miss Naish intended to kill herself. He recorded an open verdict.

Outside court Miss Naish's father said: 'I have spoken to lots of women Theresa cared for and delivered babies for, and they have all said she was incredible. 'She joined the St John's Ambulance when she was 14. All she ever wanted to do was look after people.'

SOURCE



How can breast surgeon who botched 19 operation still work for the NHS?

A breast cancer surgeon is still allowed to work for the NHS despite botching operations which led to £700,000 in compensation being paid to 19 women. Many of the patients have suffered agony, disfigurement, trauma and been haunted by flashbacks of surgery. One cancer victim who has had three additional operations because of complications said the surgeon had ruined her life and another was shocked when she sold her bras during an examination 'like a dodgy market trader'.

Consultant surgeon Puvaneswary Markandoo was suspended on full pay after 35 women, aged between 30 and 65, came forward to complain about problems after operations. In total, 29 proceeded with compensation claims against the surgeon's employer, the Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. The trust has paid out £678,245 to 19 women, at an average settlement of £35,697 each. Health chiefs admitted negligence in a vast majority of the payout cases. Six claims are outstanding.

But much to the astonishment of her patients, the 62-year-old surgeon has been allowed by the General Medical Council to continue to work for the NHS, although she is banned from private work. Last year the GMC found her to be deficient in 11 areas of her job including basic surgery and working within laws and regulations.

The authorities decided she could work for an NHS hospital under conditions including supervision and retraining. Miss Markandoo had been suspended from her £122,000 job for three years and has now left Barnsley Hospital. The Malaysian-born surgeon, who qualified as a doctor 32 years ago, has moved to London. She has done unpaid 'administrative' work at one London hospital but it is not known if she has been carrying out any clinical work.

One patient to receive compensation was Mary Jolly, 57, a grandmother from Barnsley. She had a mastectomy after getting breast cancer which was followed by reconstructive surgery and an implant. Her problems began after a breast reduction on the healthy breast carried out by Miss Markandoo. She suffered constant pain and 'oozing' from the wound. Several further operations followed but she still has pain. The mother-of-three said: 'Like all those other women I put 100 per cent trust in her and she betrayed that trust.

'I wish I had never set eyes on her and I find it unbelievable that she can still work in the health service after what she has done.' 'I realised at some point that there was something odd about her. 'Once when I went for an examination she brought two bras out of her drawer and asked if I wanted to buy them. Doctors just don't do that. She seemed then like some dodgy market trader. 'The doctors won't to do any more surgery on me any more to try and put things right because I am diabetic and I don't heal well so I just have to live the situation as it is.'

A spokesman for the hospital trust said: 'Once the trust identified a problem with treatment provided by Miss Markandoo to patients in the Barnsley breast clinic it took the proactive step of setting up an advice line for all those patients possibly affected. 'The trust has worked hard with its insurers and legal advisers to ensure that these matters have been dealt with as quickly and reasonably as possible.'

SOURCE



Monbiot in the pay of big oil



Alarmist George Monbiot writes in the Guardian on how we're just stooges of the oil industry. An excerpt:

In Climate Cover-Up, in Ross Gelbspan's books The Heat is On and Boiling Point, in my book Heat, and on the websites DeSmogBlog.com and exxonsecrets.org, you can find dozens of such examples. Together they expose a systematic, well-funded campaign to con the public. To judge by the comments you can read on this paper's website, it has worked.

But people behind these campaigns know that their claims are untrue. One of the biggest was run by the Global Climate Coalition, which represented ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, the American Petroleum Institute and several big motor manufacturers. In 1995 the coalition's own scientists reported that "the scientific basis for the greenhouse effect and the potential impact of human emissions of greenhouse gases such as CO2 on climate is well-established and cannot be denied". The coalition hid this finding from the public, and spent millions of dollars seeking to persuade people that the opposite was true.

These people haven't fooled themselves, but they might have fooled you. Who, among those of you who claim that climate scientists are liars and environmentalists are stooges, has thought it through for yourself?

What I really love, however, is the giant ad for "Shell" served alongside Monbiot's piece:

SOURCE

It's absurd to say that Monbiot is in the pay of big oil because a small part of his paycheque comes from them. But it is equally absurd to say that climate skeptics are in the pay of big oil because a tiny minority of them have received small amounts from big oil. Another example of similar Warmist absurdity here, where the revolt against Warmist laws among Australian conservative politicians is attributed to a "holy war" -- because one tiny and wholly marginal Christian denomination opposed such laws



Immigrants to Britain awarded English language certificates without training

A crackdown is needed on centres awarding English language qualifications to immigrants, the exams regulator said.

Ofqual said there were fears that some certificates were being issued with little or no training or learning taking place.

It has written an open letter to all organisations that award the English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) qualification.

It said: “There are concerns being expressed about the way in which immigrants coming to the UK can obtain ESOL with citizenship qualifications, as a means to applying for permanent residence in the UK.

“Allegations are being made about a number of centres offering these qualifications, stating that the certificates are being issued with virtually no training or learning taking place and with insufficient rigour in the assessment process.

“We are writing now to ask you all to review your ESOL provision, to check the centres you have approved are offering this qualification without compromising its integrity, so that the learners get the qualification they deserve and certificates are therefore valid.

“Where there are cases of suspected malpractice at a centre we expect you as the awarding organisation to conduct a full investigation and take action as appropriate.”

SOURCE



Britain's Batty Hatty's wrong again - marriage IS a big deal

Harriet Harman has launched a sneaky attack on Tory plans to give tax breaks to married couples. Ms Harman claims that David Cameron will end up stigmatising families who don't fit the traditional two-parent model. The Tories, she argues, have got no business telling other people how they should live their lives. Heaven forbid! That's Harriet's job.

Let's forget Batty Hatty's breathtaking hypocrisy for a moment. What really makes me want to shake Labour's deputy leader is that she knows full well that being brought up by married parents gives a child the best possible chance in life. That's not a political prejudice, it's a fact. Kids who are raised by a mum and a dad, even if they live in poverty, are far less likely to end up with mental health issues or go to jail. They do better at school. They have fewer drug and alcohol problems, and fewer teenage pregnancies. They are also more likely to stay married themselves, and to stick around for their own children.

That doesn't mean single or divorced parents can't do a great job of raising their kids. I know plenty who do. It just makes it a damn sight harder. And there are far too many feckless individuals out there who don't even try. One in three British children whose parents split up over the past 20 years has lost contact permanently with their dads. It's such a cruel statistic. An amputation of the heart. The emotional carnage that loss causes each young person is appalling, let alone the long-term collateral damage to society.

We know that one in ten children from broken families is left feeling suicidal by the rift, while many more seek solace in drink, drugs and crime.

Are you listening, Harriet, with your gushing and complacent 'We don't favour one way of family life over another'? Well, children favour one way of family life over another. Or don't their feelings count because they can't vote for New Labour?

Most Britons would not willingly put the clock back to an era when you risked being a social outcast if you chose to leave a dead or abusive marriage. Yet if we believe Batty Hatty and treat all family arrangements as equal to avoid hurting people's feelings, where do we end up?

With Karen Matthews and her seven kids by five different dads, all supported by a warped tax and benefits system which actually discriminates in favour of the unmarried and the irresponsible. Madness.

To his credit, on Monday, David Cameron entered the lioness's den, telling the single-parent charity Gingerbread that government cannot remain 'neutral' on the issue of family. The tax and benefits system, he said, has 'got to send long-term signals about commitment' and the value of marriage.

Some people may feel that the Tory leader didn't go nearly far enough. Why didn't he point out the calamitous effect that fatherlessness, in particular, has had on our underclass?

I happen to think David Cameron is doing something that is as brave as it is unfashionable. He's saying something because he believes it's right - especially for children - not because it's what people want to hear. He's telling the men and women who are financially worse off because they're married that they are not fools to try to stick together.

'No one needs a Tory tax incentive to value their marriage,' says Harriet Harman. Perhaps not. But anything that makes marriage and long-term commitment look attractive to people has got to be worth a try.

SOURCE



More British "elf n safety" extremism



In an age of Big Brother, the nanny state and elf 'n' safety, this cycle path in South London is a very definite sign of the times. Most cyclists venturing on to the thoroughfare in Elephant and Castle would have been left in little doubt as to who was allowed to go where.

Vigilant workmen used gallons of paint to mark out hundreds of bicycles and 'SLOW' notices along the route on the New Kent Road. A bicycle appears roughly every 7 - 10 feet.

Despite the extra indication of which direction cyclists should travel, one commuter proved that there are always exceptions to the rule as he appeared to be going the wrong way. Perhaps it proves that despite the best intentions, people won't always toe the dotted line.

The increased visibility could be in response to a sharp rise in cyclist deaths. Recent Department of Transport figures reveal that 820 cyclists lost their lives or were seriously injured in the three months to June - an increase of 19 per cent on the same time span last year.

SOURCE



British primary schools bad for boys

Being taught by women indoctrinated into feminism must be very alienating

Boys are slipping further behind girls after just two years of schooling, official figures have revealed. They are behind girls in English, maths and science by the age of seven and the gender gap is widening, it emerged. The figures, from the Department for Children, Schools and Families, sparked renewed concerns about the prospects for a generation of boys.

Millions have been spent on initiatives aimed at reducing the educational gulf between the sexes but ministers insisted yesterday there were no quick solutions. Research has shown that youngsters who perform poorly at primary school are less likely to do well in their GCSEs and progress on to university. A report last month warned that the failure to teach the three Rs properly in primary schools drove 'angry and resentful boys out of school and into trouble'.

The report, published by the Centre for Policy Studies, claimed left-wing 'ideological fads' had wreaked most damage on working-class boys.

Yesterday's statistics reveal how the gender gap at seven is widest in writing, with 86.7 per cent of girls reaching 'level two' - the standard expected for their age - compared to 75.3 per cent of boys. This gives a gap of 11.4 per cent - an increase on 11 per cent in 2006. Girls also pulled further ahead in maths and science, while the gap in reading remained similar.

A lack of male teachers and growing exposure to computer games and TV have also been blamed for the under-performance of boys, who are also considered late starters.

Dr Richard House, senior lecturer in psychotherapy at Roehampton University, said: 'There is a grave danger that boys will simply become disaffected and 'turn off' from learning if they experience comparative failure at too young an age.'

Schools Minister Diana Johnson said there were no quick fixes. 'It takes time and energy from both parents and teachers to make changes,' she said. 'You need focused, long-term support to get sustained improvement over time.'

SOURCE



Research throws up doubts over Tamiflu

Relenza may be a better alternative but that is not addressed below

There is no clear evidence that Tamiflu prevents complications in people with flu, an analysis suggests. While studies have shown the antiviral can cut the length of time people have symptoms by about a day, no real evidence has emerged that it prevents conditions like pneumonia, researchers said. The study, published online in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), questions the validity of research from Roche, the pharmaceutical giant that makes Tamiflu.

In August, experts said the drug was unlikely to prevent complications in children.

More than a million courses of antivirals including Tamiflu have been given out to people across Britain since the start of the swine flu pandemic. Around a million courses have been handed out through the National Pandemic Flu Service for England, with many more given out through GP surgeries.

The latest investigation, by the BMJ and Channel 4 News, found no real evidence Tamiflu stops complications and puts the cost of the drug to the Government at some £500 million. A review of 20 existing studies was carried out by a team led by experts from the Cochrane Collaboration, which last reviewed the evidence in 2005. Their updated study found Tamiflu “did not reduce influenza-related lower respiratory tract complications”. The drug was found to induce nausea while evidence of adverse reactions to the drug were “possibly under-reported”, they said.

