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Eurosceptics running protection racket in Tory party, says Lord Mandelson
Mandelson says anti-EU Tories are threatening to 'burn down the house' unless David Cameron caves into their demandsTory Eurosceptics are running a "Soprano-style protection racket" in the Conservative party in which they are threatening to burn down the house unless David Cameron caves into their demands, Lord Mandelson has claimed.As the former Tory chancellor Lord Howe warned that the prime minister is losing control of his party over Europe, Mandelson described the Eurosceptics as the "provisional wing" of the Tory party.Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, hit back at Lord Howe. Speaking on The Andrew Marr Show on BBC1, he said: "I don't think those views actually represent the reality. The substance is that the Conservative party says if we are going to be successful in that global race we need to renegotiate that relationship with Europe and give the British people a say."But Mandelson echoed Howe's warning, though he used a more dramatic analogy. He said: "We all know what's going on inside the Conservative party. The UK Isolation party and their fellow travellers in the Conservatives are sort of operating a Soprano-style protection racket inside the Conservative party. They are saying: 'Do what we want, give us what we are demanding, or we are going to burn your home down.'"The former Northern Ireland secretary even appeared to liken the Eurosceptics to the provisional wing of the Irish republican movement. He said: "Just because one wing - the provisional wing - of the Conservative party want to bring down their leader and change their party's policy and are using this as an issue to do so is not a good reason to hold a referendum," he said.Mandelson, who was a close adviser to two prime ministers, offered some advice to Cameron. "Now, in my view, the prime minister has got to say: 'Enough is enough. You guys have got to clear off. Take your tanks off my lawn. I am going to lead this party and govern this country in the way that serves its true economic national interest and I am going to do so without being bullied around by a bunch of people whose only interest is to be separate from Europe, not to create the prosperity for Britain and the trade and other economic opportunities by staying within Europe and its single market.'"Mandelson endorsed Ed Miliband's position on an EU referendum. "On this issue they are right. They are saying yes to a referendum if there is some significant change in the relationship. But no, not an in-out referendum just for the sake of having a referendum, which would be a lottery. You couldn't predict what the outcome would be."In a sign of how the Conservative party has shifted in a Eurosceptic direction over the last 15 years, the former cabinet minister John Redwood praised Cameron as he confirmed he had offered advice ahead of his EU speech in January. Redwood, who challenged John Major for the Tory leadership in 1995 over Europe, said: "We went to the prime minister privately and helped him with the Bloomberg speech and we are very happy with his new policy. Now we wish to get on with it."Hunt said: "If you look at the substance of the issue the Conservative party is absolutely united. We look at the EU and we worry about Britain's ability to compete in the global race. We look at the regulations and the red tape that comes from Europe … and if you go into the boardrooms in New York, or Tokyo or Singapore they think the European economy is frankly a joke."Their interventions came after Howe lambasted Cameron over Europe. The former chancellor wrote in the Observer: "Sadly, by making it clear in January that he opposes the current terms of UK membership of the EU, the prime minister has opened a Pandora's box politically and seems to be losing control of his party in the process."The ratchet-effect of Euroscepticism has now gone so far that the Conservative leadership is in effect running scared of its own backbenchers, let alone Ukip, having allowed deep anti-Europeanism to infect the very soul of the party."ConservativesPeter MandelsonEuropean UnionJeremy HuntNicholas Wattguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sun, 19 May 2013 10:21:54 GMT)

Lawyers' treatment of Oxford abuse ring victim prompts call for reform
Campaigners demand urgent shake-up of court procedure after seven barristers cross-examined a girl every day for three weeks in Oxford child-grooming case"I want to ask you once more why you are telling lies?" demands defence barrister Tayyab Khan. He is cross-examining a witness on her evidence relating to the multiple violent rapes she suffered at the instigation of a child-grooming gang operating in the West Midlands."No," she says. "I'm not telling lies." She breaks down, but the court transcript shows the barrister pressing the point. "You're a compulsive liar," he states. She's shouting and crying now. "Was you there? Was you there?" she asks."You're telling lies," Khan insists again. "No, I'm not, shut up, shut up!" she shouts. She's clearly distressed, but this seems not to bother him as he continues with his line of questioning regardless.Khan's client, Ahdel Ali, was convicted of crimes including the rape of a 13-year-old and multiple sexual offences with children as part of a three-year investigation called Operation Chalice – but not before the main victim in the trial, a girl called Abby, was aggressively cross-examined by seven barristers every day for three weeks. Each represented a different man charged with sexually exploiting her over two years, and all in turn had their go at testing not only her evidence relating to their client, but also calling into question her integrity, lifestyle and issues of consent. Seven men were eventually convicted as a result of Operation Chalice, one of the first cases dealing with grooming of the kind that last week saw the conviction of seven men in Oxford for preying on vulnerable girls.Having watched their daughter crumble as she endured this concerted legal assault, Abby's parents are appalled. "She'd already gone through a horrific experience, and then had another horrific experience in court," says her mother. "For weeks they laid into her. You wouldn't put a hardened criminal through that, let alone a child."Any rape victim facing a single defence barrister will find being cross-examined a painful experience. But the recent series of gang grooming trials has brought a disturbing problem into focus: when a group of abusers is charged together, each individual will have his own barrister. The Operation Chalice, or Telford, trial opened with 18.The repeated attacks by each subsequent defence advocate on the victim's character then becomes an excruciating echo of the abuse and loss of control that the child has already suffered, points out documentary-maker Anna Hall. Her forthcoming Dispatches: The Hunt for Britain's Sex Gangs details the dilemmas facing detectives, who know that to prosecute such cases is to jeopardise seriously the future mental health of already vulnerable and damaged girls.The notion that young victims who have been repeatedly gang-raped should be required to endure multiple aggressive interrogations in order to get justice is now being challenged by child sexual abuse campaigners.Childline founder Esther Rantzen says there is an urgent need for change. "I believe that the overriding reason Jimmy Savile never had to face allegations in a court of law is that, even when somebody had the courage to go to the police, the Crown Prosecution Service thought it wouldn't have a chance of getting a conviction because the child would be so horrified at being cross-examined like that, that they would either break down, or try to run away, or simply fail to convince the jury because they were so distressed," she says. "And that is the terrible decision that the CPS has to make again and again."Rantzen suggests cross-examination of vulnerable complainants should be filmed before the trial and carried out by the judge, supplied with relevant questions by the defence. But what if more questions emerge later as a result of new information or additional arrests?"The lord chief justice has gone on the record to say you just go back and ask further questions of the child," she says.The Ministry of Justice is considering commissioning pilot projects to try out different methods of testing evidence in cases of child sexual abuse, but no funding decisions have yet been made.Under section 28 of the Youth and Criminal Evidence Act 1999, which has never been brought into force, defence barristers are already permitted to conduct pre-recorded cross-examinations, though not, as Rantzen would like to see, the trial judge. Whoever does the cross-examination in advance of the trial, there may be drawbacks for prosecutions of dangerous perpetrators in removing a victim entirely from the court process as it unfolds, suggests barrister Hugh Davies QC, an expert in criminal law relating to child exploitation and sexual abuse."A wholly pre-recorded approach can feel less immediate to the jury, with the risk that they will relate less personally to the victim – it can feel too much like watching television, rather than absorbing the reality of a victim's account," he says. "The ultimate objective is that a true account is believed by the jury."Defence counsel, Davies points out, are the only lawyers in a courtroom currently not obliged to be trained in crimes of child sexual abuse and how to conduct questioning. This, he believes, must not be allowed to continue, an opinion shared by the Advocacy Training Council in its 2011 report Raising the Bar, which recommends compulsory training and certification for barristers conducting cases involving vulnerable witnesses.Ultimately, Davies believes, it is the legal culture itself that has to change. "The style and language that was apparently adopted by some defence counsel in the Telford trial appears difficult to justify," he says. "In future, I would not expect to see a single vulnerable witness being questioned for weeks by a series of barristers, each with the right to question as to matters of general credibility."In the meantime, a recent realisation by police and the CPS that human trafficking legislation can secure convictions in gang grooming trials may soon make one distressing aspect of defence interrogations redundant altogether – the thorny issue of consent.Under trafficking legislation used for the first time in the Telford case, Anna Hall explains that a child under 16, given trafficked status, cannot be held to have consented to their own exploitation. She says: "That means there is no point in a barrister raising a victim's sexual history to throw doubt on whether they consented to sexual activity which their client is charged on, and then the next barrister doing the same, and so on."There's another advantage of this legislation being used to prosecute gang sexual abuse, points out trafficking expert Mike Hand. "In the case of the Chalice children, they were being moved around the police force area by the gang, and outside the area, in some cases , with the intention they would be sexually exploited. If you can show that, you can convict for trafficking. You don't need forensic, you don't need DNA. You don't need disclosures from children. It's a very simple piece of legislation."A radical change of approach in the treatment of child sexual abuse victims in court can't come too soon for Abby's father, now helping his traumatised daughter attempt to rebuild her life."What I can't live with is destroying someone who's innocent of any crime and is a total victim who's had their childhood taken away from them, any decent start in life taken away from them," he says. "Ultimately, it's destroyed a family. It disgusts me. And the judicial system in that respect is wrong."Some names have been changedThe Hunt for Britain's Sex Gangs will be screened on Thursday 23 May on Channel 4Human traffickingChildrenRapeProstitutionLouise Tickleguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sun, 19 May 2013 08:30:02 GMT)

Science promises strawberry fields forever
UK growers adopt specialist computer forecasting system to help improve yields of crops whatever the weatherAs Britain steels itself for the prospect of yet another washout summer, strawberry growers are finding themselves forced to come up with increasingly sophisticated ways of assessing the threat posed to their livelihoods by inclement weather.For fruit growers, predicting the weather is vital. It causes fruit yields to vary by as much as 70%, making for an erratic growing season if poor conditions are not anticipated.The last few years has seen a glut of strawberries arrive during rainy periods, when demand was limited. Conversely, this has meant a shortage of the fruit in some parts of the country at peak times – for example outside London when Wimbledon fortnight started last year.But as the year's first crop of British field-grown strawberries goes on sale this weekend, growers have a new hi-tech weapon in their armoury. The biggest growers are using a state-of-the-art forecasting system that allows them to predict the yields in individual fields.The specialist technology compares historical yield curves, the recorded effect weather has on the crop and the planting date of the strawberries in their respective locations. The information is then fed into a computer along with long-term weather forecasts, specific growing data for some of the 600 varieties of strawberry produced in the UK, and growth charts for each field.The new system is helping the UK's biggest growers, who are responsible for producing around 20,000 tonnes of strawberries – a third of the annual UK crop. It involves field visits up to three times a week, when light levels and plant growth are recorded. The collated information has helped growers accurately determine when to plant their crops to ensure yields mature throughout the season, "smoothing out" the supply of strawberries to the supermarkets.Although the vast majority of British strawberries are grown under polytunnels, their yields are heavily influenced by dank, cold conditions."For the last couple of years a glut of strawberries arrived during a rainy spell when demand wasn't so high," said Paul Jones, a strawberry buyer for Tesco."As a result we got together with some of the UK's biggest strawberry growers and suppliers to discuss bringing in technology that could help them plan their planting programmes more accurately. Now, with the aid of computer technology and leading weather prediction data, we will be able to process and analyse forecasted strawberry volumes down to individual field level."The hi-tech approach is a new way of harvesting one of the most venerated, historic fruits. In medieval times strawberries were regarded as an aphrodisiac and a soup made of strawberries, borage and soured cream was served to newlyweds at their wedding breakfast.An initial trial of the new system involving a small number of growers last year was found to be around 95% accurate, enough to convince large-scale producers of the need to use the new technology. Growers hope it will spell an end to the problems they experienced last season when a very wet spring and poor light levels were followed by the wettest summer for more than a century.Securing a steady supply is likely to pay dividends for retailers. Demand for strawberries – which were first cultivated by the Romans in 200 BC – continues to increase every year, according to industry figures. The industry predicts an 8% rise in tonnage this summer compared with 2012 and estimates that between 60,000 and 65,000 tonnes will be produced by British growers.But the prospect of a glorious summer in which to enjoy strawberries looks a forlorn hope. Early indications, such as last week's snow flutters in Shropshire and Devon, suggest that we may be in for a similar summer to last year.FarmingFood & drinkJamie Dowardguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sun, 19 May 2013 07:00:13 GMT)