The experts said the drug was effective in treating people preventatively after they had come into contact with somebody who was infected, and shortened the length of symptoms in those with swine flu. But they criticised some of the evidence available and said Roche had not been able to “unconditionally” provide the information needed. As a result, the team dropped eight trials that were included in their earlier review because they were unable to independently verify the findings.

Writing in the BMJ, they concluded: “Paucity of good data has undermined previous findings for oseltamivir’s (Tamiflu’s) prevention of complications from influenza.”

Dr Fiona Godlee, editor in chief of the BMJ, said: “Governments around the world have spent billions of pounds on a drug that the scientific community now finds itself unable to judge.”

In a separate review, Professor Nick Freemantle and Dr Melanie Calvert, from the University of Birmingham, looked at observational studies based on a list provided to the Cochrane authors by Roche. They conclude that “oseltamivir may reduce the risk of pneumonia in otherwise healthy people who contract flu. However, the absolute benefit is small, and side effects and safety should also be considered.”

They added: “Interpretation of the studies was difficult. “It seems likely that some patients were included in more than one study, which undermines the ability of these studies to provide independent estimates.”

Dr Godlee and Professor Mike Clarke, director of the UK Cochrane Centre, said the review called into question “not only the effectiveness of oseltamivir but the whole system by which drugs are evaluated, regulated and promoted.” In an editorial in the BMJ, they said “once a trial is completed, there needs to be ready access to the raw data behind any analyses used to license and market a drug. “When vast quantities of public money, and large amounts of public trust, are placed in drugs, the full data must be accessible for scrutiny by the scientific community. “Pending full disclosure and independent review of the raw data from Roche, the risks and benefits of oseltamivir remain uncertain.”

A spokeswoman for Roche said study summaries of Tamiflu would be made available on a password-protected site for members of the scientific community. A statement from Roche said: “Roche is aware of this issue and has been liaising with Channel 4 News and the BMJ to fully address all of the issues that have been raised. “Roche stands behind the robustness and integrity of the data supporting the efficacy and safety of Tamiflu. “Tamiflu is playing a pivotal role in the management of the pandemic (H1N1) 2009 influenza virus.”

A spokesman for the Department of Health said: “The Cochrane Review is an analysis of the use of Tamiflu to treat H1N1 [swine] influenza in healthy adults based on work on seasonal influenza. “It doesn’t cover people with underlying health conditions, or children, and we know that it may not be appropriate to generalise from effects in seasonal flu to those in a pandemic. “This is why we regularly ask for expert advice to ensure that our antiviral policy is based on the best available evidence and informed by expert judgment.

“On November 30 the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) reviewed the most up to date available evidence on antiviral use and concluded that it clearly continues to point towards a benefit in those with severe illness. “Unlike seasonal flu, swine flu has caused higher levels of severe illness in the young and healthy, and in some cases death. “So it is difficult to determine who will be hardest hit.

“Our priority has always been to minimise the risk of serious illness and death from swine flu. Therefore, while there are still significant levels of H1N1 circulating, our strategy remains to offer antivirals to all patients with the illness.”

SOURCE



Testosterone’s aggressive impact is circumstantial. It can make you friendlier

It is popularly known as the selfish hormone, which courses through male veins to promote egotistical and antisocial behaviour. Yet research has suggested that testosterone’s bad reputation is largely undeserved. Far from always increasing aggression and greed, the male hormone can actually encourage decency and fair play, scientists have discovered.

The common belief that it makes people quarrelsome, however, can cause it to have that effect. When people think they have been given supplements of the hormone they tend to act more aggressively, even though it does nothing biological to promote such behaviour.

The findings, from an Anglo-Swiss team, suggest that rather than encouraging selfishness and risk-taking as a matter of course, testosterone has subtler effects on human behaviour that depend very much on social circumstances. The research also highlights the importance of social expectations and prejudices on the placebo effect: these can cause testosterone to influence people’s actions according to its reputation, rather than its biological effect. “It appears that it is not testosterone itself that induces aggressiveness, but rather the myth surrounding the hormone,” said Michael Naef, of Royal Holloway, University of London, an author of the study. “In a society where qualities and manners of behaviour are increasingly traced to biological causes and thereby partly legitimated, this should make us sit up and take notice.”

The popular belief that testosterone promotes aggression is founded in animal research: castrated male rodents, for example, become less combative. In humans, studies of male prisoners have found that those with higher testosterone levels are more likely to have committed a violent crime, to rebel against prison rules and get into fights.

Some scientists, however, have questioned whether the male hormone contributes directly to antisocial behaviour. The alternative view is that testosterone makes people more anxious to seek high status. This can, in different circumstances, promote either hostile or co-operative behaviour.

The study, which is published in the journal Nature, sought to test this using a common psychological exercise known as the ultimatum game. In this game, a player is given a sum of money, say £10, to share with a second player, offering as much or as little as he or she wants. If the offer is accepted, the pot is distributed that way, but if it is refused, neither player gets any cash. Players who are very aggressive, offering just £2 or £3, stand to benefit financially, but also risk coming away with nothing.

Before playing the game, a group of 60 women was given either a testosterone supplement or a placebo. “We wanted to verify how the hormone affects social behaviour,” said Christoph Eisenegger, of the University of Zurich. “If one were to believe the common opinion, we would expect subjects who received testosterone to adopt aggressive, egocentric, and risky strategies – regardless of the possibly negative consequences on the negotiation process.”

The subjects who were given testosterone supplements in fact made much fairer offers in the ultimatum game than those given a placebo, suggesting that the hormone does not promote aggression in these circumstances, but co-operation. “The preconception that testosterone only causes aggressive or egoistic behaviour in humans is thus clearly refuted,” Dr Eisenegger said.

The only exception was when participants guessed that they had been given testosterone and not the placebo. In these cases, they made more aggressive offers. “Subjects who believed that they received testosterone — regardless of whether they received it or not — behaved much more unfairly than those who believed that they were treated with a placebo,” the researchers wrote. The results support the idea that testosterone promotes status-seeking, and that this can encourage or discourage aggression depending on the circumstances. In the ultimatum game, an unfair offer risks damaging a person’s status and reputation if it is rejected, so co-operative strategies are favoured. But in situations of conflict, as in prisons, a more aggressive and risky strategy may pay off.

“In the socially complex human environment, pro-social behaviour secures status, and not aggression,” Dr Naef said. “The interplay between testosterone and the socially differentiated environment of humans, and not testosterone itself, probably causes fair or aggressive behaviour.”

SOURCE





December 9, 2009

Rap music, goat curry and why crying racism won't help us beat black crime

Rod Liddle is what Americans might call a 'shock jock'. He's a journalist who has cornered the market in boorish controversy. In normal circumstances, his inflammatory comments are best taken with a large pinch of salt. But his latest outburst, delivered on his online blog, has caused particular offence.

Responding to a news story about two black youths who conspired to push a pregnant woman into a canal as part of a failed murder plot, he wrote that 'the overwhelming majority of street crime, knife crime, gun crime, robbery and crimes of sexual violence in London is carried out by young men from the African-Caribbean community.'

In return for all this crime, says Liddle, the black community has given Britain 'rap music, goat curry and a far more vibrant and diverse understanding of cultures which were once alien to us. For which, many thanks'. (Sarcasm is one of Liddle's trademarks).

Even by his own standards, these comments have created a firestorm of controversy, inciting outrage and accusations of racism from all quarters. Diane Abbott, MP for Hackney, has compared him to fascist leader Oswald Mosley, while Bonnie Greer, the playwright who appeared on Question Time with Nick Griffin recently, said: 'My response would be to say that the overwhelming majority of paedophiles, murderers, warmongers and football hooligans are white males and all we got in return was beans on toast and Top Gear.'

The whole furore has descended into name-calling and crude accusations. Which is a sadness, because behind the overblown rhetoric from both sides there are some profound issues at stake - not least of which is freedom of speech.

We live in a free country and journalists should be able to write what they like, within reason. You may not admire Mr Liddle's style of writing, nor agree with his views, but that does not mean that he should be sacked from the magazine for which he writes, as some have suggested. It is his job to provoke. And that is exactly what he has done.

But beyond that most precious civil liberty lies a more uncomfortable truth, for the fact is that in his own clumsy way, Liddle has touched on a very real problem - the disproportionate number of young black men who commit crime. Ministry of Justice figures for 2007/2008 show that while only 2.2 per cent of Britons aged ten or above are black, 14 per cent of criminal cases tried in a crown court involve black suspects. For some crimes, the figures are even more alarming. One controversial report conducted by Scotland Yard last year found that more than half of teen knife crime offences in the capital involve black suspects. Small wonder, then, that two years ago the Commons home affairs committee warned of a 'serious crisis' among Britain's young community.

It's no use howling 'racism', this is a real problem confronting our society - and despite her politically correct posturing, Diane Abbott knows it. On her blog, Abbott writes: 'Sadly 80 per cent of gun crime in London is "black on black", often involving boys in their teens. As a black woman and the mother of a teenage son, this is frightening and wholly unacceptable.' So frightening and unacceptable, indeed, that despite her hard-Left credentials, she chose to send her children to a fee-paying school, rather than to a local state secondary. In her own words, 'too many black boys were unsuccessful within inner-city state schools'.

Why is it acceptable for Ms Abbot to raise such issues, but not Mr Liddle? Yes, he may have expressed his views in rather inflammatory terms, but he has touched on a vital issue: Why do so many young black men in our cities turn to crime?

This is more than just about race and underachievement. It concerns culture and the direction of modern Britain. When people from the West Indies first came to Britain in the late Forties, they were as law-abiding, and often as well-educated, as the indigenous population. What happened to this immigrant community is a snapshot of what happened to Britain in the intervening decades, although the situation is much worse among some of the new immigrants.

First of all, there has been a spectacular increase in family breakdown. The traditional British family in many parts of the country simply doesn't exist. This has been noticed by organisations such as the Centre For Social Justice. In a study they published in 2007, the organisation observed that crime has a direct correlation with family breakdown - 70 per cent of young offenders are from lone-parent families. Yet for many years these observations have been derided by a liberal media, too privileged to care about something which seems so alien to them.

Secondly, an almost deliberate assault on education in the past few decades has created a terrible situation. Our schools, particularly those in the inner city, have lost many of the characteristics which made British education famous throughout the world. The abolition of grammar schools in the Sixties made the problem worse. Children from less privileged backgrounds were even less likely to find a ladder up the social scale, and so social mobility in Britain declined.

Thirdly, a bloated welfare system ensured that there was no real incentive for people to get out of their situation. Together, these three factors create a toxic cocktail which has enabled a large class to be created which has no real stake in the country. And unfortunately, a large proportion of this class - often called the 'underclass' - is from the immigrant population who came to Britain in the Fifties to better their lives. Indeed, they have affected the Afro-Caribbean community more than any other.

The ultimate irony is that the Britain in which those West Indian immigrants had aspired to live has changed beyond recognition. And their children and grandchildren are the ones worst affected.

Ultimately, though, it is foolish to view this kind of social breakdown exclusively through the prism of race. It is true that young Afro-Caribbean males in the larger cities have a particular problem, but the issue is one which confronts the whole country. Ignorance and violence are a blight across the nation, from multi-racial London to less diverse places such as Newcastle and Sunderland. Any inhabitant will say how these towns have become more frightening places to live. Any person in any town in Britain will tell the same story about how it is no longer safe to go out at night. This is not just a 'black problem', it is a national one.