Proms fans call for a crackdown on touts as £12 seats fetch £500
Anger as the price of seats for the sold-out Doctor Who concerts go through the roofThe Proms have been described by Czech conductor Jiri Belohlavek as the world's largest and most democratic music festival. Running over eight weeks in the summer with a daily programme of orchestral concerts held mainly in the Royal Albert Hall, it is a firm fixture in classical music lovers' diaries.Yet this year it appears that access to the events is not as democratic as it might be. The Observer has found that large numbers of tickets are being offered on "resale sites" for hundreds of pounds – many times their face value – much to the dismay of the BBC and the Royal Albert Hall, the only official seller.One unofficial online site is offering seats for the Doctor Who-themed Prom on 14 July for £500, compared with the official flat-rate price of £12. A ticket for the first night on 12 July is offered for £400, against an original value of £38.It is not just fans of the Proms who will be disappointed this summer. Many events in the coming months have already sold out – including the Rolling Stones' Hyde Park concert – with the only tickets available on websites fetching way above face value. Now campaigners are calling for the government to crack down on the touts.Labour MP Sharon Hodgson, shadow minister for children and families, wants ticket-touting to be made illegal. "Families and music lovers are missing out on a British institution just so that a few individuals can make a fortune. The government needs to use the upcoming consumer rights bill to take action on touting and put the fans first."Last weekend the BBC announced that a record 114,000 Proms tickets had sold since booking opened last week, a 17% rise on 2012. The two Doctor Who-themed Proms were the first to be announced as sold out, with special appearances by actor Matt Smith for the programme's 50th anniversary fuelling demand. But Fred Gilroy, a nurse practitioner in Sunderland, was so disappointed over his experience of trying to buy a ticket that he contacted the RAH and his local MP "to advise you of something I found to be quite … unethical".He said: "At 9am [last Saturday] morning, the BBC Proms tickets went on sale. Two weeks ago I completed my Proms Planner online in order that when the tickets came on sale you [could] merely complete the purchase and pay for the tickets. After 10 minutes online, I was 'number 5,892' in the queue and before very long the tickets I wanted, the Doctor Who Proms, had sold out. My two kids, who are six and four, were both disappointed."He tried online ticket-brokers and came across one offering a row of four seats for those Proms: "However, the price was £212.76 per ticket. The tickets have a face value of £12. That means someone can book their tickets and sell them at a highly inflated price. I feel, if this is not illegal, it is unethical and should be looked at, possibly capping the amount that someone can profit from further selling event tickets."He said that this goes against what the Proms stand for and why they were started in the first place – to give music to all at affordable prices.The RAH told him to try turning up to buy tickets which are made available on the day, but he cannot risk paying to travel from the north-east and staying overnight in London on the off-chance.The BBC said that it does not use other ticket agents and it is "very difficult to manage unofficial selling".A spokesman said: "This is an industry-wide, serious problem and we work closely with the RAH to do what we can to prevent it."The RAH declined to comment, but ticket prices are a sensitive subject. It faced claims last year that two of its trustees profited from selling their debenture-seat tickets at hugely inflated prices. Debenture seats are owned on 999-year leases.One resale company is Viagogo, which takes 15% of the ticket price from buyers and 10% from sellers.Steve Roest, its head of European Business Development, said his company provides "a secure platform" where people buy and sell tickets: "We allow anyone to sell on Viagogo, so long as the ticket is valid."Proms 2013BBCMusic festivalsTicket pricesClassical musicOnline shoppingDalya Albergeguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sun, 19 May 2013 06:01:11 GMT)

East Coast trains is on the wrong track with ticket fine
East Coast trains insisted on fining me, although it was a genuine mistakeI inadvertently boarded an East Coast train from London to Newark which was an hour earlier than the one I had booked. It's a journey I regularly take, but I had had a harrowing experience that morning trying to help save a child's life and so had forgotten to put my watch back an hour after returning from France. I therefore believed I was on the correct train.I explained the circumstances to the ticket inspector and offered to get off at the next stop and await the correct train, but he said that since I would boarding from a different station to the one booked, my ticket would still not be valid and I must I pay £74.50 for a full single ticket from London to Newark. I was really distressed but the inspector lacked any empathy or understanding. I do think the whole picture could have been looked at. Since I was expecting a lift from Newark and had to wait an hour once there, getting an earlier train was no advantage to me. NJ, LondonIn your correspondence with East Coast Trains, the company simply repeats that the rules are the rules and there's nothing it can do, despite the distressing circumstances. It is referring to the National Rail Conditions of Carriage. However, inspectors are usually possessed of human instincts and you would expect discretion to be applied when it's clear a genuine mistake has been made.When I point this out to East Coast Trains, it hastens to exert its humanity: "Due to the customer's original ticket type, the options she was given by the guard are correct," says a spokesman. "She was unable to get off and board the next train as her ticket was for a point to point journey, meaning a break in journey is not valid, therefore, she would still have been charged by the next guard. However, after consideration, East Coast is willing, on this occasion, to offer a refund of the original unused ticket."If you need help email Anna Tims at your.problems@observer.co.uk or write to Your Problems, The Observer, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU. Include an address and phone number. We regret Anna cannot reply to letters individually.Consumer rightsRail faresConsumer affairsEast coast mainlineTransportAnna Timsguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sun, 19 May 2013 06:00:37 GMT)

Mental illness: the claim that abuse is behind psychosis is irresponsible | the big issue
Oliver James's assertions are unhelpful and risk demonising peopleIn more than 30 years of clinical practice, mostly in general practice, I have encountered much mental illness and experienced it in family members also. To polarise the debate between organic psychiatry looking for elusive biomarkers and promoting drug-based treatments versus Oliver James's assertion that "abuse is the major cause of psychosis" is unhelpful ("Medicine's big new battleground: does mental illness really exist?", News).Primary-care physicians, who see and treat the vast majority of mental illness in the UK, are trained to see presentations of illness in biological, psychological and social terms. All are relevant. To classify abnormal behaviours as distinctly separable "disorders" or "diagnoses", as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual seems to be trying to do, is as unhelpful as, say, classifying diabetes as an eating disorder.In The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better, Wilkinson and Pickett demonstrate quite clearly that health and social problems, particularly the prevalence of mental illness and drug and alcohol use, are highest in those countries with the greatest income inequality. The UK rates very badly in this respect. This realisation, and action to tackle it, is the "paradigm shift" that is needed, not a sterile debate about nomenclature.Dr Ed Morris WitneyOliver James claims that "it is becoming apparent that abuse is the major cause of psychoses". Unless accompanied by strong evidence, that statement is highly irresponsible, given that it points suspicion at the families of people suffering from an often devastating disorder. Such families, often already mistakenly burdened with shame, do not need yet another witch hunt. There is some evidence that rates of exposure to abuse are elevated in people who develop some forms of psychosis, but that is far from evidence that abuse is "the major cause".Although he is unknown in the scientific community as a researcher into the origins of psychosis, James must know very well that correlation does not equal causation and that the sort of study he mentions cannot make it "apparent" that abuse makes any causal contribution. That he then attributes a causal link between abuse and psychosis to an unspecified and, as far as I know, non-existent mechanism he calls our "electro-chemical thermostats" does not change that.Michael O'DonovanProfessor of psychiatric genetics/honorary consultant psychiatristCardiff UniversityThe argument about whether mental illness exists or is a construct of the psychiatric profession is a retrograde step. It is not helpful to the thousands of people who contact Sane and who struggle with mental ill-health, or to those who are responsible for their care. Nor does it advance research into understanding underlying causes.We do not ask similar questions about the existence of cancer, heart disease or diabetes. There, the focus is on the search for more effective treatments and cures.Marjorie WallaceChief executive, SaneLondon E1No one has identified the real villains of the piece. In the US, the insurance giants rule the mental health world and it is they that require a diagnostic map to enable them to determine who gets treated for what, by whom and for how long. The clinician assesses the client and informs the insurer, which pays him/her, including a DSM diagnosis. The insurer then ticks boxes and replies something like "six sessions of cognitive-behavioural therapy". I found that approach appalling.In this country, psychiatrists leading large multidisciplinary teams make these decisions and are hardly likely to relinquish the power and enormous salaries they enjoy should any model other than the medical be used. I find that approach pretty dreadful too.Dr Mary Wrightson OundleNorthamptonshireMental healthHealthguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:23 GMT)

Trainee lawyer was denied permanent contract when she became pregnant
33-year-old wins case against top City law firm, but her counsel warns of many similar casesA trainee lawyer is in line for compensation from a top City law firm after winning her case for discrimination after she missed out on a job because she was pregnant.An employment tribunal found that law firm Travers Smith denied Katie Tantum, 33, a permanent job because she became pregnant in the final stages of her £42,000-a-year contract.A hearing will be held in June to determine what level of compensation Tantum, who is the daughter of a former MI6 Middle East director, should receive.Nigel Mackay, who represented the Cambridge graduate for law firm Leigh Day, said: "We are delighted for Katie. It takes courage and tremendous resilience to stand up to your employer, even more so when that employer is a leading City law firm and you are only just embarking on your legal career."The evidence in this case was very clear – Katie's level of performance meant that she would have been offered a permanent role at Travers Smith but she was denied that role because she was pregnant."The case was heard at the Central London Employment Tribunal in February, and the ruling sent out on Friday. Mackay said that Travers Smith, which specialises in corporate, financial and commercial law, was not alone in its attitude."Despite there being equal numbers of female and male law students taking up training places at City firms, women are still failing to progress to senior roles in anything like the numbers of their male colleagues," he said.A spokesman for Travers Smith said: "We really did not expect this decision at all. We are very surprised and disappointed by it"Throughout the proceedings, we thought our evidence was strong. We still believe that, although the employment tribunal has found otherwise on one aspect of this claim."We sincerely regret that one of our former trainees was left unhappy from her experience at the firm, and we will take on board the lessons to be learned."Discrimination at workMaternity & paternity rightsGenderThe gender gapWomenLin Jenkinsguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:20 GMT)