I would suggest that these problems, and particularly those of the Afro-Caribbean community in our cities, stem from the fact that this breakdown has largely been ignored by the political class. The chattering classes and their friends in government abolished grammar schools, refused to support the idea of the family, expanded the welfare state and fostered chaotic immigration policies.

Through flawed ideology and a failure to promote traditional values, the Left made the situation for all those at the bottom of the heap far worse - whatever the colour of their skin. As Liddle himself has said: 'There is an important argument to be had about crime levels in London, Manchester and Birmingham which are down to culture.'

Neither his boorishness nor the knee-jerk reactions of the anti-racist mob really help that debate. There is a need to have a national discussion about how to solve a serious problem. We should be able to have that discussion in a rational, mature way.

SOURCE



The ultimate British "elf n safety" madness

Sell you a sandwich? Sorry, you might choke, says train steward

Chris Haynes had gone to the buffet car after the crew announced that everyone on board would get a free soft drink as compensation for the train breaking down. After suffering the long delay and a lengthy queue to be served, Mr Haynes was understandably hungry. He saw some egg sandwiches on sale behind the bar that looked appetising, but when the 58-year-old came to order he was astonished to be told he couldn't buy one.

Mr Haynes explained that he was not trying to get a free meal and was happy to pay, but the steward again told him that he could not sell him a sandwich. Recalling the bizarre exchange yesterday, Mr Haynes said: 'When I asked the man why not he said it was for health and safety reasons. 'I told him I didn't understand how health and safety came into selling a hungry stranded passenger an egg sandwich on a broken-down train.'

Mr Haynes said that when he asked for an explanation a second time, the steward replied: 'Don't you see? If the train has to be evacuated you could choke to death on the sandwich.' Mr Haynes, a bar manager himself, said: 'I've never, ever heard anything so ludicrous in my life. There was a queue of people behind me and they all looked shocked.'

The grandfather, who is about to emigrate to New Zealand to run a tour company, said he was astonished by the steward's reaction to his simple request. 'First Great Western were quite happy to give out free drinks but weren't prepared to sell egg sandwiches for health and safety reasons,' he added.

Mr Haynes had been travelling back to London from a day at Newbury-Racecourse in Berkshire when his packed evening train came to a standstill less than half way into the journey. First Great Western run a special service to Newbury Racecourse on race days. The train last Saturday, carrying racegoers from the Hennessy Gold Cup at Newbury Races, eventually arrived at Paddington Station two and a quarter hours late. 'Everything was going well until we broke down somewhere around Reading,' Mr Haynes said.

A spokesman for First Great Western said yesterday that she was not aware of the incident. She added: 'It is not our policy to refuse to serve customers on these grounds.'

SOURCE



Judge outraged by uncaring British health bureaucrats

A senior family judge took the extraordinary step of leaving court to calm down because he was so angered by two local authorities who “abandoned” a sick boy to save money.

Mr Justice Hedley said that he was left with a sense of disbelief that the two local authorities, Cambridgeshire County Council and the Orkney Island Council (OIC), had distanced themselves from the boy to avoid footing the bill for his care. He made his judgment public yesterday and also sent it to Westminster and Holyrood to draw attention to the two local authorities. “I found it necessary to adjourn briefly so as to ensure that no wholly improper judicial observations escaped my lips,” he said of the October hearing. “This judgment has been reserved because I did not trust myself to express my views in a temperate manner.”

Mr Justice Hedley said that the school-age boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was born with a serious congenital heart problem on the Isle of Orkney but is now cared for by relatives, a professional couple who live in Cambridgeshire. He required major surgery within weeks of his birth, and his biological parents were unable to care for him, requiring the child’s move to Cambridgeshire, under the supervision of the Orkney Island Council. The distant relatives, Mr and Mrs O, have effectively adopted him.

At first, the OIC offered financial assistance but it has since indicated that it will be withdrawn. It said Cambridgeshire County Council should pay up. But the county council says it is so cash-strapped that it cannot afford it.

Mr Justice Hedley said that the foster parents had been told that “neither authority believed that they had any duty to offer even basic support, let alone the extras that a child with special needs requires”.

Both local authorities have refused to pay for Mr and Mrs O’s application for a special guardianship order that would make their care for the boy more permanent.

“Mr and Mrs O could be forgiven for feeling abandoned to care for a child disowned by the state in its local authority form, and they could be forgiven too if the thought ever entered their minds as to why they had taken on this child in the first place,” the judge said. “They entered into this arrangement in good faith and in reliance on the apparent assurance of the OIC to support them financially through the boy’s minority. “Because they are honourable people, committed to the boy, they cannot just repudiate the agreement as the OIC claims to be entitled to do. They are stuck with the poison fruit of these two local authorities’ dispute,” he said.

He called the actions of OIC a “huge triumph for its budget manager” but a “complete catastrophe for any foster parent unwise enough to rely on [its] word”. He concluded his judgment by saying: “I wish to pay tribute to Mr and Mrs O for their care for the boy and for their steadfastness through all these difficulties not of their making.”

He ruled that it was the responsibility of Cambridgeshire County Council to prepare a supporting statement for a special guardianship order. However, Mr Justice Hedley said he had no power to address the matter of which local authority, if either, should give financial support for the boy, and said that was a matter for the Government to decide.

SOURCE



British government Ministers told: Don't call Islamic extremists Islamic extremists

We read:

"Ministers have been BANNED from using words like Islamist and fundamentalist - in case they offend Muslims. An eight-page Whitehall guide lists words they should not use when talking about terrorism in public and gives politically correct alternatives. They are told not to refer to Muslim extremism as it links Islam to violence. Instead, they are urged to talk about terrorism or violent extremism.

Fundamentalist and Jihadi are also banned because they make an "explicit link" between Muslims and terror. Ministers should say criminals, murderers or thugs instead. Radicalisation must be called brainwashing and talking about moderate or radical Muslims is to be avoided as it "splits the community".

Islamophobia is also out as it is received as "a slur that singles out Muslims".

The guide, produced by the secretive Research, Information and Communications Unit in the Home Office, tell ministers to "avoid implying that specific communities are to blame" for terrorism. It says more than 2,000 people are engaged in terror plots.

The guidance was branded "daft" last night by a special adviser to ex-Communities Secretary Hazel Blears. Paul Richards said: "Unless you can describe what you're up against, you're never going to defeat it. Ministers need to be leading the debate on Islamic extremism and they can't do that if they have one hand tied behind their back."

Source

8 December, 2009

New British immigration rules result in flood of bogus students

New Home Office immigration rules, which ministers promised would reduce the number of new arrivals, have actually led to a surge in applications and prompted immigration officials to voice their concerns. Thousands of bogus students are being handed British visas after the Government's much-heralded reform of the immigration system created a major loophole, an investigation by The Sunday Telegraph can disclose.

Whistleblowers within the immigration service have revealed for the first time that rising numbers of student visa applications have created a big global backlog because new Home Office rules left officials powerless to refuse fraudulent applicants. Undercover reporters in three foreign countries have also exposed a host of fraudulent methods used in attempts to exploit weaknesses in the Home Office's new "points-based" immigration system. These include:

:: Fake "relatives" in Britain offered at $1,000 (£610) each, to make visa applications look more impressive.

:: Under-the-counter loans organised for foreigners to "prove" they can pay course fees and support themselves, although the money is handed back to the lender once it has appeared on bank statements.

:: Immigrants being advised to apply to a legitimate university and then switch to a bogus college once on British soil.

Last week, Professor David Metcalf, the chairman of the Home Office's Migration Advisory Committee, said he was "stunned" by the number of colleges allowed to bring students into the country on degree courses despite them being "not proper universities", and called for the scope of student visa sponsorship to be reviewed. A separate review is already under way after Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, last month called for a rethink of the student visa system.

The situation has worsened to such an extent, and created such a rush of applications, that one foreign government has already raised "concerns" about the points-based system with Home Office ministers, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal. Government officials in the Philippines alerted British consular staff to the large number of poorly-educated citizens who were heading for Britain on study visas.

Theresa Dizon-de Vega, Consul-General at the Philippine Embassy in London, said: "The Ambassador had a very productive discussion recently with minister Phil Woolas and officials of the UK Home Office. "The Philippine Embassy and the UK Home Office agreed to co-ordinate closely and exchange information and views on various immigration-related concerns including the implementation of the new points-based system of migration."

It is a major blow for the points-based system (PBS) which was meant to "raise the bar" and reduce the number of immigrants coming to Britain from outside Europe. Devised by Liam Byrne, the former immigration minister who has since promoted to the Cabinet as Chief Secretary to the Treasury, the PBS came into force for overseas students in March. It requires students to have 40 points to come to Britain. Applicants receive 30 points for holding a course offer from a college or university, and 10 points for proving they can pay the fees and support themselves while in the country.

Sources within the UK Border Agency claim the PBS removed the discretion of entry clearance officers in British embassies around the world, who are now forced to approve applications if candidates demonstrate they have 40 points, even if they suspect the applicant is a fraud.

An investigation by this newspaper has exposed widespread abuse by visa agencies in India, China and the Philippines which are advising customers on how to get around the British Government's requirements, with some admitting that most "students" were simply coming here to work. One agency in Fazilka, in Punjab, India, made an extraordinary pledge, telling our reporter: "We guarantee an applicant a student visa within a month." At another agency based in a cramped, stinking building in Fazilka, close to the Pakistan border, an adviser told our reporter that students in Britain always find a way to work more than the permitted 20 hours a week.

In the Philippines, one agency offered to bolster a visa application by arranging for Filipinos already living in Britain to pose as members of the applicant's family for $1,000 and also promised that course records could "be arranged" for a fee, even if the student had failed their exams. The applicant would then be able to secure a place in a British college – winning 30 points required under the PBS – on the basis of fraudulent paperwork.

Agencies in China advised applicants to register with a bona fide language school or university, and then switch to a bogus college once on Britain soil, to make it easier to extend their visa. Li Wiuling, an agent in Beijing, said: "You can change after you arrive, because the formal ones are expensive." She offered a "guaranteed" visa for 40,000 yuan (£3,500) and promised that anyone who failed to attend their classes in Britain faced little prospect of being discovered. "There are so many people doing the same thing, they are all fine. There won't be one risk out of 100," she said.

Sources in the immigration service estimate that there are 5,000 immigrants in the London area alone who arrived here as bogus students and are working in the black economy, possibly with little intention of ever returning home.

Awareness of the Home Office's new rules in countries such as China, Pakistan and India has led to student visa applications quadrupling in some areas, generating a global backlog running into tens of thousands, The Sunday Telegraph discloses today. Applications in Sri Lanka and Nepal are also believed to be increasing....

Damian Green, the shadow immigration minister, said: "Ministers should be very worried if the new system is easier to exploit than the old one. They must act to reassure the public, and genuine colleges, that this is not another immigration disaster in the making. "The borders agency needs to call in all applications that have come through these routes as a matter of urgency."

A source said: "Under the old system under the Immigration Act, immigration officers could reject an application they believed was not legitimate. They don't have that ability any more. "As long as an applicant gets the points there is no flexibility for the entry clearance officer to reject the visa. It's a terrible loophole. "The government's spin was that the PBS would make it much quicker and easier to spot false applications, but it has actually made things much worse."

A Home Office spokesman denied there was a moratorium on applications and insisted that the rise in student visa numbers was down to the global recession and not the PBS.