Briton picked for five-month mission on International Space Station in 2015
Tim Peake's selection seen as major boost for UK industry and an inspiration to young peopleBritain's first official astronaut, Major Tim Peake, has been selected to fly on a five-month mission on the International Space Station in 2015, it is believed. The go-ahead for the flight will be seen as a major boost for the UK's space industry. Peake graduated as a European Space Agency astronaut more than two years ago and has been waiting for a space mission since then.It was feared the former army helicopter pilot might be given a short-duration mission because the UK only makes modest contributions to Esa's manned space programme. Major contributors such as France, Germany and Italy were expected to have priority.However, the Observer has learned that 41-year-old Peake has been assigned a lengthy stay in orbit in 2015. He will be blasted into space on a Russian Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan in November that year and flown to the space station where he will stay for five months. He will be able to take part in spacewalks and other complex scientific activities.UK space officials, who have refused to reveal any information about Peake's forthcoming mission, are expected to confirm details of his flight at a press conference on Monday at the Science Museum in London.The news of Peake's mission was welcomed by Nick Spall, of the British Interplanetary Society, which has been campaigning for years for the government to change past policy and allow the UK to have official astronauts. "At last this has come about with a flight slot to the International Space Station (ISS) for Tim Peake," he said."The UK can now join in with important microgravity research work on the space station, win industrial contracts for future human spaceflight projects and forge new links with Nasa, Russia and hopefully China – and one day India – in space. Many young people will be inspired by Tim. It will also help boost the UK's technical employment potential for jobs and industry."Peake, who is married with two sons, is considered to be Britain's first official astronaut because in the past those UK citizens who have flown in space have either been privately funded for their missions – such as Helen Sharman who flew on a Russian rocket in 1991 – or have taken out American citizenship, such as Nick Foale and Piers Sellers, who have both flown on the US space shuttle.By contrast, Peake was picked to be one of six new Esa astronauts who were selected, in 2009, from several thousand candidates. During their 14-month training programme, the six travelled to Nasa's astronaut base in Houston, to the Russian astronaut training centre in Star City outside Moscow, to Tsukuba Space Centre in Japan, and spent two weeks on a survival course in Sardinia. To improve their Russian language skills, the astronauts spent a month lodging with families in St Petersburg. To see how the astronauts coped with stress, the training staff created mock emergencies, including one scenario where an astronaut fell unconscious during a spacewalk.Peake completed his training in November 2010 and been waiting to be assigned a spaceflight. However, he has denied that the wait was causing problems. "No, it doesn't get frustrating at all – there's just so much going on, so much diversity, and there's brilliant training all along the way," he told the BBC a few weeks ago.A graduate from Sandhurst, Peake received a commission with the Army Air Corps in 1992 and served as a platoon commander with the Royal Green Jackets in Northern Ireland. He gained his wings in 1994 after completing the army pilots' course. Following a posting to the US, he returned to Britain in 2002 to instruct trainees in flying Apache helicopters. He went on to graduate from the prestigious Empire Test Pilot School at Boscombe Down and conduct special forces operations.He retired from the army in 2009 and joined Augusta Westland as a senior helicopter test pilot. He has flown more than 30 different aircraft.International Space StationSpaceEuropean Space AgencyRobin McKieIan Sampleguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:18 GMT)

How to improve female fertility: avoid selfish men | Barbara Ellen
Women understand it gets harder to become pregnant as they get older. But they don't always have a choiceThe new "Get Britain Fertile" campaign features a photograph of presenter Kate Garraway, made up to look elderly and pregnant. Her wrinkles and white hair juxtaposed with a fecund belly illustrate the main thrust of the campaign – to make British women aware of the decline in fertility by their 30s and 40s.However, is there a grown woman left in Britain who's not already aware of this? Moreover, when are we, as a society, going to address a painful truth: that where timing is concerned, female fertility is not, as is often supposed, controlled exclusively by women, but also very much in the power of the men they are with?There's much that's well intentioned about GBF. It claims to be aimed at both men and women. Garraway, an ambassador for the campaign, says she feels fortunate to have had children relatively late, and wants women to make "informed choices". However, GBF taps into the culture of misogyny surrounding female fertility. It feeds the urban myth of women "refusing" to have children because of careers, partying, or holding out for Leonardo DiCaprio.These delusional "picky" females have been figments of the collective imagination for so long they need to be dusted down. Indeed, GBF is accompanied by a survey, stating that many women aged 18-46 are concerned about practicalities: ranging from loss of earnings and workplace inflexibility, to childcare costs and housing. All crucial issues, but for the purpose of this article, let's look at the third of women who say they want children but haven't yet found the right partner.In my opinion that one-third is an underestimate. Even not finding the right man often turns out to be a euphemism for: "I met him, I spent years with him, but ultimately, he wouldn't have children." Put bluntly, many of these women at their fertile peak didn't refuse anything, their men did.Like it or not, this is how men influence female fertility and, ultimately, female infertility. The mere thought is enough to inspire feminist panic: women, not men, should control their fertility. Who could disagree? It's also true that some women don't want children, period. And yet how many of us have met (or even been) the thirty-fortysomething, forced to abandon a long relationship because the man wouldn't start a family?Such men may feel that the relationship isn't right, or don't want their freedom curtailed, or other reasons, all as valid as a woman making similar decisions. It only becomes unfair, verging on selfish, when men keep such insights to themselves for too long. These are the time-wasters, what I'd term the fertility-drifters, who think nothing of keeping women dangling for years on end.It's not that these women are pathetic wimps, rather that often they can't win: if they push, they're pushy (humiliating); if they don't push, if they're respectful and patient, they'll waste even more time. Frequently, these men go on to start families with younger women, leaving their original partners scouring dating sites, lampooned as desperadoes on the hunt for viable sperm.Some might say: "Diddums, that's life." Fine, so long as we acknowledge that this is something many women put up with during their fertile years, and that to castigate them is unfair. Sometimes it's not women who are picky, it's men. Ergo, such men should at least be part of the ongoing debate about late female procreation. After all, a stalled relationship at the wrong time with an immature, untruthful, or simply unwilling, man, is enough to compromise or even destroy a woman's fertility. If the GBF campaign really is aimed at both sexes, perhaps they need to include a photograph of a man with the caption: "Play fair and, by the way, sperm deteriorates too." Meanwhile, women may need another mantra – don't let anyone waste your precious time.Baz's claim to greatness seems a mite premature Baz Luhrmann has hit back at criticism of his adaptation of The Great Gatsby, saying that F Scott Fitzgerald was also "horrendously criticised" when he published the novel.Luhrmann makes it sound as though he'd have been positively offended if the film had received blanket rave reviews, thereby robbing him of creative kinship with Fitzgerald. What's he rattling on about?Why do some film people assume the grandeur of their source material in this way? It's akin to the director of a biblical turkey, huffing: "Well, some people also disliked the way Matthew, Mark, Luke and John did the New Testament!"It's all conflation; there's no genuine link between the two projects. The fact that Luhrmann made this film places him in no greater cultural proximity to Fitzgerald than ordinary people who've read and enjoyed the book. It's also a trifle early for Luhrmann to be making these claims to joint creative martyrdom with Fitzgerald: comparing a film that's just opened to a novel written in the 1920s. Give it a little time, Baz, (a century?), then we'll have a better idea how much you've got in common with Fitzgerald.Let him go, Nick. He's not right for youHow intriguing to hear that senior Tories are working out the best way to "divorce" the Lib Dems before the next election.Is it true? Who cares? What's not to love about the divorce analogy? I'm picturing David Cameron, fuming, wine glass splintering in his hand because Nick Clegg forgot to put the bins out yet again. "Is it too much to effing ask?" he'd roar, as Clegg appears with a terry nappy slung over one shoulder, screaming back: "How dare you judge me? After all I've done for you!" The nappy is thrown down, wine spills from the glass, as both flounce to other ends of the kitchen, lips trembling, an unspoken question hanging in the air: "What has become of us?"Cut to later that evening, both mournfully sipping chablis, giving each other wistful smiles, before Clegg breaks down: "I can't go on like this, Dave. I'm back on the gaspers!" Both fall silent, remembering past desperate attempts to salvage what once felt so right, so good, such as that planned mini-break to discuss Lords reform (anything!), just to see if they could patch things up. But it never happened. They were both too busy. For each other. For coalition love.At the end, the unutterable decency, as Cameron helps Clegg pack up his proportional representation pamphlets, their fingers occasionally touching in what may be lingering tenderness for what might have been. Then it gets ugly, with Cameron refusing to hand over the rose garden photographs that remind them both of happier times. More recriminations and door slamming as Clegg takes his voting blocs and leaves forever … or until it's next politically convenient. I have to admit – I can't wait. If the coalition play this right, this could be the funniest ugly divorce ever.Fertility problemsWomenBarbara Ellenguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:17 GMT)

Judi Dench defends drama school in row over advertising boards
Oscar-winner attacks council decision to order Central School of Speech and Drama in London to remove hoardings that support charitable workDame Judi Dench has come to the defence of the drama school where she learned her Oscar-winning craft.The London borough of Camden has banned two advertising hoardings outside the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama on supposedly aesthetic grounds.The Central says that it receives up to £150,000 a year from advertisers using the sites, which it donates to theatre charities involving thousands of young people nationwide, and that there have been no complaints since they went up 27 years ago. An appeal to the secretary of state will be heard on Tuesday.Dench, widely regarded as the finest actress of her generation, has written a passionate letter to the council in which she expresses dismay at the removal of "a vital source of revenue" to theatre and arts education.Noting that Camden itself has withdrawn funding from various arts and social programmes, she writes: "To penalise this independent goodwill at such a time of recessionary hardship seems misguided."She refers to "the considerable benefit" from the hoardings, singling out £50,000 given annually to the Shakespeare Schools Festival, which reaches 1,000 schools across Britain and involves 50,000 children – "many from deprived areas," including Camden. The hoardings have also provided funds for disadvantaged youths involved with the Roundhouse and a "black theatre" summer school.The Central, in north-west London, is one of the UK's most prestigious drama schools. Its alumni include Laurence Olivier, Vanessa Redgrave and Peggy Ashcroft. The hoardings also fund bursaries for future Oliviers.Dench's letter mentions her family's long association with the Central, "one of the finest centres of drama training and research in the UK". She and family members, including her daughter, live in the area or are studying there. "Therefore," she says, "I feel that I can also comment on grounds of planning and local aesthetic value." Calling for Camden "to reconsider its action", she adds: "The alternative will diminish the borough's effectiveness as a centre for the arts, and narrow the scope for its young people to participate in the theatre."Professor Gavin Henderson, the school's principal, said that the money from the hoardings was crucial. It helped to support the neighbouring Hampstead theatre's educational programmes after the council withdrew funding: "Camden council has … cut back on all their arts funding to a point where it's virtually nonexistent. But their planning department [has been] … looking at hoardings that they don't like aesthetically… [and] issued orders for these to come down."The two electronic hoardings are displayed against a nondescript modern building owned by the Central and overlook a busy traffic route. Henderson is all the more surprised by the aesthetic argument, because Camden's real eye-sores go unnoticed: "The council is quite happy to have hugely unsightly rubbish and recycling bins located immediately beneath these hoardings, with vermin running in and out. Rats. None of that registers at all and that's in their domain, not ours."Other objectors refer to Camden market, where the council permits "ugly" advertising eyesores to deface classic Victorian houses and shops.The Central has received further support from Dame Jenny Abramsky, chair of the Heritage Lottery Fund, former head of BBC Radio and a board member of the Shakespeare Schools Festival: "Government … is urging universities and arts organisations to do more to attract funding from the private sector in these times of grave economic restraint. These hoardings are an unusual and original example of a higher education and arts institution doing just that. They should be applauded."Valerie Leach, Camden's cabinet member for planning, said: "Camden council is one of the biggest supporters in the country of our local voluntary sector. This delivers a range of arts projects. We have a duty … to protect … local areas from hoardings without any formal planning permission, such as this site."Judi DenchCentral School of Speech & Drama, University of LondonHigher educationDalya Albergeguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:15 GMT)

One tax law for us and another for Amazon | Nick Cohen
Britain's reluctance to pursue multinationals risks turning us into another ItalyOn the edge of Rugeley stands Amazon's largest distribution centre in Britain. Life for the workers who trudge around the 800,000 sq ft warehouse is not as bad as it was for the men who once worked in the pits of the Staffordshire coalfield, but that is not saying much. They must carry satnavs, which direct their movements round the stacks and flash warnings from managers to stop dawdling or chatting with colleagues. Britain being the way it is, they have no job security.Trade unionists call the Amazon shed a "slave camp". But whatever arguments they have with Amazon's management, one point should be beyond dispute – Rugeley is in Britain. British customers send Amazon their money. British workers package their goods and send them off in vans along roads built and maintained by the British taxpayer. If workers steal – and before they can go home or visit the canteen, they must walk through airport-style security scanners to prove they have not – Amazon will call on the taxpayer-funded police to arrest them and the taxpayer-funded criminal justice system to prosecute them. Admittedly, Amazon's buyers who supply the stock are based in Slough rather than Rugeley. But the last time I looked Slough was in Britain too.Amazon.co.uk is a UK company. It has to be. An online retailer cannot relocate offshore. It needs local distribution centres to service local markets, otherwise the costs of moving its stock would be ruinously expensive.Yet Amazon pays just £3.2m tax on sales of £4.2bn because the Revenue allows it to get away with arguing that it should be taxed in Luxembourg. The same lack of connection between corporate tax status and commercial reality applies to Starbucks, Google, Vodafone, Goldman Sachs and every other company the British state allows to dodge tax.The traditional defence that companies just take advantage of legal loopholes and you would "do the same in their position" falls apart in a country where the tax regime defies the evidence of our eyes. Leaving all other considerations aside, you will never be "in their position".If you want to understand any society, look at its tax system. If one man or a clique can tax at will, you can conclude the society is a dictatorship or oligarchy. If you have reasonably progressive and universal taxes, you can assume it is a modern democracy. Britain has elements of democratic taxation. The same rules on occasion apply to everyone. But other parts of the system resemble the ancien régime of pre-revolutionary France. Only in our case the privileged estates the government exempts from taxation are the corporations rather than the aristocracy and the church.For a generation, politicians have extended exemptions by selling Britain as a country where big businesses would be lightly taxed. When I put it like this, I make the policy sound too cool and rational. The process was far more emotional than that. Tycoons enchanted politicians. They convinced them that their interest and the national interest were as one. So deep was the ideological capture of the top of the British state that corporations have not on the whole had to corrupt ministers.No one has accused Gordon Brown of taking bribes, to quote the most egregious example. But in his abject period as chancellor, Brown ensured that his friends in private equity were taxed at a lower rate than their cleaners. One might have thought that the crash of 2008 would have discredited the notion that all will be well if we let capitalism run riot. Not a bit of it. George Osborne invites multinationals to advise him on how to tax multinationals. At their behest, he allows companies to move money to tax havens and then deducts the costs of their shady transactions from their British tax liabilities. The result of two decades of special treatment for vested interests can be summarised in one statistic. Between 1999 and 2011, British companies' profits increased by 58% but revenues from corporation tax increased by just 5%.To understand the scale of the avoidance, it is not enough to look at the permissive laws, however. Richard Brooks's The Great Tax Robbery is close to being this year's indispensable book because, as a former tax inspector turned Private Eye journalist, he has the material to show how the wealthy are exempt from what few laws apply to them."Dear Saddam," ran a spoof letter doing the rounds of the Revenue in the run-up to the Iraq war, "we are trialling a new weapons inspection regime modelled on the Inland Revenue's approach to large corporate taxation. All you have to do is tell us you don't have any and we'll go away."One inspector said in his bitter farewell speech that he once thought that the Revenue's advertising slogan "tax doesn't have to be taxing" was a bad pun. "Now I realise that for big business it meant what was said on the tin."British politicians and a series of negligent and doltish managers ordered the Revenue to back away from big business. In his justifiably notorious speech to the Confederation of British Industry in 2005, everyone remembers Gordon Brown promising "light-touch" regulation for a financial services industry that was already careering towards bankruptcy. We forget that he went on to say that he would apply a light touch to "the administration of tax" for big business as well.The Revenue itself promises corporations that, rather than doing its job and collecting monies owed, it will follow a "customer-focused supportive and enabling approach". Or as Dave Hartnett, the former permanent secretary for tax, who cut sweetheart deals with Vodafone and Goldman Sachs, explained it in 2010, Britain had a "non-confrontational" approach.I have written before that the willingness of New Labour, the Tories and the Revenue's senior managers to pursue the working and middle classes while exempting powerful corporations would turn the British into Italians. We would start to believe that tax evasion was respectable. We would view a state that hit the ordinary man and woman while sparing big business as immoral and illegitimate. That moment is drawing closer. The old complaint that there is one law for the rich and another for the rest does not do justice to the debasement of public authority in Britain. When it comes to tax, too often there is no law for the rich whatsoever.Amazon.comTax and spendingGoogleGoldman SachsStarbucksVodafoneNick Cohenguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:14 GMT)

Aristocrats make bid for equality? That's a new one | Catherine Bennett
Why are so many liberals excited by the campaign to allow women equality in inheriting hereditary titles?Better late than never: elements within the British aristocracy have begun disseminating ideas of fairness and equality. In a historic letter to the Telegraph, more than 200 signatories last week called on Parliament to end the system of male primogeniture and "grant equality to both sexes". Either of two forthcoming bills, these agitators say, would apply the adjustment to the royal family's succession laws to all hereditary titles and should be supported: "It is only logical and just that it be granted to all families."Given the regularity with which even relatively unsmug and impoverished non-aristocrats are now urged to check their privilege, some will argue that would-be-titled members of the historic ruling class can never make very compelling feminists. One of the leading activists, the Countess of Clancarty, says she wants a "level playing field". But even her sympathisers might object that, unlike early, upper-class campaigners for women's suffrage, these new campaigners are agitating for a benefit that cannot, for blood-related reasons, conceivably benefit any non-honourable woman who is also tormented by her lack of a title.As much as our hearts go out to, say, the female Campbell per generation who cannot become the Thane of Cawdor, is her disappointment on a scale to merit organised agitation? Certainly, in comparison with this cause, the prominent campaigning by women in the media against our shocking marginalisation as BBC television presenters takes on the look of an urgent and altruistic priority.But look at the signatories to the Telegraph letter, many of whom can never hope to benefit, even remotely, from advances in female thaneship. Standing shoulder to shoulder with Earl Alexander of Tunis and Viscount Clanfield, and assorted victims of male primogeniture-related discrimination such as Lady Pollyanna Fitzgerald and the Hon Amanda Murray, we find a host of enlightened notables including Baroness Kennedy of the Shaws, Baroness Grey-Thompson, Rufus Sewell and, for the constitutionally vibrant Liberal Democrats, the MP Dr Julian Huppert. Equally persuasive, to anyone who anticipates from this advance only an inexhaustible supply of reflexively Conservative-voting expenses claimants, the crowd of authors rallies behind a quote from the Labour life peer, Lord Dubs. "There should not be gender discrimination in Britain," he says, "full stop."A speedier and more diverting way of addressing this form of gender discrimination might be to imitate a number of other European countries and outlaw the use of titles on pain of imprisonment or, as sticklers for tradition might prefer, execution. In a recent article, peerage equality campaigner and non-thane, Lady Liza Campbell, describes the painful experience, for a girl, of being part of a titled family. "Right here, in the heart of British life, in the bosom of one's own family, however loved you are, a girl is less than a boy." If hereditary titles come at such a cost, there must be a strong case for abolishing them altogether, no matter how much turmoil it might cause at Tatler, in the Middleton family, and to a handful of affected maitre d's.Alternatively, would it be possible for disappointed non-inheritors to invent or, if necessary, buy titles, assuming that this, rather than privileged acquisition of family property, is the main reason for discontent? A quick search suggests that bona fide ladyship packages are available, online, for as little as £18.95: "Providing you do not purport your title to be a peerage," say the title providers, "you will have the legitimate right to assume the Lordship/Ladyship title conferred to you within your pack and to use the styled title of Lord or Lady."The title providers are unable, admittedly, to supply either viscountcies or earldoms, and as the Conservative MP Mary Macleod now argues, true progress requires equal access to authentic symbols of oppression. "This motion is about building fairness, modernity and equality in our society," she argued in a recent speech that, for some reason, brought to mind the Europhobic shock jock Jon Gaunt, invoking the European convention on human rights in defence of his on-air, Nazi-themed insults.For her part, Macleod cited the sad story of a baron "whose title will go to his fourth cousin once removed, rather than one of his eight daughters". Of course some supporters of the aristocracy will have wondered if the baron did not bring this tragedy upon himself by giving up much too early. Others might prefer the relatively trusty, fourth cousin once removed route to a newfangled innovation that, even if it satisfies the ambitions for his wife of Julian Fellowes, could finally annihilate a class that has survived revolution, wars, inbreeding, republics, democracy, serial leftie attacks and, most recently, Nick Clegg's failed attempt to defenestrate the 92 House of Lords hereditaries. Although for the last one, Ed Miliband's progressive Labour party, rather than any aristocratic endurance skills, must obviously take the credit.For feminists, the reform looks more problematic. Much as gender equality in the peerage might appear, as it does to Baroness Kennedy, a vital corrective to historic discrimination, its aristocratic, predominantly Conservative supporters in the House of Lords will hope this advance also means enhanced, protective justification for their politically disreputable existence. Along with routine preening by members of this unsackable rump on their being elected (by fellow peers) and therefore they insist, more democratic than life members, there could even be further boasting about the patrician love of equality.And yet, as some of the beadier old parasites, along with those blessed with sons, will suspect, there is a good chance that the moment they admit one reform based on fairness, modernity and level playing fields, their most dependable defence against progressives – that of tradition, heritage, custodianship, etc – will be surrendered for good. If the charge of sexism can trump ancient letters patent, then so can that of ageism, brought by disconsolate primogeniture victims of both sexes, who should have no difficulty finding 200 sympathisers to sign a letter to the Telegraph calling for a version of the Napoleonic Code. And their rallying cry? A declaration by Labour's fratricidal Ed Miliband that "there should not be age discrimination in Britain, full stop".Again, once the aristocratic community has endorsed the level playing field, there can only be distaste for tax breaks for historic home owners, for death duty paintings allowed to stay in private houses, for reserved apartments in National Trust houses, for unelected parliamentary seats and the deferential use of unearned titles – unless, that is, everyone can benefit.To paraphrase Lady Liza's lament: "Right here, in the heart of British life, in the bosom of one's own family, however loved you are, a commoner is less than aristocrat." Three modern, feminist cheers, then, for Baroness Kennedy's equal rights for honourables and good luck to her 200 fellow signatories. Please don't check your privilege, any of you, or not until it's all over.WomenFeminismHouse of LordsCatherine Bennettguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:12 GMT)