Phil Woolas, the immigration minister, said: "The points-based system ensures that colleges and schools must be licensed to bring in foreign students, inspected by accreditation bodies and the UK Border Agency to ensure they are genuine, and take responsibility for their students. "Before we tightened controls around 4,000 UK institutions were bringing in international students, this has been reduced to around 2,000. "We continuously monitor our systems and where improvements can be made we will make them."

More HERE



If NHS hospital had listened to me, Baby Peter would still be alive’, says consultant

A thoroughly evil bureaucracy

A consultant from the NHS clinic that sent Baby P home to die has broken her silence to allege that managers from the world-famous Great Ormond Street Hospital bullied her and tried to buy her off to cover up their “appalling failure” to protect vulnerable children.

In an exclusive interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Dr Kim Holt told how she and all three of her senior colleagues raised concerns — more than a year before 17-month-old Peter Connelly came to the clinic in summer 2007 — that it was “falling apart” and that a child would die if action was not taken. “We were at our wits’ end,” she said. “We knew that a case like Baby Peter was going to happen.”

Instead of taking action, she said, Great Ormond Street, which employed the doctors, forced her out of the clinic on “wholly spurious grounds” and later offered her a six-figure sum to “buy my silence”.

Dr Holt was one of four permanent consultants at the paediatric clinic, at St Ann’s Hospital, Haringey. Of the other three, two left in disgust and one went sick for a period. By the time Peter became a patient at the clinic, none of the four was in place. He saw Dr Holt’s replacement, an inexperienced temporary locum — who sent him home after allegedly failing to notice he had a broken back. Two days later, the 17-month-old was found dead in his bloodstained cot with eight broken ribs, severe lacerations to his head, a tip of a finger missing, broken teeth, missing nails, and scores of cuts.

After Peter’s death, Dr Holt said, Great Ormond Street approached her and offered her a sum rising to £120,000 to leave her job and stay silent. Documents supporting this claim have been seen by The Sunday Telegraph. “They were in a panic [after Baby P],” she said. “They said I had to withdraw my allegations or the money was off the table. They wanted me to sign a statement saying that all my concerns had been addressed. I refused because it would have been a lie. They were trying to buy my silence.”

Because of her refusal to sign, Dr Holt, 50, who has 25 years’ experience and three medical degrees, has been prevented from returning to the clinic. “I am not going to be gagged,” she said. “I must speak about this because it is so wrong. “I believe that if our concerns had been taken seriously at the time we raised them, then we could have prevented the death of Baby Peter. Several of the failings found by the inquiries into his death were 100 per cent the same as the failings we complained about the year before he died. Sharon Shoesmith, the director of the social services side in Haringey, lost her job. But there was a total failure of leadership on the health side as well.”

In spring 2006, Dr Holt and her three colleagues, Dr Sethu Wariyar, Dr Haitham el-Bashir and Dr Sukanta Banerjee, signed a joint letter of complaint to Great Ormond Street and Haringey management.

In it they said that understaffing, difficulty in getting appointments for patients and poor record-keeping posed a “very high risk” to patient safety at the clinic and complained that managers were “trivialising” their concerns. Dr Holt said: “That letter is extremely strong. It was very unusual for four consultants to write like that. We only did it because we were at our wits’ end. We had a professional and moral obligation to raise our concerns. The children had no one else to speak up for them except us and we felt passionately that we were letting them down. “The response of management was hostile and bullying. One manager threatened me with the sack.” She was advised to take a month’s break, which she did, but said she was not allowed to return.

A secret assessment of Dr Holt’s case by NHS London, leaked to The Sunday Telegraph, found that she had done “nothing wrong” and described her as “highly committed, efficient and effective”. It did not find that she had been “directly targeted” for complaining but said that her and her colleagues’ concerns were “genuine and well-founded” and that Great Ormond Street had not done enough to address them.

Instead of acting on the concerns raised, Great Ormond Street and the co-manager of the service, Haringey Primary Care Trust, actually cut the number of consultant posts at the clinic, from four to three. An assessment done after Baby Peter’s death found that the clinic needed nine.

Dr Holt said she had taken her case to Jane Collins, the chief executive of Great Ormond Street, Baroness Blackstone, the current chairman of the board and Sir Cyril Chantler her predecessor, but had not been satisfied with their responses. “The Great Ormond Street managers were obsessed with Government targets. We were just supposed to process the children and not care about their lives. The world knows Great Ormond Street as this beacon of the care of children. But the case of Haringey shows its reputation is misplaced. “There is something which is not right at the heart of this hospital. There are many wonderful doctors there, but the ethos has been undermined by a core of people who are failing in their duty.”

The NHS London assessment of Dr Holt’s case is expected to be published later this week. Dr Holt, who now has a part-time role at Great Ormond Street, said: “I have signed a confidentiality agreement... and I am not allowed to talk about what it contains, but I can say what it does not contain. “I do not believe the report properly addresses the key issue at the heart of what went wrong, namely staffing. Great Ormond Street will say that they have made changes now, but the fact is that a child had to die before they did so.”

A spokesman for Great Ormond Street Hospital denied that the discussions about a payoff were an attempt to “gag” Dr Holt and claimed that they took place before any specific concerns were raised by her about child protection. The spokesman added: “We do not accept much of her version of events. The NHS London report finds that substantial efforts were made to resolve the issues raised. It does make some measured criticisms which we will act on. The issue of workload is a matter of funding, over which we have little control.” [Rubbish! What about firing some of their useless "administrators" and hiring doctors instead?]

SOURCE



The stubborn British bureaucracy partially coming to its senses?

Twelve billion (BILLION) pound NHS computer project could be scrapped at last. They sure take a lot of convincing that they are on the wrong track. An off the shelf database program would probably have done most of what they wanted at negligible cost -- but they knew better, of course

The multibillion-pound national progamme to overhaul NHS computer systems could be cancelled in this week’s Pre-Budget Report, Alistair Darling has said. The National Programme for IT (NPfIT), parts of which are already running four years late, aims to create a single electronic records system for 50 million patients in England, as well as providing electronic prescriptions and other services.

The Chancellor said the “quite expensive” programme, which has been running since 2002 and has an estimated budget of more than £12.7 billion, could be postponed to save cash. Mr Darling told The Andrew Marr Show on the BBC: “It is necessary for me, on Wednesday, to indicate areas where we are going to cut spending and where we are not going to spend as much as we were. “For example, the NHS has quite an expensive IT system that, frankly, is not essential for the front line. That’s something we do not need to go ahead with just now.”

The programme — reputed to be the largest non-military IT project in the world — has previously been criticised over delays to the proposed database of medical records and concerns that the system will not be secure. Fewer than 20 hospital trusts in England have installed electronic medical records under the project, despite an initial deadline for the whole country to have done so by 2010.

Ministers had previously defended the system, insisting that it could save the NHS £1.14 billion by the revised deadline of 2014. But the Government may have to pay out millions to break existing contracts if it cancels the project. At least £400 million of public money has been spent on the project, with four regional contractors — BT, Accenture, Fujitsu and CSC — initially being awarded contracts to provide systems in different regions of England.

Tough contracts mean that software manufacturers and suppliers are paid only when the required systems are delivered and working, meaning the project is still largely on budget.

After the withdrawal of Accenture and Fujitsu from the project due to spiralling costs in 2006 and 2007, hospital trusts in the South of England have recently been encouraged to buy systems “off the shelf” from a list of other suppliers.

The National Audit Office has said that the Government underestimated the challenges involved in the project, pointing to the “serious delays” in applying new software to individual trusts.

The Conservatives have called for a moratorium on Government IT projects, should they win the next election. Andrew Lansley, the Shadow Health Secretary, said today: “After seven years Labour have finally acknowledged what we’ve said for years, that the procurement for NHS IT was costing billions and not delivering. The opportunity cost to the NHS also measures billions of pounds. “This is another government IT procurement disaster. It just shows you can’t trust Labour on spending efficiency.”

Norman Lamb, the Liberal Democrats’ health spokesman, added: “This whole programme has been disastrously flawed from the start. “It has held back the development of IT at a local level, cost billions and is running years behind schedule. “Labour has been in denial for years and this is a belated and partial recognition of the scale of their failure. “The truth is that the national programme should be abandoned in its entirety, subject to existing contractual obligations, and instead we should start building from the bottom.”

Treasury officials stressed that only part of the IT programme was on the line and it would not be scrapped altogether. "The Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Health have examined options for savings on the NHS IT system and more details will be set out in due course," a spokesman said.

SOURCE



British marriage to become a meaningless ceremony?

Are there any rights and obligations of marriage that will not be extended to "shacked up" couples?

Two million unmarried couples need new legal rights to protect them from injustice if they separate, the new senior judge in charge of law reform has said. In many cases long-term partners cannot be adequately protected by existing laws, according to Lord Justice Munby, chairman of the Law Commission. It was time that the law was brought up to date with changes in society. “It is a fact that the number of people marrying today is less than it has been for over 100 years,” he said.

The comments by Lord Justice Munby, who was giving his first interview since taking up the post, will boost the case for a reform of the law pending a decision expected next year from the Government. The judge also indicated that there should be a review of the law on how a married couples’ finances are split on divorce. The Law Commission would soon be consulting on its next programme of work, he said, and the Court of Appeal had said that this area of law should be looked at.

Senior judges had consistently called for reform in this area after a series of “big money cases” with large awards and settlements. The Law Commission would therefore have to “think very carefully” and come up with good reasons for not doing it. Such cases have prompted accusations of unfairness, with wives taking large shares of their husband’s fortune. It was unsatisfactory, he said, that there was a single set of criteria for dividing the wealth of all couples, however large the sum involved. “It might be an advantage having an approach for each.”

On unmarried couples, Lord Justice Munby said that a very significant proportion of children were conceived and born out of wedlock and the family unit was “very, very different from when I grew up”. Many children lived with step-siblings or others to whom they were not related, and were brought up by single mothers whose children were by different fathers. “We cannot blind ourselves to the reality of this, particularly — and this has been the experience of judges — when the consequence of this, and the undying myth of the common law marriage, is that the lack of [legal arrangements] can cause serious injustice.” Couples “assume they will have some kind of protection,” he said.

“An astonishing number of people believe that there is something called common law marriage which will entitle them to a share of finances and property.” He said that one way to tackle this myth was to educate people to understand the situation. But in his 35 years of professional practice such efforts had clearly had no effect — and “these injustices continue”.

The comments from Lord Justice Munby, who recently took up his three-year post in charge of the law reform watchdog, come as the Government awaits research findings from Scotland, where since 2006 unmarried couples have been granted legal rights on separation. The Law Commission of England and Wales, which he now heads, put forward proposals in 2007 for extending some legal rights where couples have children or would suffer hardship without a financial settlement.

Two months ago it put forward separate reforms under which unmarried couples would automatically inherit some of their partner’s estate on his or her death. Lord Justice Munby, a judge since 2000 in the family and administrative divisions of the High Court, said he did not believe that giving unmarried couples legal rights on separation as proposed by the Law Commission would undermine marriage. “I don’t believe [they do],” he said. “Lawyers — and I would have thought it was the same for the Law Commission — have to have regard to the society in which we live; and it is a fact that our society has changed in some respects immensely, even in the time I have been a practising lawyer.”

Lord Justice Munby said that the days had long since gone when the business of judges was to enforce morality.

Although ultimately such changes were for Parliament, that did not mean the Law Commission should wash its hands. It had to recognise realities and come up with suggestions for reform, if the law created injustice. He added that the Law Commission would shortly announce a “very exciting project consultation on adult social care”, or all the law relating to the care that people can receive in their own homes, from meals on wheels to help with washing and dressing. The reforms would save millions in bureaucracy and red tape, he said.

SOURCE



British police use 'tricks' to 'fiddle' crime figures

Police forces are using a series of tricks to manipulate crime figures to give a false picture of their performance, a former senior detective has revealed. The techniques – dubbed "gaming" – are used to create the illusion that fewer crimes are being committed and that a bigger proportion are being solved. Rodger Patrick, a retired Detective Chief Inspector, claimed that the methods are tacitly approved of by senior officers, police watchdogs and the Home Office.

The claims will reignite the debate about the validity of crime statistics after recent figures suggested that crime fell four per cent in the second quarter of this year, and following the admission by a police watchdog that some forces are failing to record violent crime properly. The techniques identified by Dr Patrick include:

:: "Cuffing" – in which officers make crimes disappear from official figures by either recording them as a "false report" or downgrading their seriousness. For example, a robbery in which a mobile phone is stolen with violence or threats of violence is recorded as "theft from the person", which is not classed as a violent crime.

:: "Stitching" – from "stitching up", whereby offenders are charged with a crime when there is insufficient evidence. Police know that prosecutors will never proceed with the case but the crime appears in police records to have been "solved".

:: "Skewing" – when police activity is directed at easier-to-solve crimes to boost detection rates, at the expense of more serious offences such as sex crimes or child abuse.

:: "Nodding" – where clear-up rates are boosted by persuading convicted offenders to admit to crimes they have not committed, in exchange for inducements such as a lower sentence.

Dr Patrick, who researched the subject for a PhD, said: "The academics call this 'gaming' but police officers would call it fiddling the figures, massaging the books or, the current favourite term, 'good housekeeping'. It is a bit like the police activities that we all thought stopped in the 1970s."

Serving police officers confirmed that the tricks were being used and gave examples of how they had been implemented. In one case, an offender shot at another man at close range but missed and broke a window behind his target. The offence was recorded as criminal damage rather than attempted murder. In another example, a man robbed in a city's red-light district – an area he had been innocently passing through – was told by officers they would be unable to record the crime without informing his wife he had been the area, leading to the complaint being withdrawn.

One detective, who declined to be named, said: "Name any crime and I'll tell you how it can be fiddled."

Simon Reed, vice-chairman of the Police Federation, which represents front line officers, said: "This research demonstrates that senior officers are directing and controlling widespread manipulation of crime figures. "The public are misled, politicians can claim crime is falling and chief officers are rewarded with performance-related bonuses."

Last month Denis O'Connor, the Chief Inspector of Constabulary, published an official report into the way police record violent crime and admitted the figures may be skewed by "perverse incentives" around government performance targets.

Dr Patrick's research highlighted figures from his own former force, West Midlands, which reveal what happened when senior officers cracked down on one of the gaming techniques. Rank and file officers were told in 2002 that informal police warnings could no longer be counted as a detection for common assaults. Within 12 months the number of recorded common assaults dropped from 22,000 to 3,000 while thousands more crimes switched to the category "other woundings". "Such a rapid adjustment indicates the organisational nature of the phenomenon and suggests some form of co-ordination and direction by management," the research said. "The scale of the 'gaming' behaviours measured in this thesis ... suggested senior officers were either directly orchestrating the behaviour or turning a blind eye to it."

Dr Patrick believes other gaming techniques are still being used in forces across the country.

The report also warned that the use of "stitching" was "significant", while "cuffing" had continued after the introduction of Home Office rules which were supposed to guarantee and standardise the way crimes are recorded. "Cuffing" can involve a situation where a victim of crime is accused of making a false crime report, and is therefore treated like a suspect rather than an injured party, Dr Patrick said. "You cannot have members of the public who have been victims of crime coming to the police for help and being treated like suspects. That is not right and it will erode confidence in the police," he said.

Dr Patrick found that watchdogs such as Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) and the Police Standards Unit had a "general tendency to underplay the scale and nature" of gaming. He was scathing of HMIC's failure to tackle the problem, noting there were no examples of chief police officers being publicly criticised by inspectors for this type of crime figure manipulation. HMIC tended privately to refer examples of widespread gaming to the Home Secretary or the police authority rather than "hold the chief constable to account" because of the risk of political embarrassment, he said.

Dr Patrick concluded that HMIC inspectors should be made accountable to Parliament rather than the Home Office, and suggested they should be drawn from other professions rather than solely from senior police ranks.

SOURCE



The false rape claims never stop in Britain

Cheating wife cried rape in text message to husband after fit of guilt over affair

A wife who cried rape because she felt guilty about cheating on her husband in their home was spared jail yesterday. Helen Dalby went to extraordinary lengths to stand by her false claim, having a full medical examination and even helping create an e-fit of her imaginary attacker.

But despite wasting £3,800 of public money and showing little regard for two men arrested, she was given a ten-month suspended jail sentence after admitting perverting the course of justice.

Judge David Tremberg told 35-year-old Dalby: 'The men (who came under suspicion) no doubt will have wondered what might have happened to them if this nightmare did not go away. Your lies diverted a massive amount of precious police time and resources from proper duty.' Dalby's behaviour risked weakening the cases of genuine rape victims and allowing dangerous offenders to be acquitted, he added. In similar cases prison sentences of up to two years have been imposed. But the judge ruled this case was 'exceptional' because Dalby did not act out of 'spite or malice', and imposed a more lenient sentence.

Yesterday she was back home with her husband Isaac, who has faithfully stood by her. Problems with their sex life caused by his long hours at work had driven Dalby into the arms of another man, he said. 'I've been hurt by Helen but I don't want to lose her,' added 35-year-old cleaner Mr Dalby. 'She realises she is lucky not to go to prison. It is terrible what has happened for these two men and their families.'

Dalby had a three-month affair with a man she met through a telephone dating service, the court heard. On 15 August, she had consensual sex with her lover at home in Grimsby before texting Mr Dalby to tell him she had been raped by a stranger.

David Cammies, prosecuting, said she later pretended to police that a man had followed her home, pushed her inside and attacked her in a bedroom. Officers launched an investigation, seizing clothes, bedding and a cigarette butt. Two innocent men - including her lover - were arrested and spent 'many hours' in custody before her lies were exposed, the court was told.

Outside Grimsby Crown Court, Dalby said: 'I am very, very sorry. It is the biggest mistake of my life. I didn't want to hurt anybody. Once I had said it, Isaac said we should call the police. It just snowballed.'

Police expressed surprise at the sentence and urged victims not to be put off from reporting genuine sex attacks.

SOURCE



British teachers trying to shoot the messenger

Head teachers are threatening to block the publication of primary school league tables next year after branding them “demoralising”. The National Association of Head Teachers said it was “determined” that 2009's rankings would the last of their kind. The union, which represents the majority of primary school leaders, warned that members would boycott Sats tests in 2010 unless they were scrapped – making them effectively impossible to proceed. The proposed action is being backed by the National Union of Teachers. It comes despite the announcement of an overhaul of league tables by Labour.

Mick Brookes, general secretary, said: “NAHT is determined that this is the last time that this system will be used to unfairly compare schools in vastly different contexts. "League tables of pupil performance are misleading to parents. They are also demoralising for schools and school leaders, particularly those working tirelessly in tough communities, and they add nothing to the impetus for school improvement."

Unions claim Sats narrow the curriculum and promote a culture of "teaching to the test" as school attempt to climb league tables. Some schools cut subjects such as history, art and PE in the final year of primary school to drill pupils to pass, it is claimed. Under the proposed industrial action, teachers would refuse to administer, invigilate and mark Sats in English and maths next year. It would affect most exams taken by almost 600,000 pupils in England in May.

Last week, Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary, signalled a softening of his opposition to the scrapping of Sats. He said teacher assessments - when staff analyse pupils' work over the course of the final year without a formal test - would would be included alongside raw Sats results in league tables from 2010. He suggested the alternative system could eventually replace tests altogether. But unions have refused to call off the proposed boycott.

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: "Every year teachers ask themselves why their schools have to go through this charade. There is only one answer to the annual, traditional hunt for ‘the worst school in the country’. Governments now and in the future have to drop their deeply engrained habit of naming and shaming schools as their principle method of school improvement."

Diana Johnson, the Schools Minister, said: "Figures demonstrate exactly why it’s important that we have a strong school accountability system, based on externally validated results. "Tests in English and maths play a key role in giving parents the information they need on their child's level of attainment and progress after seven years of publically funded education.”

Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT, which opposes the industrial action, said: "I have no doubt that the results will once again show the steady and sustained year-on-year improvement schools consistently produce. "However, the tables will no doubt once again provoke the mind-numbing debate on Sats which will serve only to undermine the hard work and achievement of pupils and teachers."

Sats tests in science were scrapped earlier this year following a recommendation from the Government's expert group on testing.

SOURCE



Another iatrogenic disaster?

A popular diabetes drugs taken by up to 500,000 people raises the risk of dying by 60 per cent compared with other medicines for the condition, researchers have found. The drugs, known as sulphonylureas, are commonly used to treat type two diabetes, which can be caused by being overweight. The condition affects around two million people in the UK.

In the study, the drugs were found to increase the risk of dying from any cause by 60 per cent. They also increased the likelihood of heart failure - a condition where the heart fails to beat strongly - by 30 per cent, compared with another common medicine. It is thought sulphonylureas affect the way the body protects the heart from damage, leaving it vulnerable, the authors said.

The researchers at Imperial College London said the findings were 'important' but stopped short of saying that diabetics should avoid the drugs. They said guidelines already recommend that metformin, the drug they used for comparison, be used in preference to sulphonylureas.

Diabetics are already more susceptible to heart problems because of their condition and concerns have been raised that some of the medication may exacerbate this. In addition, the study - involving over 90,000 diabetics in Britain - found a newer drug pioglitazone, reduced the risk of dying when compared with metformin by up to 39 per cent.

The study was led by Prof Paul Elliott, who wrote in the British Medical Journal online: "The sulphonylureas, along with metformin, have long been considered the mainstay of drug treatment for type 2 diabetes. Our findings suggest a relatively unfavourable risk profile of sulphonylureas compared with metformin. "This is consistent with the recommendations of the American Diabetes Association and International Diabetes Federation that favour metformin as the initial treatment for type 2 diabetes."

Dr Iain Frame, Director of Research at leading health charity Diabetes UK, added: “This study looks at the relative risk of the various drugs used to treat Type 2 diabetes. It is a retrospective study and there is nothing particularly new revealed here. “We have to treat the results and the interpretation of them with some caution. “Diabetes UK would not advise people with Type 2 diabetes to stop taking sulphonylureas based on the results of this research. "If you are concerned about taking this medication you should contact your GP or diabetes healthcare team.”

SOURCE




Vegetables to die for help Montacute’s men to reach ripe old age

This is rubbish. By chance alone there will always be some places that fare better than others

A little village in Somerset has been identified as Britain’s safest place for old men to grow even older. Men of retirement age living in Montacute (pop 640) have a longer life expectancy than their contemporaries anywhere else in Britain. Montacute, near Yeovil, was identified as the longevity hotspot of the country by an analysis of more than three million pension records. Sixty-five-year-olds living in Montecute can expect an average of 25 more years of life, taking them up to 90. In contrast, 65-year-old men living in Bootle on Merseyside can expect an average of only 17 more years.

The life expectancy figures were worked out by actuaries, based on the number of men over 65 expected to die in the next 12 months. The figures were calculated for every postcode. The national average, expressed as mortality per thousand, is ten, but in Montacute the figure is just 6.4. This contrasts with Bootle, which scored the highest with 15.3. The actuaries then used a formula to turn the mortality figures into average life expectancy by postcode.