For the record
A profile of neurocriminologist Adrian Raine contained a paragraph that misrepresented the views of the neuroscientist David Eagleman. It implied that Eagleman believed the possession of particular genes resulted in criminal behaviour. This is not his belief. In his words: "Genes are part of the story, but they're not the whole story. We are likewise influenced by the environments in which we grow up." We are happy to make this clear ("Welcome to the world of neurocriminology", New Review, last week, page 14).The caption on a photograph that accompanied an article about the sale of the Scottish island of Tanera Mor wrongly said that the image was of the spectacular view from Tanera Mor to the other Summer Islands. The photograph was actually taken on the mainland looking towards Tanera Mor in the middle ground ("Spectacular, ancient, thriving: the island on the market for £2.5m", News, last week, page 14)."King conspiring to end French love affair with European glory" (Sport, last week, page 15) referred to the last all-French Heineken Cup final between Toulouse and Perpignan in 2003. That should have been the last all-French Heineken Cup final in Dublin, which was in 2003.Write to Stephen Pritchard, Readers' Editor, the Observer, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU, tel 020 3353 4656 or email reader@observer.co.ukguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:06:06 GMT)

Sean Rigg's death must be the catalyst for a reform in policing | Observer editorial
Officers must be held to account when there's a death in police custody if the force is to regain the public's trustThe main role of the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) is to bring the full facts to light when independently investigating a death in police custody. The IPCC has come in for severe criticism on many occasions but never more so than in last week's independent review of its investigation into the death of Sean Rigg at Brixton police station in August 2008.Led by criminologist Silvia Casale, the report is a damning indictment of the IPCC's failings. Among its findings are that investigators failed to control events at the outset, allowing police officers to confer when writing their initial accounts, and there was a shrugging acceptance of "implausible" police accounts of Rigg's behaviour and "improbable" assertions that he didn't appear mentally ill. It is refreshing and welcome in the light of this damning indictment that the chair of the IPCC, Dame Anne Owers, promises to implement all the review's recommendations. However, it beggars belief that the IPCC has agreed to adopt basic investigative practices only in the 10th year of its existence.Inquest, the charity that worked with the family of Sean Rigg, has pointed out his is not an isolated case. This is indicative of broader systemic problems that must be addressed, beginning with the implementation of Casale's recommendations.The Casale report is a watershed for the police service and the IPCC: the former must systematically drag police practice up to an acceptable level when providing adequate care to vulnerable people and eliminating the disproportionate use of force and restraint; while the IPCC must fearlessly hold all concerned properly to account whenever someone dies or is seriously injured in police custody.Confidence in the police and the police watchdog is already at its nadir. Positive action has to be the only way forward.PoliceIndependent Police Complaints CommissionMetropolitan policeguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:04:32 GMT)

Barack Obama must act like a true leader | Observer editorial
It is always hard for an American president in the second term, but both his country and the world need Obama to show strength and courage and put scandal behind himIt is a simple fact of American politics that power starts to fade away from a second-term president almost from the moment they are sworn in. Theoretically freed from the chains of having ever to seek re-election, they soon find that America's all too self-interested professional politicians are suddenly aware that the current occupant of the Oval Office will not be around in four years.The ability to cajole and bully Congress – and even members of their own party – and get them to pass laws – starts to evaporate. Add to that the propensity of second terms to see presidency-defining scandal – think Monica Lewinsky, think Iran-Contra – and it is no wonder that many re-elected presidents seem simply to be waiting around for the term "lame duck" to be applied. But even by the super-charged standards of the modern news cycle, President Obama's serious case of second-term blues has come early. It is seven months since Obama bested Republican challenger Mitt Romney in the presidential election and sparked talk of a new era of progressive change while a defeated GOP would descend into anarchic faction-fighting.Instead, Obama last week found himself buffeted by the storms of three separate scandals. The usually compliant Washington press corps, perhaps feeling neglected by a White House that has given them short shrift in terms of access, scented blood. They subjected Obama and his beleaguered press secretary, Jay Carney, to repeated and heated grilling at every turn.They had a lot of material to work with. News that America's tax collectors in the shape of the Internal Revenue Service might have been singling out conservative groups for extra attention has rightly shocked many, including, it must be said, Obama himself. Then there is the just as distressing revelations that the Department of Justice has been probing phone calls placed to journalists at Associated Press. The nominal justification for what seems an outrageous way to treat a free press was the hunt for a national security leaker. Given the administration's history of leaking details of its drone programme when it wants to look muscular on terrorism, the hypocrisy was breathtaking. Finally, the ongoing furore over how much officials tried to spin the tragic death of four Americans in Benghazi got a new lease of life amid a plethora of leaks.All in all, it was whack-a-mole week at the White House and Obama was not the one wielding the hammer. To the amazement of some, the word "Nixonesque" started appearing in coverage of the week's events. The image of a secrecy-obsessed, hypocritical and over-reaching White House was clearly one the right wing was eager to peddle. But many on the left joined in, too. It was far from just the Rush Limbaughs of this world who were wondering if America's 44th president might just have something in common with its disgraced 37th one.That takes criticism too far. None of the current scandals justifies comparison with the great deceit that Nixon presented to the American public. Rather than masterminding any of them, Obama and his team seem to have been caught by surprise as much as anyone else. But the three scandals do not stand alone. They have come after a period in which much of the sheen was already being rubbed off the prospects of Obama's second term.The desperate hunger strikers of Guantánamo Bay have shone a harsh spotlight on Obama's manifest failure to fulfil his 2008 campaign promise to shut the vile prison. Figures on both the right and left have been appalled at the enthusiasm with which Obama has embraced a drone programme with a dismaying lack of regard for innocent civilians, due process and indeed the US citizenship of some of its targets.Finally, there was the humiliating defeat over gun control. In the wake of last year's tragic Newtown school shooting, Obama had staked a huge amount of personal capital on a mild tightening of America's notoriously lax gun laws. Yet Obama was outfoxed by the cynical machinations of the National Rifle Association. Just as his first-term push over healthcare was gutted of its most transformative element – a public option for coverage – so it was that a bill on gun controls was filleted of a ban on automatic rifles.No wonder that Obama's second term is being seen as a devastating disappointment. Some of this is not his fault. No president in America's system of checks and balances can get their own way. And Obama is cursed by having to work with a Republican-controlled House of Representatives determined to derail him. Yet Obama all too often shows neither leadership, ambition, nor courage. Just look at Guantánamo Bay. Obama openly admits the base is a PR disaster and a moral wrong. Yet his solution is to seek help from Congress in dealing with the issue, the very same Congress that has stymied previous efforts.This is all too typical of Obama's style of governing. The candidate on the campaign trails of 2008 and 2012, who can inspire so many with his glorious words, is replaced in office by a president whose defining characteristic appears to be aloofness. Perhaps the only good thing to come out of the scandals and current malaise will be an overdue realisation that things need to change. For no one wants an American leadership vacuum. Obama deserves great praise for rescuing the American economy from the brink of collapse, but huge problems remain. Poverty, inequality and joblessness all blight the economic landscape. Abroad, numerous short-term crises, such as North Korea and the war in Syria, cry out for attention while several major long-term trends, such as climate change and the rise of China, demand American leadership.Now is the time for the Obama of the campaign trail finally to step up to the plate. He must shed his instinct for caution, get rid of the notion that he can't do anything without Republican support and start to lead the country that elected him. None of the scandals assailing him smacks of Watergate and he must put them behind him. Though Republicans will drag them out as long as they can, he must rise above them and use the clout of his office to bring about real and bold change.Immigration reform, climate change, curbing the power of the still-too powerful banks and myriad crises abroad are all in desperate need of action. If he does not, then Obama will have betrayed the hopes for change he once so powerfully embodied. It would be a tragedy. Due to the colour of his skin, Obama will always be a historic American president. But it would be better all around if that fact were because of his actions while in power.Barack ObamaDemocratsUS politicsRepublicansUnited Statesguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:04:27 GMT)

Grooming victims in danger of 'reliving abuse' by giving evidence in dock
Experts including the chief executive of children's charity Barnardo's were 'shocked' by the language used by defence barristers in Oxford gang trialJustice experts and children's charities have expressed alarm at the "shocking" language used to describe sexually exploited young girls during the trial of a street grooming ring based in Oxford that concluded last week with the convictions of seven men.They are calling for an urgent reform of attitudes towards victims of grooming, and expressed fears that unless the current criminal justice system is changed more young people will be in danger of "reliving their abuse" if they give evidence in court. During the four-month trial at the Old Bailey, defence teams sought to portray the victims as "naughty girls" who had lied about their ages and had consented to sex.One witness was accused by a defence barrister of "telling a whopper" when she said she was threatened with having her throat slit if she did not perform a sex act on the men.Another defence barrister asked: "Were these girls victims from the start or were they naughty girls doing grown-up things they bitterly regret?"One was branded an unreliable witness as a result of her "awful, abused, abusive and desperate life", while another was scorned for returning to her abuser after she had been raped."Some of the language heard [during] this trial has been shocking," said Anne Marie Carrie, Barnardo's chief executive. "It is wholly inappropriate to imply in any way that the victims' horrific experiences were something they had brought on themselves."Carrie said depicting the victims as "naughty girls" who were "not behaving like children" demonstrated a profound misunderstanding of how exploitation was perpetrated. She pointed out that exploitation could cover a broad spectrum of activity, from seemingly "consensual" relationships or "informal exchanges of sex" for attention, accommodation, gifts or cigarettes, through to being used in serious, organised crime."The predatory nature of the perpetrators of these crimes means that vulnerable victims do not realise they are being abused because they have been manipulated into believing they are in a loving relationship," Carrie said.The use of multiple barristers to cross-examine the girls meant their accounts sometimes varied. This was seized on by defence teams to suggest the girls were lying.Harry Fletcher, a criminal justice expert, said the use of up to 30 defence lawyers in the case had resulted in "chaos". He warned that it was crucial to learn from the Oxford case. "There needs to be a different way of doing things," Fletcher said. "Young people will end up being revictimised if they are put through a tortuous trial and cross-examination."A survey of Barnardo's services in England and Wales revealed that last year, of 56 known police investigations, only 15 have so far resulted in prosecutions and six of those in convictions.The director of public prosecutions has committed the crown prosecution service to improving its response to sexual exploitation victims. But Carrie said the Oxford case had demonstrated that more still needs to be done to reform attitudes towards victims of child sexual exploitation at every stage of the justice system."It is essential that we take urgent steps to manage the impact of the invasiveness of court proceedings on vulnerable young people and ensure that victims of sexual exploitation are treated as children before, during and after court proceedings," she said.Human traffickingChild protectionJamie Dowardguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:04:25 GMT)