Matthew Edwards, of Watson Wyatt, the international business consultancy, and lead actuary on the study, said it showed that variations in longevity were directly affected by where people live. He said: “These findings show vividly that postcodes can explain substantial variations in mortality, with the longevity varying from 17 to 25 years according to their postcode band; a difference in expected future life time of eight years.”

A parallel study of women found that differences in longevity by postcode were far smaller than for men, with a variation of just four years. The figures for women have yet to be released.

“The variations in life expectancy are due to substantial differences in general health and lifestyle patterns between different parts of the UK. The North-South divide in particular is very striking, and the variation in life expectancy by postcode band for female occupational pension scheme holders is about half of the above range.”

In Montacute there is little doubt about the reason that its residents live such long lives. Many of them have vegetable patches and grow much of their food. Not only is the fresh produce healthier to eat, but the hard work involved in digging and harvesting it also keeps them fit.

Shirley Hann, who has lived in the village all her life, still grows her own vegetables at the age of 74. A great-grandmother of three, she said: “It seems that growing our own vegetables does have a bearing on how fit we are and how long we live. People here all have allotments or a little vegetable patch in their back garden. “I’ve been eating homegrown veg my whole life. I’ve never regarded it as amazing, but I’m fit enough to do it. Plus if you’ve got something to do and you’ve got an interest, it keeps you healthy.”

Her cousin, Keith Hann, 72, has grown 95 per cent of his fruit and veg for half a century. The great-grandfather, who worked as a financial consultant, said: “When you grow your own food, or the majority of it, you’re having pure food not full of chemicals, which I’m afraid seems to be in most foods you buy from supermarkets. “We have a lot of older people in the village who seem healthy, agile and determined. “I think the younger generation could learn a lot about living from older people who appreciate their health and whatever they may have.”

Charlie Northam, 89, has only recently given up growing vegetables for himself and his wife, Mabel, 90. He put their good health down to his homegrown onions and said: “I wouldn’t live anywhere else for all the tea in China.”

SOURCE



UK: The big squeeze: "Next year, Britain’s middle classes and the rich will face the biggest squeeze on their living standards in decades, shows research produced by accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers for The Independent. In the build-up to what promises to be an exceptionally tough pre-Budget report this Wednesday, PwC says the typical British family (’Middle England’) already faces a decline of 2.4 per cent, or £300 a year, in its discretionary spending power, after tax, mortgages, food and other essentials.”

Nonsense on poverty: "The Joseph Rowntree Trust released its report on the state of poverty in the UK and brought forth the usual howls of outrage about, well, pretty much everything really. I was actually rather enjoying the howls of how we now have Dickensian, Victorian, levels of poverty for I always do enjoy hysterical hyperbole. But it set me thinking, do we actually have such levels? Of course, we simply do not have, absent a very few families blighted by mental illness, drugs or drink, anything like the physical poverty of those days.”





7 December, 2009

Science rescues British children from obesity police

SOCIAL WORKERS have been told to think again about putting overweight children on “at risk” registers after scientists found that obesity can be linked to a genetic defect. In the past three years dozens of parents in Britain have been accused of abusing their children through “overfeeding”, with some youngsters being taken into care. In one of the most extreme cases, in October, social workers went to a maternity ward in Dundee to remove a baby born 28 hours earlier. The Dundee family's lawyers will challenge the decision before a sheriff next week.

The research, by Cambridge University, suggests many parents have been wrongly accused and that the problem lies in the children’s chromosomes. Sadaf Farooqi, who runs the metabolic research laboratories, said: “We have found that part of chromosome 16 can be deleted in some families, and people with this deletion have severe obesity from a young age.”

The results, published today in Nature, emerged from comparing the genomes of 300 obese children with those of 7,000 healthy volunteers. This showed many of the obese youngsters were missing the section of chromosome 16 that contains a gene known as SH2B1, which plays a key role in regulating weight. “They were left with a strong drive to eat and gained weight easily,” said Farooqi.

Some of the 300 obese youngsters in the study were already on “at risk” registers as it was assumed their parents were overfeeding them. They have now been removed from the register, Farooqi said.

In February 2007 The Sunday Times reported on one of the first such “abuse by overfeeding” cases. It involved a boy of eight from Newcastle upon Tyne who weighed 14 stone and whose parents faced care proceedings. The intervention of social services in that case was seen as a landmark in fighting obesity.

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Bureaucratic inertia and vested interests block "Green" truck in Britain

Wacky Greenie schemes are celebrated but when an environmental initiative that makes sense comes along it is not permitted in sclerotic Britain

It was hardly The Dukes of Hazzard. The 74-year-old outlaw trucker donned his bifocal driving glasses, adjusted his panama hat and made a break for the highway. Barely 50m from the haulage yard, the local police chief was lying in wait to stop the supersized lorry taking to Britain’s roads. At 25.25m (83ft), he suspected that it was longer than the legal limit and the lorry’s inaugural road test would have to wait. Government inspectors do not want such long vehicles on the road, fearing environmental damage, wear and tear on the network and potentially devastating crashes.

But the double articulated lorry, designed to carry bulky supermarket freight, was simply too big to reverse back into the yard. So police guided the Denby Extra superlorry on a mile-long drive through the outskirts of Lincoln, as far as a roundabout on the A46, where the 18 wheels could find room to turn and take the truck back to its siding.

The driver, Dick Denby, a grandfather of six, descended from his cab and declared: “A change is as good as a rest. A new experience every day is my motto in life.”

In his hand was the pink notice served by an inspector from the Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (VOSA) informing him that his pioneering vehicle would have to be removed from the road for inspection. “This is a notice really to bugger off, to get off the highway, ‘get back to your rat hole, matey’,” Mr Denby said.

And with that he followed the inspector and the head of collision investigation at Lincolnshire Police, Sergeant Dave Kay, into his office to be formally notified that the lorry could go no further. “Arrest is always the last option,” Sergeant Kay said. “I hand it over now to our VOSA colleagues.”

An inspection team set about measuring the 44-tonne lorry. Mr Denby claims that he is exploiting a legal loophole that allows such monsters on the roads. They are, he says, more fuel efficient and environmentally friendly than standard juggernauts, which measure 54ft. Tests on private land have found that the lorries burn 15 per cent less fuel than conventional trucks to carry an equal volume of cargo. Two trucks can carry the load of three existing lorries, so that fewer vehicles need take to the road, he says.

But the Department for Transport is against the road trials, fearing a backlash from drivers and the rail industry, which could see their market for freight undercut.

“Last year, following independent research, we announced that goods vehicles substantially larger than those currently permitted would not be allowed on UK roads for the foreseeable future,” a DfT spokesman said.

As inspectors set to work, the key point of contention on Mr Denby’s truck was the first trailer section — at 7.82m, according to VOSA, it was too long to run on British roads. Mr Denby said that a thick bulkhead fitted inside the Dutch-built lorry had reduced the length of the cargo hold to 7m and it was therefore legal under the 1986 Road Vehicles Construction and Use Regulations. The inspector’s report was to be sent to his superiors with the possibility of a prohibition order being imposed. Mr Denby was consulting his lawyers.

The DfT said that it was prepared to go to court to prevent a challenge to any prohibition order.

The haulage industry is divided on the merits of adopting the large trucks, even if they already operate in the Netherlands, Sweden and Finland. The manufacturers of light, bulky goods such as toilet paper are most interested in the technology.

With the lorry parked back in his haulage yard and the lawyers alerted, Mr Denby, who had not driven a lorry for 14 years, left for an old boys’ reunion at Fortnum & Mason.

SOURCE



Climategate Professor reduced to obscene abuse in lieu of intelligent discussion

That rather tells its own story. He couldn't handle the truth of what was being said

A professor who is accusing global warming skeptics of engaging in "tabloid-style character assassination” of scientists, called an American climate skeptic “an assh*le” on the December 4, 2009 live broadcast of BBC's Newsnight program. “What an assh*le!” declared Professor Watson at the end of the contentious debate with Climate Depot's executive editor Marc Morano. A clearly agitated Watson had earlier shouted to Morano “will you shut up.”

The remark was broadcast live on BBC and prompted an on-air apology to viewers from the BBC later in the program for the offensive language.

Watson (Email: a.watson@uea.ac.uk) is a professor at the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of East Anglia, which was the source of the disclosed files. Watson's emails appear in the hacked Climategate files.

During the live debate, Morano challenged Professor Watson for being in “denial” over the importance of Climategate and noted that “you have to feel sorry for Professor Watson.”

“[Watson's] colleague, [Professor] Mike Hulme at the University of East Anglia is saying this is authoritarian science, he is suggesting the [UN] IPCC should be disbanded based on what Climategate reveals," Morano said.

"[UK environmentalist] George Monbiot is saying many of his friend in the environmental and the climate fear promoting business -- as Professor Watson is part of -- are in denial. You have to feel sorry for Professor Watson in many ways here,” Morano explained.

A clearly agitated Watson blurted out “Will you shut up just a second!?”

Morano summed up his views on what ClimateGate reveals during the debate. “It exposes the manufactured consensus. Your fellow colleagues are saying this,” Morano said to Watson.

SOURCE (See the original for links, video)



Photographer questioned by British police under anti-terror laws... for taking 'too many' pictures of town centre Christmas lights

The rabid war on photography continues

An amateur photographer taking pictures of Christmas lights was questioned by police under anti-terror laws. Andrew White, from Brighton, was taking pictures in a busy town centre in nearby Burgess Hill when he was spotted and followed by two Police Community Support Officers. They stopped him and asked why he had been taking pictures and if he was a professional photographer.

Mr White, 33, asked why they wanted to know and was told it was to do with counter-terrorism legislation. Police said he was stopped for 'taking too many photographs in a busy shopping area'. The PCSOs demanded his personal details, including his name and address.

Mr White said: 'I had nothing to hide so I just provided the details. Now I'm concerned about where those details are going to end up. 'I only took one or two photos but even if I had taken more, who are they to say what is too many? 'I don't think taking too many photos in the street warrants being considered some kind of terrorist threat, which is what they were suggesting. 'I think the money spent on getting PCSOs to waste my time and harass me in the street could be better spent elsewhere.' Mr White said the officers were polite but they insisted that they had to take his details because they had stopped him.

A Sussex Police spokesman said they spoke to Mr White because they were concerned he was taking too many photographs in a busy shopping area. The spokesman said: 'They were acting in good faith, balancing individual liberty against the need to ensure public safety.' Under the 2002 Police Reform Act, PCSOs have the power to demand the name and address of a person suspected of committing a criminal offence or for antisocial behaviour.

SOURCE



LibertyPhile notes that even readers of Britain's Leftist Guardian overwhelmingly approved the Swiss vote to ban Muslim minarets in that country.

There is an interesting video here about the extent of Muslim activism in Britain.

British PM snubbed by soldiers' 'curtain' protest: "Gordon Brown was snubbed by badly injured Afghan veterans when they closed curtains round their beds during a hospital visit and refused to speak to him. More than half the soldiers being treated at the Selly Oak hospital ward in Birmingham either asked for the curtains to be closed or deliberately avoided the prime minister, according to several of those present. The soldiers, who have sustained some of the worst injuries seen in Afghanistan, described his visit as “opportunistic” and a “waste of time”. Furious about equipment shortages and poor compensation for their injuries, one soldier said: “It is almost as if we are the product of an unwanted affair ... he has done nothing for us.”

There is a new lot of postings by Chris Brand just up -- on his usual vastly "incorrect" themes of race, genes, IQ etc.





6 December, 2009

Lazy British paramedic lets baby die

Khalid Abdel-Rahim, a paramedic with the London Ambulance Service, faces being struck off by a conduct and competence committee at the Health Professions Council in London.

A panel heard Mr Abdel-Rahim responded to an emergency call at 2.25am on May 19 last year, accompanied by a newly-qualified female emergency medical technician. The patient, a pregnant woman, had had no ante-natal care, was not registered with a GP and refused to go to a hospital. She gave birth shortly after the crew arrived at the scene, but the baby was not breathing, the panel heard.

Chris Whalley, for the HPC, told the panel the technician, who was junior to the paramedic, attempted resuscitation, even though Mr Abdel-Rahim should have taken the lead. After about 15 minutes, Mr Abdel-Rahim made the decision to stop, although he did not have the authority to do so, the committee was told. Mr Whalley said: "He should not have made this decision and he did not have the authority to do so."

Mr Abdul-Rahim was also accused of a number of other failings, including that he failed to call for a second ambulance crew and midwife when it became obvious that birth was imminent. He also allegedly left the technician to attend to the patient and baby in the back of the ambulance when she was eventually persuaded to go to the hospital, when, as the paramedic, he should have attended to the patient himself.

And the committee heard that Mr Abdel-Rahim made a radio call to the hospital informing them incorrectly that there had been a miscarriage. This meant staff at the hospital were not properly prepared. On arrival, staff did attempt to restart the resuscitation, but the child was pronounced stillborn at 3.45am.

Mr Whalley said the HPC's case was that Mr Abdel-Rahim was guilty of a "serious lack of competence at best, serious misconduct at worst". The panel also heard evidence from assistant chief ambulance officer Steve Sale, who chaired a trust disciplinary panel, which looked into the incident. He said the crew arrived at a "chaotic scene", adding: "The patient herself was uncooperative, uncommunicative and did not wish to be examined by the crew at that time, so it was a difficult scene and a difficult call to respond to."

He said the technician persuaded the patient to allow an examination after building up some rapport, at which point it became clear that the birth was imminent. Mr Sale said, at this point, the paramedic should have called for a second ambulance and midwife.

Mr Abdel-Rahim, who did not attend today's hearing, was unable to tell the trust's own disciplinary panel why he did not do this.

The panel heard it was the technician herself who complained about Mr Abdel-Rahim's conduct because she was shocked when staff at the hospital tried to restart the resuscitation which the paramedic had stopped.

At the trust's disciplinary hearing, Mr Abdel-Rahim admitted allegations that he failed to resuscitate a new-born baby in line with guidance and training, but he said the scene was so chaotic that it clouded his judgment and thinking.

The HPC would not disclose the name of the hospital other than it was a large teaching hospital in London and the patient's address was less than a mile away.

SOURCE



NHS faces 'perfect storm' of funding cuts and rising workload

The NHS is facing a 'perfect storm' of funding cutbacks, rising costs and increasing workload due to the ageing population, a think tank has warned. Health service managers and politicians must be honest about the scale of the financial challenges, the King's Fund has said in a report.

The NHS is faced with having to make efficiency savings of £20bn over three years from 2011 when the big funding increases come to an end. Yet demand for healthcare is increasing all the time with patients expecting better quality and a more responsive NHS and the ageing population requiring more care.

In the report Windmill 2009: NHS response to the financial storm, the King's Fund said it was vital that government and regional health service managers did not try to micromanage. Dr Anna Dixon, The King’s Fund Director of Policy, said: "It is clear that the NHS needs to start planning now and engaging staff and local people as it faces some difficult choices ahead. It’s vital that politicians are honest about the level of funding available and support local leaders in making these tough decisions."

The NHS budget has tripled under Labour but the big year-on-year increases were always planned to come to an end in 2011 with smaller rises after that. Now the recession and the government deficit have put increasing pressure on the NHS and some experts have warned there may even be a real terms cut in NHS funding as ministers seek to pay off the national debt.

Alasdair Liddell, report co-author, said: "There’s a danger that the recession will provoke the different organisations that make up the NHS to turn inwards and focus on their own survival as institutions rather than thinking about how they can work together to continue to provide the best service possible to their local communities. "That might require new partnerships and innovative ways of working with others, so this certainly isn’t the time for private and third sector providers to be dissuaded from getting involved in providing NHS services."

Karen Jennings, Head of Health at Unison, said: “The report is right to say that NHS leaders should be honest about the financial challenges ahead. It is also important for Trusts to recognise the valuable role that staff can play in unlocking improvements and driving up quality, particularly in a period of relative austerity. “And the report's findings on the advantages of working with the private sector do not come as a surprise, given the involvement of a number of private healthcare providers in producing it.

"That is what has generated so many off the wall and frankly damaging findings in the “Windmill” report. “The private sector does not have a monopoly on innovation. There are many examples of excellence within the NHS; what is needed is greater collaboration and sharing of that good practice."

SOURCE



British Centenarian Told to Wait 18 Months to Get Hearing Aid

Longevity apparently does not count for much in Britain's government-managed National Health Service.

Much of 108-year-old Olive Beal's hearing was gone. The one-time suffragette and former piano teacher from Kent, England was unable to enjoy music or hear conversations clearly with her five-year-old analog hearing aid. A modern digital device would improve Beal's hearing - and life - tremendously, but she was having difficulty receiving a replacement.

Beal's granddaughter, Maria Scott, explained: "Her analog hearing aid does not filter out background noise so it makes it very difficult for her to hear clearly. But the digital one would allow her to hear people talking to her and to CDs. She loves music hall numbers."

Beal was administered a hearing test in late July 2007, and a hearing expert recommended a digital hearing device. However, the local health authority, Eastern and Coastal Kent Primary Care Trust, has an 18-month waiting list for new hearing aids provided through the NHS. Despite her age and despite contributing income taxes that fund the government's universal health system into her late 60s, Beal was told she must wait her turn in line. A spokesman for the Eastern and Coastal Kent Primary Care Trust explained: "[P]riority is given to patients who do not have an existing hearing aid..."

Under the government system, Beal would be 110 years old by the time the new hearing aid was scheduled to arrive. Beal expressed her fear: "I could be dead by then."

Maria Scott added, "I would have thought they would take her age into account as she probably has not got 18 months to wait... Her eyesight is falling [sic], and if she cannot hear then she will be isolated from the outside world."

Fortunately, widespread press attention and concern about Beal's situation prompted Phillip Ball, a private audiologist, to assist Beal voluntarily. Ball said: "I can see no reason why a lady of her age should be fobbed off by her NHS Trust and told to wait at least 18 months, so I immediately got on the phone to offer my services. I visited Olive this week and she should have a fully functioning digital aid in a matter of days [early August 2007]. She will now be able to hear a great deal better."

A digital hearing device costs approximately 1,000 British pounds (~$1,600) each, and wait times for hearing aids can be over two years in some parts of Britain. "The new digital hearing aids can really transform people's lives," said Donna Tipping of the Royal National Institute for the Deaf, a British charity. "It is an issue of quality of life, with isolation, frustration and withdrawing from society caused by loss of hearing, and it is sad because this is reversible."

As her grandmother is one of Britain's oldest living citizens, Maria Scott added, "I thought a 108-year-old deserved to be treated better than this."

SOURCE



Tony Judt and the confusion of the modern Left

It is with a little sadness that I write this. I am going to comment on a recent essay by Tony Judt. Even though he is an anti-Israel Jew, he is a brilliant mind and a most knowledgeable historian. He is now however suffering from a severe physical disability and the essay I wish to comment on could well be his last substantial work. So, with respect:

The essay boils down to two things: A rejection of "economism" and a dreamy glorification of 20th century democratic Leftism. And he ends up saying that Leftists should be conservatives. A more confused, though lucid, set of ideas would be hard to imagine.

For a start, his central dilemma is one that is ever-present on the contemporary Left: He argues for moral values while also believing that there is no such thing as right and wrong. If self-contradiction is a mark of insanity, the modern Left is terminally deranged.

It is purely in the name of some unspecified moral order that Judt rejects "economism". And what he condemns as "economism" boils down to being concerned about your financial state of affairs. It is wrong, apparently, to be concerned about how much money you have in your pocket. It is no doubt an outcome of Judt's own privileged life that he literally seems unable to understand why people would have such concerns.

It was one of my correspondents who alerted me to Judt's essay and the comment he sent with the link was simply: "A moron". One can understand that judgement. Let me be a little more professional about the matter, however, and say that Judt's moral ideas are seriously underdeveloped and that a full elaboration of his moral beliefs and reasoning would be needed for anyone to draw any reasonable conclusions from his essay.

He goes on to glorify government-provided services generally but once again seems not to be living in the real world. Who has not experienced the horrors of dealing with large bureaucracies and who does not find small businesses easier to deal with? He seems unaware that you get much better treatment as a valued customer than you do if you are a mere number to some bureaucrat. You are virtually powerless against a bureaucracy but you have some weight as a person who can take his business elsewhere.

Judt's primary example of a service that should be government provided is the railways. He thinks that they are "an essential public service". That people in some places get along quite well without them and that the vast majority of Americans hardly use them at all appears to have had no impact on his thinking. His argument seems to boil down to saying that railways run purely for profit would not serve isolated regions or the poor very well. He is probably right about that but does it follow that a government-run railway is the answer? If we are going to subsidize anything, why not subsidize small buses to run on the route concerned? That would undoubtedly be a lot easier on the taxpayer's pocket.

So his final plea that we remember the past glories of socialism is as deranged as his moral ideas. Leftists should hope that people do NOT remember how awful past government services have been. What Judt wants us to "remember" is a dreamy ideal that never existed. His closing assertion that "The left, to be quite blunt about it, has something to conserve" is undoubtedly a common Leftist belief but it is just another example of his moral incoherence and blindness to the actual past.

In an effort to do justice to the man, however, I will happily concede his point that privatizations of government services have not always worked well. And since he seems to have railways on the brain, let me mention the privatization of British Rail. I remember the shabbiness, erratic services and awful sandwiches of British Rail well so am perhaps in some position to comment. Who could believe train drivers who drove off while people were still trying to board? I do because I saw it. I was one of the passengers concerned.

There is no doubt that rail services in Britain today are often very poor but that is a consequence of their very PARTIAL privatization. The infinitely better rail services of the Victorian era were provided by companies that OWNED not only the trains but the tracks they ran on. In Britain today, however, the private rail companies own very little. They bid for the privilege of providing a service and get a government-controlled monopoly in return. So, once they have obtained their monopoly, it makes sense for them to screw passengers for all they can. Roadspace and parking are severely limited in Britain so passengers usually have no real option of other forms of transport.

In the Victorian era, by contrast, railways DID compete (and also co-operated when that was useful). There was more than one set of tracks running North and if you wanted to get from (say) London to somewhere in Scotland, there were competing ways of doing so. So it seems reasonable that a recreation of the completely private Victorian ownership structure would give results comparable to the Victorian experience. But modern Britain is too socialist for that to be contemplated.

And as for government-sponsored or government-run train services in Australia these days, don't get me started. The Melbourne services are run on British lines and just ask any Melbourne commuter how that works out.

There many more points in Judt's essay that I could contend with but the eloquence of the essay hides such a poverty of ideas that I cannot justify spending more time on it.