Burke and Hare – murderers? Don't be so callous | Kevin McKenna
It could be time to rehabilitate of some of Scotland's more colourful charactersThere has been a great deal of misunderstanding about Alice Cooper's controversial song I Love the Dead, the last track on his classic 1973 Billion Dollar Babies album. Many have dismissed it merely as an unsophisticated and juvenile attempt to shock by glorifying necrophilia. I, on the other hand, have always thought that it is possessed of far more profound cultural significance.I love the dead before they're cold,Their blueing flesh for me to hold.Cadaver eyes upon me see nothing.The song, I feel, can help those of us who are either contemplating death or who are struggling with the loss of a loved one. Perhaps, too, it gently mocks those who take the business of death and dying far too seriously. As such, Alice's challenging but sensible lyrics would have provided an appropriate soundtrack to a meeting last month of Holyrood's education and culture committee on the regulation of the press. This was the Scottish government's latest desperate attempt to appear relevant in the debate on press regulation post-Leveson. The meeting was simply about adding a couple of splashes of tartan into any royal charter on press regulation decided by Westminster. Under the charter, the Scottish Parliament would, of course, have no say in any amendments to the charter or its dissolution.And lo, it came to pass that in some Holyrood committee room last month, a cadaver of ministers, MSPs and assorted Scottish newspaper editors spent an entire afternoon, which can never, ever be recovered, deciding to insert an amendment to a royal charter. It will, heretofore, be known as the Alice Cooper clause. This would ensure that "appropriate respect and sensitivity was paid to the recently deceased where the only public interest in them was in the manner of their death, and their near relations".The clause is utterly meaningless, vapid and open to such wide interpretation that it could become dangerous in the hands of those who will always seek to hinder a free press: politicians, the police and the judiciary.The amendment is merely a clumsily constructed disguise for what it really is: the beginning of a journey that, if some people get their way, would result in "defamation of the dead" legislation. If Scotland were to become independent, there would be very little to stop such legislation occurring. As things stand, Westminster will simply have a chuckle to itself at the Scots' historic and cultural fascination for matters pertaining to the graveyard.Nor has this come about because Scottish newspapers have a unique tendency to dance on the graves of the deceased. Dear Lord, no. In fact, the obituary pages of Scotland's two mighty broadsheets are among the finest of their oeuvre. It is simply the result of two stories, written more than 20 years ago, by two of Scotland's finest writers, Jack McLean and Meg Henderson, about events surrounding the playground murder of a schoolgirl by one of her schoolmates in Glasgow's East End.In attempting to unravel some of the complicated issues surrounding the case, including sentencing policy, each of these writers inadvertently caused distress to the surviving family of the victim. Neither McLean nor Henderson, each of whom is unimpeachable in their journalistic ethics, did anything that could be construed as illegal or unethical. At worst, they were insensitive and possibly wrong-headed.The sense of outrage of the victim's family may be understandable but what is not is the way that Leveson, Holyrood's culture committee and some Scottish newspaper writers have trashed the reputations of these two fine writers without allowing them the right to defend themselves.I fear now that civic Scotland's desire to be the greatest wee nation in the world for not offending people (dead or alive) may be about to come to fruition. Soon, we may need to rewrite the standard accounts of the lives and deaths of some of our more colourful and edgy characters and deliver them from rebarbative obituary writers. My top three for revisionism are:1. Sawney Bean Executed in the 16th century for killing and eating more than 1,000 of his fellow human beings (or human beans, hence the surname). Mr Bean, a native of North Ayrshire, had been an agricultural entrepreneur of some note before he fell upon hard times after being conned by English landowners. He was head of a clan of 48 who would starve if he didn't do something about it and pronto. The product of a Catholic education, he soon became the subject of baseless innuendo linked to the deaths of local mendicants. The ruddy and well-fed faces of his followers in a time of economic privation led to jealousy. The tendency of his relatives to play chess with human heads was merely circumstantial.2. Ally MacLeod The football manager died a broken man and reviled by the nation following Scotland's failure to reach the last eight of the 1978 World Cup. MacLeod was guilty in the eyes of the nation of displaying those two character traits that were once deemed to be capital offences in Scotland: optimism and a sunny disposition. If Scotland had merely been shite throughout our stay in Argentina, the nation could have forgiven him. MacLeod, though, made the fatal error of coaching his side to a 3-2 win over Holland, the best team in Europe. This sealed his fate because it also made him perverse.3. Burke and Hare These two harmless scallywags were executed for the murder of 16 people in the first half of the 19th century. Yet often overlooked is their substantial contribution to medical science in ensuring that Edinburgh's surgeons had a rich source of healthy cadavers to work on. Most of their victims were miscreants who had probably initiated assaults on the two Irishmen because of their religion. This was a time of widespread anti-Catholicism and the two stout Irishmen were probably just defending themselves. Just think, if Holyrood's Dodgy Sectarian Behaviour Among the Lower Orders bill had been passed 200 years earlier, this would never have happened. And Scotland would still be a third-world nation in medical science. Three cheers, then, for the chaps.Press regulationScotlandScotlandKevin McKennaguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:04:17 GMT)

José Mourinho: second coming of the Special One? | profile
He is the football manager as celebrity, whose appeal goes way beyond the game. With a return to Chelsea likely, after a turbulent time in Madrid, can he still wield his charismatic magic?Barring any unforeseen twists in the tale, José Mário dos Santos Mourinho Félix will soon return to his adoring British public with a second stint as manager of Chelsea. While the return of the "Special One" (© Mourinho J) will largely be a matter for celebration in south-west London, there's also a huge and ready constituency nationwide, licking their lips in anticipation of more fun from this much-loved pantomime villain, currently serving his last days at Real Madrid.And, boy, does he need to get away from Madrid. On Friday night, Mourinho described this season as the "worst" of his career, following a 2-1 Copa del Rey defeat to city rivals Atlético. This came at the end of a season in which he had been feuding, it seems, with almost all of the Real squad, and kept Iker Casillas, the Spanish goalkeeper – chief feudee – on the bench for much of the time. Well, he's always enjoyed a drama.For most of us, our first Mourinho Moment came in March 2004, when his Porto team scored a last-minute goal at Old Trafford, to send Manchester United crashing out of the Champions League. Dramatic as Costinha's winner was, it paled next to the unbridled celebrations of his manager. Mourinho ran the length of the touchline before sliding to his knees – to scowls of disdain from Alex Ferguson – and pumping his fist at the shell-shocked crowd. It was to be the first salvo in a decade of lively encounters between the two.José Mourinho was born 50 years ago in the port city of Setúbal, 30 miles south of Lisbon. Football was in his blood. His father, Felix, was capped by Portugal and Mourinho played to a middling level at Belenenses and Rio Ave. Yet it was coaching that caught his imagination. He went to Lisbon's Polytechnic of Physical Education, where he studied sports science and, on graduating, started out on a familiar route into soccer management, coaching Vitoria's youth team back in Setúbal.The 1992 arrival of Bobby Robson as manager of Sporting Lisbon was, by common consent, the game-changer for Mourinho. Starting out as his translator, he quickly earned Robson's respect for the intense detail of his preparatory notes. When Robson left for Porto, then Barcelona, he took his trusted match analyst with him, a journey that ended with promotion, when Mourinho took over as Porto coach in 2002. On arrival, he wrote a letter of welcome – a mission statement – to every member of his squad. It began: "From here on in, each practice, each game, each minute of your social life must centre on the aim of being champions…"In his first season, Porto won the Portuguese league and the Uefa Cup, winning the league again the following year – and then came that memorable 2004 Champions League run. After dispatching Manchester Utd, Porto went on to win the competition outright, an achievement that brought Mourinho to the attention of Roman Abramovich.If we'd thought his Old Trafford celebration was entertaining, it was as nothing compared to his first interview in the Chelsea hot seat. He said that his predecessor, the well-liked Claudio Ranieri, had deserved the sack for "failing". He said that he, too, would expect the sack if he were to fail, but for Mourinho, failure was inconceivable. Why? Because he was special."Please don't call me arrogant. I'm European champion and I think I'm a special one."Mourinho had spoken. The Special One was born.And he was special, or at least different. He set his stall out from the offset, eschewing the arriviste Surrey lifestyle of his Chelsea squad. Rather than an off-plan Oxshott monster-mansion, he moved his family to an elegant Eaton Terrace townhouse in south-west London. Mourinho embraced the capital immediately and fully, defying Ron Manager stereotypes by dining at San Lorenzo and taking his young family to the zoo, the theatre, the galleries.It didn't harm Mourinho's stock, either, that he was so easy on the eye. A classically handsome Iberian, he looked just as good in his training gear as he did in his immaculately tailored suits. ITV chief Kevin Lygo, whose children attended the same school as Mourinho's, recalls with amusement the frisson when Mourinho would arrive to collect his kids – and that was just the men. With his soulful, slightly baggy eyes, the Special One was acutely aware of his own magnetism, an asset he's put to excellent commercial use over the years. He even licensed his trademark stubble to Braun shavers.Yet there was never, would never be any prospect of his making the gossip columns. A huge part of Mourinho's brand, and his value, is his clear and present devotion to his family.Mourinho is also supremely skilled at manipulating the media and enraging the opposition – players, supporters and managers alike. With one well-timed soundbite, he would set the cat among the pigeons. Coming to Chelsea the summer after Arsenal had gone a whole season unbeaten, Mourinho said: "Look at the way your teams play against Arsenal. They don't believe they can win."The emphasis on "your" and "they" was genius, implying that he, an outsider, was about to show the Premier League how it should be done. It worked a treat. The usually phlegmatic Arsène Wenger allowed himself to be drawn into a slanging match, commenting on any and every Chelsea slip-up. This apparent obsession led Mourinho to label him a "voyeur". He added: "He likes to watch other people. He speaks, speaks, speaks about Chelsea."Another great foe has been Rafa Benítez. To this day, Mourinho refers to the defining moment of the 2005 Champions League semi-final when Liverpool won with "the ghost goal" that might or might not have crossed the line. There's a school of thought that this bullish, antagonistic persona is just that – a mask, a smokescreen, carefully cultivated to take the pressure away from his players so they can fully focus on the task in hand.In doing so, he creates a siege mentality that is predicated on loyalty to the crown – that crown being worn, of course, by the Special One. There's a counter-argument that Mourinho craves the limelight and is addicted to praise, describing all his teams and their achievements as Me, My and Mine.What's for sure is that he's a Machiavellian operator who picks his spats as adroitly as he picks his teams. Having incensed Alex Ferguson in 2004, Mourinho was quick to realise it had been a Pyrrhic victory. He began to court Ferguson, buttering him up with praise and playing to his self-image as a man of superior taste, fond of fine wine, something of which the Portuguese knew a little, too. (He is honorary president of a collective dedicated to ousting the screw-top wine bottle.)There was method to his acting, of course. After being sacked by Abramovich in 2007, Mourinho regularly spoke of his desire to land another "top job" in England. And, for all that he'd continue to call Chelsea "my boys" (usually after a win), Mourinho was solicitous in his praise of Manchester United, their "legend" and, particularly, Ferguson. He as good as treated this year's Champions League match between the clubs as an open audition, praising his venerable opponent.Madrid won and Mourinho was well aware that Ferguson himself would have a huge say in the anointment of his successor.There's something irresistible in the notion that the wily Ferguson was on to Mourinho all along. He was all too aware that the faithful dad and husband was a serial adulterer when it came to football clubs. That the same devout family man who raised £25,000 for Tsunami Relief and donated his Uefa Ballon D'Or to the Bobby Robson Trust in 2011 is also the man who poked Barcelona coach Tito Vilanova in the eye then ran away; who boasted of his €15,000,000 salary to the Italian media; who is regularly censured and sent to the stands for his outbursts; and who sprinted down the Old Trafford touchline, pumping his fist at the crowd.Mourinho is all these things and more. He's a narcissist. He's a sore loser. He's pathologically loyal to "his boys". He's a born winner. Above all else, though, the comment you always hear said of Mourinho is that he's "a breath of fresh air". He would guarantee great copy, give great headline, ruffle a few feathers, then go home to the wife and kids. Welcome back. We've been expecting you.José MourinhoReal MadridChelseaEuropeKevin Sampsonguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:03:14 GMT)