One in five Scots unable to read and write

This would once have been unimaginable in education-mad Scotland

Almost one million Scots are unable to read and write properly, according to an influential group of educationalists who have called for an overhaul of the country’s approach to literacy.

According to the Literacy Commission — which also includes business leaders and the novelist Ian Rankin — about a fifth of adults do not have the literacy skills they need for their daily lives. The group has also warned that about 13,000 pupils leave primary school every year without reaching even basic levels.

The commission has set out a plan to improve standards and achieve the aim of making Scotland the first fully literate country. It believes deprivation is the biggest barrier to this and wants help to begin before children start school.

Under its proposals, primary school pupils will learn to read by the synthetic phonics method, which involves learning the sounds that make up words, rather than recognising individual words. Teachers will be trained to identify slow learners, who can then be put through diagnostic testing and given one-to-one support.

SOURCE



The business of education reform in Britain

Reform’s latest report, Core Business, does an excellent job of pinpointing some of the main problems with education in the UK, but, to my mind, does not go quite far enough on the solutions.

As the report makes clear, low expectations, a lack of intellectual rigor and grade inflation are serious problems in our schools, while the fact that the most disadvantaged children are pushed to follow non-academic qualifications to boost school league table results is nothing less than a disgrace. A powerful and convincing case is also made that government policies of emphasizing differences in educational potential of children is in fact a symptom of the failure of state education.

On the policy side, there are two recommendations. Firstly, it is suggested that, “all students should be required to study a minimum of five academic GCSEs”, while vocational qualifications would be done in addition to, not instead of GCSEs. Yet on its own, this change would offer little for the thousands of children let down by state education. The problem isn’t vocational qualifications per se – just consider the Indian examples of NIIT and GNIIT – but rather the fact that the state holds a debilitating monopoly on education funding and delivery. It might well make the skewed league tables more accurate to ignore vocational qualifications, but as competition between schools is nonexistent, this will not return power to parents in any genuine sense. What we need is for parents to become consumers of education – something which Reform, to their credit, have pointed out in numerous other reports.

Secondly, the report recommends ending Ofqual’s and the QCDA’s control of the curriculum. This makes sense, but replacing them with another Quango run by academics is a Band-Aid solution to a much wider problem. It may prevent grade inflation, but will do little for improving the quality of teaching. Once again, I feel the focus should be on more competition, not just ‘better regulation’.

If the Conservative Party does come to power, they will have a mandate for radical reform of the education system. The failure of state education as things stand is beyond doubt. With a voucher system that allows schools to profit, competing curriculums to better meet the demands of parents and a bonfire of the multifarious regulations, Michael Gove MP could succeed where so many before him have failed. A proper market place with competing brands of schools, teaching methods, exam boards and curriculums is the only way to extract ourselves from the hole we have been digging since 1870.

SOURCE



Britain's official meteorologists rattled

Met Office to re-examine 160 years of climate data

The Met Office plans to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by leaked e-mails. The new analysis of the data will take three years, meaning that the Met Office will not be able to state with absolute confidence the extent of the warming trend until the end of 2012.

The Met Office database is one of three main sources of temperature data analysis on which the UN’s main climate change science body relies for its assessment that global warming is a serious danger to the world. This assessment is the basis for next week’s climate change talks in Copenhagen aimed at cutting CO2 emissions.

The Government is attempting to stop the Met Office from carrying out the re-examination, arguing that it would be seized upon by climate change sceptics. [Truth? Who cares about that? (apparently)]

The Met Office works closely with the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU), which is being investigated after e-mails written by its director, Phil Jones, appeared to show an attempt to manipulate temperature data and block alternative scientific views.

The Met Office’s published data showing a warming trend draws heavily on CRU analysis. CRU supplied all the land temperature data to the Met Office, which added this to its own analysis of sea temperature data.

Since the stolen e-mails were published, the chief executive of the Met Office has written to national meteorological offices in 188 countries asking their permission to release the raw data that they collected from their weather stations.

The Met Office is confident that its analysis will eventually be shown to be correct. However, it says it wants to create a new and fully open method [What a change!] of analysing temperature data.

The development will add to fears that influential sceptics in other countries, including the US and Australia, are using the controversy to put pressure on leaders to resist making ambitious deals for cutting CO2. The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change admitted yesterday that it needed to consider the full implications of the e-mails and whether they cast doubt on any of the evidence for man-made global warming.

SOURCE



"Rapper" morality at work

Rather what one would expect from what they "sing"



A teenage rap star and his best friend have been jailed for a total of 32 years after plotting to kill the pregnant girlfriend he feared would ruin his career. Brandon Jolie, 18, a rising rap producer, was determined nothing would stand in his way. When his 15-year-old girlfriend became pregnant and refused to have an abortion, Jolie recruited Kingsley Ogundele to 'eliminate' the problem he feared would '**** up' his life.

The pair lured the girl to a secluded canal tow path where Ogundele, 18, battered her over the head with a metal pole before pushing her into the water and holding her head under as she cried out: 'Please don't, I'm pregnant.' She only survived when a passer-by interrupted the attack and hauled her from the freezing water in North London.

The schoolgirl, now 16, later gave birth to a healthy baby boy but suffers nightmares about the attack last November. She said: 'I thought I was going to die. I could feel myself giving up.' At the Old Bailey yesterday Jolie, now 19, was jailed for 14 years for conspiracy to murder, whilst Ogundele got 18 years.

Judge Paul Worsley QC told Jolie: 'You feared your blossoming music producing ambitions would be frustrated and your lifestyle would be severely disrupted. 'Those selfish concerns gnawed away and you explained your problems to Ogundele. Together you decided she should be murdered, together with her unborn child.'

The judge described the victim as a 'bright and attractive girl' who is likely to suffer long-term psychological distress. In a statement to the court, she said: 'I cannot walk out the house without my mum. When I go out in the daytime I am always looking behind me. This often makes me panic and my heart races. 'I do not trust boys any more. This incident took place because I became pregnant to Brandon Jolie. I didn't want to marry him but I did want him to be part of my baby's life. 'Now I don't ever want him to see my baby. How can I explain that his father tried to kill us both just because I was pregnant?' ....

Detective Inspector Helen Williams said: 'If it wasn't for the courageous intervention of a passer-by I strongly believe this would have been a murder investigation. 'It's hard to comprehend the casual way in which Ogundele and Jolie plotted to kill the victim - all because they didn't want Jolie's aspirations of fame to be affected.'

SOURCE



Equality snoopers to keep files on Britons' sexuality

People will be routinely asked to answer sensitive questions about their sexuality so a Government quango can compile a massive 'equalities' database, it emerged last night. The Equality and Human Rights Commission is to take information given in confidence by millions and place it on a huge 'Lifestyle Database'. It will draw information from sources including visits to A&E departments, government surveys and the reporting of crimes to police.

In order for bureaucrats to measure whether gay or straight citizens are suffering greater 'inequality', the EHRC said everybody should be asked to provide information about their sexual identity. They will be asked if they are heterosexual/straight, gay/lesbian, bisexual or other.

Campaigners said the establishment of the 'Big Brother' database - which will be available on the quango's website - would alarm the public. Alex Deane, Director of Big Brother Watch, said: 'This intrusive database is being built without even the smallest consideration for privacy. 'When people go to hospital, they don't think that information about their illness is going to be shared with the EHRC. 'What possible right does the EHRC have to build this database, and then share what they've gathered with other people on their website?'

Details of the plan emerged after the EHRC, led by chairman Trevor Phillips, began the tendering process for establishing the database. Freedom of Information requests, obtained by the Old Holborn blogger, then revealed what the scheme involved.

Equalities bosses have decided they must work out whether citizens are suffering inequality based upon various different factors. These include age, gender, disability, sexual orientation, religion and belief, transgender status, ethnicity and social class. Citizens' characteristics will be checked through their answers to various government surveys and information on whether they need hospital care or have called the police. It will allow bureaucrats to check different groups are not more likely to die young, be murdered, suffer illness, or violent crime. Checks will also be made of happiness, healthy living standards and educational attainment. Any minority groups considered to be losing out can then be targeted for Government help.

It will not be possible to identify individuals from the information on the database. But what is alarming campaigners is the way the information will be compiled. Staff are planning to take data which is given to a list of 45 different sources by members of the public. This includes their A&E records, the British Crime Survey, the British Election Study, the Census, Childcare and Early Years Parents' Survey and the Citizenship Survey. The information is not provided in the knowledge it will be handed over to an equality quango.

But the EHRC's report on the way the database should be established says the sexual identity question should become a standard part of major surveys 'as soon as practicable'. An EHRC spokesman said: 'Crime rates, poor hospital treatment, lack of childcare places and inadequate housing are some of the things that British people are worried about. 'Looking at each of these problems in isolation doesn't tell the whole story, as these factors may combine together to have a bigger effect on our lives. 'By looking at all the issues together, our framework will show what needs to be done to make Britain a fairer place to live.'

SOURCE



Surgery gives gift of 'HD' sight

PATIENTS are having their eyes fitted with an artificial lens that allows them to see in "high definition". Surgeons begin the process by implanting the lens into the eye using the standard procedure for cataracts. Then, for the first time in Britain, they can fine-tune the focus of the lens several days later. The technique gives patients vision so sharp that it is even better than 20/20 - the best an adult can usually hope for.

Bobby Qureshi, the first ophthalmic surgeon in the UK to use the lens, described it as "a hugely significant development". It can correct both cataracts and the long-sightedness that usually comes with age. The lens is made from a special light-sensitive silicone. By shining ultraviolet light on specific parts of the lens, surgeons can change its shape and curvature, sharpening the image seen by the patient.

Mr Qureshi told Sky News: "We have the potential here to change patients' vision to how it was when they were young. "The change is so accurate that we can even make the lens bifocal or varifocal, so as well as giving them good vision at distance we can give them good vision for reading. "They won't need their glasses at all."

The technique can overcome tiny defects in the eye that cause visual distortions. The lens can be adjusted several times over a period of days until patients have perfect vision. A final blast of light then permanently fixes the lenses' shape.

SOURCE





5 December, 2009

Socialized medicine good for bureaucrats

At least 350 NHS executives in hospitals and primary care trusts were paid more than £150,000 last year, according to research published today. A “Public Sector Rich List”, compiled by the TaxPayers’ Alliance and covering 350 public bodies, shows that 806 executives collected more than £150,000, with eight on packages worth more than £1 million.

The list, which covers Whitehall departments, quangos and nationalised industries, shows that average pay among those identified was £225,000, with 120 chiefs on more than £250,000. More than 250 quango heads were on more than £150,000 in 2008-09. Nearly 80 NHS executives earned more than the Prime Minister.

At a time when all three main parties are proposing a squeeze on public sector pay, salaries at the top have been shooting up, the figures show. While some private companies froze or cut pay, that of the 800 public sector chiefs identified rose by 5.4 per cent, the TaxPayers’ Alliance says.

SOURCE



British engineer Left Blind for Three Years Awaiting 20-Minute Operation

According to Britain's state-managed health service, cataract surgery is a "common" and "straightforward" operation that usually should last between 15 and 20 minutes. But such a quick turnaround would have been news to Richard Adams of London, who went blind in both eyes while waiting three years for cataract surgery.

The 85-year-old retired engineer and award-winning dancer began losing his vision in 2004. That year, doctors diagnosed Adams with cataracts, but an operation to remove them was not scheduled until March 2007. His excitement in 2007 at the prospect of getting his sight and livelihood back was short-lived because doctors cancelled the surgery. "I was over the moon when I found out I had an appointment in March [2007] but when it was cancelled I just went downhill," Adams