The rules | Rafael Behr
The essential etiquette guide to modern lifeBanging on about thingsIn opposition, David Cameron warned his party against "banging on" about Europe but they didn't listen. Maybe they couldn't hear him over the sound of banging.Banging on, despite the demotic appellation, is an ancient art formally known as prating, passed down by generations of pub bores. It consists of two elements – repetition and irrelevance. You have to talk incessantly about something in which other people aren't interested and not listen to their response. Otherwise, it is mere conversation. It is important not to notice that your audience heard you the first time. To know you are being tedious and to carry on regardless is provocation, which is a different art. Proper banging on must be sincerely obtuse.There is a correct movement of the eyes when banging on, which is the swivel (although boggle-eyed ranting is permitted). The complexion should be indistinguishable from the claret that has been drunk at lunch to lubricate the banging. The chin or lips should be lightly flecked with spittle. Foaming at the mouth is practised by a schismatic sect of bangers on, generally known as Ukip.Cheating at capitalismSo accustomed is modern society to the widespread practice of capitalism that some are inclined to think it has no rules; that the realm of economic activity is akin to a jungle where only the strongest survive. (Lions don't submit themselves to the authority of some enfeebled gazelle-market regulator.)In fact, capitalism does have rules but one of them is that the richer you get, the easier it is to cheat. Cheating can either be done on your own or as a team. A popular solo method is to avoid paying taxes by pretending that your profits are made in some place where the government can't see them. This is easiest for people who practise capitalism on the internet. It is especially easy for Google because the only way anyone can find anything on the internet is by googling it. The company can rig its algorithms to trick a taxman who types in "where do you make your profits?" and hits "I feel lucky".Team cheating involves agreeing with your competitors to keep prices high. Big energy companies are sometimes accused of doing this but no one can say for sure that they do. That's because another rule of capitalism is that anyone who is rich enough to cheat at it can afford a lawyer to stop people calling them cheats.Inheriting money does not necessarily count as cheating at capitalism but it is prudent for those born into wealth not to claim to be "in it together" with anyone else.Keeping secretsA new book claims to reveal the original recipe for Coca-Cola. This is only a big deal because Coke has been so uptight about not sharing the formula, thus breaking the first rule of keeping a secret, which is to act cool. Looking really secretive is the worst way to keep a secret because it increases the incentive for other people to try to find out what you know.The second rule is that the only true secret is something you know about yourself. You can't know something entirely secret about someone else because they know it too, which makes two of you, and that's the beginning of the end of secrecy. In any case, someone probably told you the secret, which means the chances are they've blabbed all over the place. Anyone who asks: "Can you keep a secret?" is clearly a poor judge of secret-keeping capability because he or she is obviously on the verge of breaching a confidence.Period drama in film and televisionApply the Gatsby rule: success as drama is in inverse proportion to lavishness of costumes.Jail time done by famous middle-class peopleA prison sentence, once served, can be formally reclassified as an "ordeal" by writing a book about it.Rafael Behrguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:03:12 GMT)

Academies are not the way forward for education | letters
Evidence on academies so far shows they do not compare wellWill Hutton's interesting analysis of the social consequences of the segregation of privately educated students from those in state-funded schools concluded (surprisingly and without evidence, apart from his visit to one school and Andrew Adonis's personal account of his reinvention of the comprehensive schools) that academies are the solution ("We all lose when we separate our children at the school gate", Comment).Does he really believe that contracting each of 20,000 schools to the secretary of state and thereby creating the most centralised control over education in western Europe since Germany in the 30s is the way forward?Certainly not on the basis of the evidence so far available. Despite the extra funding that such schools received (including the £1bn over the budgeted sum) and despite (according to the recent RSA report) the apparent manipulation of admissions to improve results, the academies as a whole do not compare well with those schools that remain accountable to the local community.Professor Richard PringGreen-Templeton CollegeOxfordWomen denied abortion rights Your report on the threat to the life of "Beatriz", if denied her pregnancy's termination, showed the brutal limits on reproductive choice in El Salvador ("'Let me end my pregnancy': one woman's plight grips El Salvador", News). However, women face similar repression in the neighbouring countries of Nicaragua, Honduras and Guatemala, though the latter two allow therapeutic abortion to save the mother's life. Anti-abortion laws in all three states not only regulate access to safe abortion, but also ban the use of the emergency morning-after pill and restrict the content of sex education.In the Central American region, 95% of all abortions are unsafe and a leading cause of maternal death. As religious extremists abuse their power to deny basic freedoms, campaigners will step up our battle for women to have control over their own bodies.Virginia Lopez CalvoCo-ordinator, Central America Women's Network, London N1Peace flames broke no lawYour article states that the symbolic flying of five Peace Flames from five continents into the UK would have "breached aviation laws" (Church concerns over 'peace flame' plan", News). Had you asked us how this took place, you would have been informed that the flames were flown by airlines in specially designed safety lamps in the same manner as the Olympic flame is flown, and of course without breaching aviation laws.The World Peace Flame organisation is an education and awareness-raising initiative that works at grass roots level. Our education packs are used in schools and youth projects in several countries to give thousands of young people the skills and awareness to deal constructively with conflict in their own lives.The World Peace Flame monuments celebrate the heroic efforts that individuals and communities make to build bridges and find common ground where differences exist. As your article points out, they burn in several European cities and remind us that aggression is all too often an instinctual and tempting option where misunderstanding threatens to prevail. I think that it is high time that London had its own monument in a suitable place of prominence.Those responsible for the World Peace Flame have always been open about their initiative and all the information about the peace flame can be found on its website at worldpeaceflame.comSavitri MacCuishDirector, the World Peace Flame Foundation, the NetherlandsTax reform to get the big onesYour leader did not discuss an option that could be a simple but effective solution to tax evasion by companies: to tax gross turnover separately in each of the countries in which they operate ("Time for a moral crusade against tax scams", Comment). There would be but one deductible allowance – company taxation agreed for the previous tax year.Regular PAYE and other taxpayers would see their contributions fall as a percentage of the total tax take necessary to run the country, as the likes of Google, Amazon, Boots and Starbucks pay their fair share.Mike GotchCity councillor, OxfordRebirth of the history manTristram Hunt was correct to draw attention to the need for progressive historians to challenge the rightwing ideology underlying much current historical writing ("History is where the great battles of public life are now being fought", Comment). This is one of the main reasons that we are editing a book, EP Thompson and English Radicalism. Its main aim is to show how Thompson's writing on history and political ideas, his peace campaigning and his socialist-humanist philosophy are as relevant today as they were when they were written. They constitute a very powerful challenge to the current historians of the right.Roger Fieldhouse and Richard TaylorThorvertonExeterManc overboard I enjoyed nearly all of the tribute to Sir Alex Ferguson (Supplement). But oh my, Paul Morley's mythologising of Manchester, that "molten, international" city with "preserved mongrel integrity". I trust that Manchester is as wary as ever of the pretentious and the opportunistic.Sean CordellManchesterguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 23:03:11 GMT)

Tory chair Andrew Feldman: I did not make 'swivel-eyed loons' remark
Conservative co-chairman taking legal advice following online rumours that he made remark about party activistsThe co-chairman of the Conservatives has denied describing party activists as "swivel-eyed loons" after rumours circulated on the internet that he was the source for remarks widely published over the weekend.Lord Feldman said he was taking legal advice after posts on Twitter implied he was the senior Tory quoted anonymously in several national newspapers. The mystery Tory made the remarks at a party dinner event – allegedly in earshot of journalists – after being asked about the decision of 116 party MPs to defy the prime minister and vote in favour of an amendment regretting the absence of an EU referendum in the Queen's speech.The unnamed figure is reported as saying: "It's fine. There's really no problem. The MPs just have to do it because the associations tell them to, and the associations are all mad, swivel-eyed loons."In a statement Feldman, who was a friend of David Cameron at Oxford University, said: "There is speculation on the internet and on Twitter that the senior Conservative party figure claimed to have made derogatory comments by the Times and the Telegraph is me."This is completely untrue. I would like to make it quite clear that I did not nor have ever described our associations in this way or in any similar manner. Nor do these alleged comments represent my view of our activists. On the contrary in the last eight years of working for the party, I have found them to be hard-working, committed and reasonable people. They are without question the backbone of the party. I am very disappointed by the behaviour of the journalists involved, who have allowed rumour and innuendo to take hold by not putting these allegations to me before publication. I am taking legal advice."The remarks threaten to inflame the incendiary row between Conservative grassroots and Cameron's inner circle, including its many former Eton schoolboys, who are criticised as being "out of touch". Feldman was at a dinner of the Conservative Friends of Pakistan on Wednesday at the Intercontinetal hotel in Westminster where the remarks were said to have been made. However, those sitting near him are said by sources close to Feldman to be willing to publicly deny hearing anything similar to the comments reported.The Conservative party went on the attack on Saturday, suggesting similarities between the Twitter rumours around Feldman and the defamatory claims wrongly connecting former party treasurer Lord McAlpine to child abuse allegations.The case of former chief whip Andrew Mitchell, who is contesting claims that he called police officers at the gates of Downing Street "plebs", was also cited.Grant Shapps, the co-chairman of the Conservative party, said: "He [Feldman] works very closely with the party volunteers. I believe him when he says that he did not say that about our fantastic volunteers," he told the BBC. "We have seen these rumours flying around the internet, we have seen it with Lord McAlpine and Andrew Mitchell, both of whom were later in the clear."James Kirkup, the Telegraph journalist who reported the remarks, tweeted: "I have seen Lord Feldman's statement. I stand by my story."Mitchell, now on the backbenches, appeared on Sky News to offer his support. He said: "It looks to me tonight as if there's a full-on media storm staring on all of this and we should bear in mind that the man at the centre of it, Lord Feldman, says it is untrue and if Lord Feldman says it is untrue then I believe him. We should avoid a rush to judgment."None of us think what has been suggested in the media today. Having worked with Lord Feldman I can tell you that this is not his view about activists and I would be very surprised if he did say such a thing."It is all very well making these points by innuendo, pointing the finger at the man who has made it clear he didn't say those things. I don't think anyone around David Cameron thinks these things."I don't think there is anyone senior in the party or junior in the party who believes anything of the sort about our activists."If anyone said such a thing I thing it would be a disgraceful thing to say, completely untrue, and Lord Feldman has made it clear that he didn't say it."The Ukip leader, Nigel Farage, seized on the remarks allegedly made by a senior Tory. Farage, who claimed to know the identity of the Tory, tweeted on Friday: "If you are a Conservative supporter who believes in Ukip ideas then your party hates you. Come and join us.""Those posting comments on the Conservative Home blog on Saturday were unforgiving. Sandy Jamieson wrote: "We activists are all 'mad, swivel-eyed loons'. Of course we are – we elected David Cameron as leader."Another poster, with the username Doppel1800, wrote: "The cliquey Cameroons are on a completely different planet which even their choice of insults betrays."Downing Street is under pressure because the Tory is said to be well known to the prime minister for many years. He or she is due to play a significant role in the party's preparations for the general election. The Times, Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mirror, which all reported the remarks and which say they know the identity of the Tory, declined to name the senior member of the prime minister's circle."The publication of the remarks, which were made during the week that the prime minister was in the US, is particularly embarrassing for Cameron. They come after No 10 aides expressed fury with Philip Hammond, the defence secretary, who criticised the government for devoting so much time to gay marriage legislation.A Downing Street spokesman said: "It is categorically untrue that anyone in Downing Street made the comments about the Conservative party associations and activists reported in the Times and the Telegraph."ConservativesDavid CameronNicholas WattConal UrquhartBarry Neildguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 21:58:00 GMT)

Fury at corporate tax avoidance leads to call for a global response
Anger over the financial affairs of multinationals such as Google, Amazon and Starbucks is gathering momentum in Westminster. Now the UK is poised to lead the debate about international tax reform at next month's G8 summitHuge orange and green cranes hover over a vast building site at King's Cross, London. Over the next three years, 2.4 acres of this site will be transformed into a million square feet of an 11-storey headquarters for the internet giant Google, no doubt chock-a-block with colourful Big Brother-house-style sofas and surreal chill-out zones that mark out its other 70 offices in 40 countries.The property deal is estimated to have cost around £1bn and was heralded by the site's development consortium as the "most significant property transaction of recent years"."This is a big investment by Google, we're committing further to the UK where computing and the web were invented. It's good news for Google, for London and for the UK," said Matt Brittin, vice-president for northern and central Europe, when the purchase was announced in January.Like Amazon, Google is seeing increasing success in the UK where one in every $10 of sales is now generated. Yet both firms claim they are merely touching down on UK soil, without a "permanent establishment" and therefore are not paying tax on profits from billions of pounds worth of sales made here.On Wednesday, Google won the advertiser of the year trophy at the 54th annual Clio Awards – the Oscars for advertising professionals. Accepting the award in New York, Robert Wong, chief creative officer of Google Creative Lab, said: "At the highest order, our job is to remind the world what it is they love about Google."That popularity has hit a serious snag. The next day the company was branded "evil" by Margaret Hodge, chair of the public accounts committee, while this weekend Ed Miliband called it "irresponsible". "If everyone approached their tax affairs as some of these companies have approached theirs we wouldn't have a health service, we wouldn't have an education system," he said.Along with Amazon and, before that, Starbucks, Topshop, Boots, Vodafone, Goldman Sachs and Greene King, Google is the latest to have become the target of grassroots hostility towards their aggressive tax avoidance policies. The actions of these corporations are not illegal, nor underhand, but especially when we're all supposed to be in austerity together, jarring horribly with public opinion.Something "doesn't smell right", as the Guardian's editorial said this weekend, after it ran an account of the extent of Amazon's dealings in the UK, far wider than what its tax lawyers are implying.The debate is now raging over whether these companies are the happy beneficiaries of a tax system knitted with loopholes, or the malicious purveyors of smoke-and-mirror accounting. HM Revenue and Customs claims the former – public opinion is rolling towards the latter. Lin Homer, chief executive of HMRC, claimed the public don't understand. Asked why she was not taking a tougher line with internet giants, she told the public accounts committee: "We see, but understand more fully, some of the information that might seem to the general public to be surprising."But campaigners say tax collectors and leading politicians have been caught out; too engrossed in austerity plans, they are scrabbling to keep up with people who point out that there are other ways to balance the books."Without a doubt, they are behind the curve," said Richard Murphy, a chartered accountant, economist and founder of Tax Justice Network. "They have all been caught by surprise because this has come from civil society, a campaign that has been going on for almost a decade but has only been picked up by politicians after the banking crisis when they suddenly realised they were desperately short of cash."He said HMRC had been ducking tax avoidance completely. He said it had powers to tackle any suspect tax returns of foreign-based companies. "If the breach is blatant, then they can act. What we haven't got is politicians who will stand up to this. It's a critical point. If the state will not stand up for its right to tax big corporations then we are in deep trouble."UK Uncut began campaigning on the issue in 2010 and it was its legal challenge that revealed how HMRC waived a £20m bill for Goldman Sachs, as well as a £6bn bill to Vodafone. Journalists, tax experts and campaigners have been investigating and exposing the tax scams being perpetrated by big businesses for far longer – pointing out glaring loopholes in Britain's tax system.When Matt Brittin of Google told the public accounts committee in November 2012 that Google did not have a sales presence in the UK, it was the news agency Reuters that quickly uncovered evidence to the contrary, resulting in Brittin being recalled in front of the committee on Thursday, where his company's behaviour was described as "devious, calculated and, in my view, unethical" by Margaret Hodge."You are a company that says you 'do no evil'. And I think that you do do evil," said Hodge, referring to Google's motto, "Don't be evil".Amazon may also be recalled, after numerous whistleblowers from among its employees approached journalists to contest official accounts of its trading practices within Britain.For the moment the government's line is that this is a global problem that cannot be solved unilaterally. On Monday, Google's executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, will meet David Cameron, a meeting No 10 insists is not about tax, but to do with Schmidt's role on the prime minister's business advisory group.Labour leader Ed Miliband, who is due to give a speech to Google employees on Wednesday, has backed a "country by country" international scheme on tax declaration but says that he is concerned that no firm proposals have so far been put forward for the G8. "You have to have much greater transparency. Tax offices have to know country by country how much profit people are making, how much tax they are paying. Unless you know that you won't get to the bottom of what is happening. You have to deal with tax avoidance schemes. You have to deal with tax havens."We are saying there has to be a big, big push on this. It has to be done internationally and if it is not done internationally, Britain should act on its own."All eyes will be on what, if anything, can be agreed at next month's G8 meeting in Scotland, where, as host of the event, David Cameron has pledged to put tax avoidance at the top of the agenda as he insists it is an issue for international co-operation rather than unilateral action.And it would not be just the wealthy who would be watching the progress of the talks, said Melanie Ward, head of advocacy at ActionAid UK."At the G20 summit in 2009, Gordon Brown led the beginnings of a global crackdown on tax havens and, for the first time, put an emphasis on helping poor countries to deal with the losses to tax havens that cost them three times as much as they receive in aid each year. But in the intervening years, tax dodging died away as a big UK issue," she said."It's shot back up the agenda with rising public anger over the antics of Starbucks, Google, Amazon and reports of sweetheart deals between the government and Goldman Sachs. The UK should close tax loopholes, but the truth is that the UK is responsible for one in five of the world's tax havens in the form of many of the crown dependencies and overseas territories. These tax havens are a leech, sucking resources from the UK and poor countries alike, so action needs to start with pulling them into line."Ultimately, this is a global problem and the solutions are global. That's why David Cameron must lead the G8 to deliver an unprecedented assault on tax dodging when it meets next month. This means calling time on tax havens and ensuring that poor countries are at the heart of any new deal to share tax information between countries."There is a serious risk that a deal will be agreed between rich countries and tax havens that would leave poor countries out in the cold. This would be entirely unacceptable. Tax dodging is hurting ordinary people, wherever in the world they live."Richard Murphy said the moral case for international action had already been won. "We now just have to beat off the accountants and businesses who oppose democratic accountability to the state to get it," he said.Tax avoidanceTax and spendingGoogleCorporate governanceAmazon.comStarbucksTracy McVeighguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 21:51:21 GMT)

Two-thirds of voters say PM should 'listen more' to backbenchers
Amid row over Europe in Tory party, Opinium/Observer poll shows 3% fall in David Cameron's approval ratingOver two-thirds of voters believe the prime minister should "listen and pay more attention" to the views of his backbenchers, amid the row within the party over Europe.An Opinium/Observer poll found that 67% of respondents believed David Cameron should listen to what he is being told rather than enforcing his own views.The Conservative party is in turmoil over Britain's continued membership of the EU with Cameron being bounced into offering a bill legislating for a future in-out referendum last week.Yet just 20% said Cameron should "enforce his views and overrule them".Meanwhile Ukip has surged to 20% in the new poll, with the Liberal Democrats on 7% and the Tories on 27%. Ed Miliband's Labour party has a 10% lead on 37%.Ukip has enjoyed a large spike in support since the local elections with its proportion of the vote doubling since the start of the year.Cameron has suffered a bad fortnight since the last Opinium/Observer poll, with his approval rating dropping by 3% to 29%, while those disapproving increased to 55%. Miliband's approval rating is unchanged with 24% approving of him while 43% disapprove. Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, has suffered a four percentage points increase in the number who disapprove of him, to 63% from 59%. Only 14% approve.Opinium Research carried out an online survey of 1,955 adults in Great Britain aged 18+ from 14 to 16 May 2013. Results have been weighted to nationally representative criteria. Full tables and results can be found hereDavid CameronOpinion pollsEuropean UnionConservativesUK Independence party (Ukip)LabourLiberal DemocratsForeign policyDaniel Boffeyguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 21:42:41 GMT)

Eric Schmidt defends Google's tax affairs following Commons criticism
Google executive chairman says company accounts comply with international lawGoogle executive chairman Eric Schmidt has defended his company's financial affairs after a Commons committee branded the internet giant devious and unethical for sheltering its multibillion-pound profits from UK taxes.Writing in the Observer, Schmidt said his company's accounts were complicated but complied with international taxation treaties that allowed it to pay most of its tax in the United States.Schmidt said that he understood why Google's apparent sidestepping on UK taxation had generated controversy and called for a reform of international tax law."At a time when families are having to tighten their belts and funding for vital public services is under pressure, corporate taxation is rightly a hot topic," Schmidt wrote. "And as a company that has always aspired to do the right thing, we understand why Google is at the centre of that debate."His remarks follow Google's mauling at the hands of the Commons Public Accounts Committee on Thursday. Members reacted in disbelief after it emerged that they paid just £3.4m of tax on £3.2bn of sales taken from UK customers last year as their sales were technically "closed" in low-tax Ireland.Schmidt insisted that corporation tax should be paid on a company's profits rather than its revenues and said because his was a multinational corporation whose engineers were chiefly based in the United States, Google's taxes should be channelled there. This, he said, obeyed rules laid out by politicians."We pay more taxes in the US than in any other country – around $2bn in corporate income taxes to the US government in 2012," he wrote. "It's the same for UK-based technology or pharmaceutical companies, which pay the majority of their corporation tax in the UK, as that is where most of the activity that generates their profits takes place."Schmidt said that the debate over international taxation showed it could benefit from reform. He added that because Google was able to generated large revenues, it was also able to plough money back into the UK economy."While profit has become something of a dirty word, it's important to remember that many corporations reinvest their profits in research and product development, which in turn tends to lead to job creation, further economic growth and, ultimately, more tax. For example, Google has just announced plans to invest more than £1bn in new offices in London's King's Cross. It's been estimated that this investment will generate some £80m a year in new employment taxes and £50m in stamp duty. This is in addition to the significant amounts we already pay in UK tax through corporate, local and employment taxes."Schmidt's comments came as Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, said he believed some multinationals, including Google were not fulfilling their social responsibilites.Miliband told the Observer: "Now, what is the politicians' responsibility: change the law. But it is also to talk about the kind of society we want to create and what the responsibilities of a company like Google are."I don't think they are living up to their responsibilities at the moment and I will be very clear about that on Wednesday."It is part of a culture of irresponsibility. If everyone approached their tax affairs as some of these companies have approached their tax affairs we wouldn't have a health service, we wouldn't have an education system."GoogleEric SchmidtTax and spendingTax avoidanceBarry Neildguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 21:18:00 GMT)

London bankers plan to dodge new EU crackdown on bonuses
Banks may increase salaries to compensate for EU plans bringing 10 times more London bankers within pay netAn EU crackdown on bankers' bonuses in the City of London will just lead to a surge in basic salaries and other initiatives to circumvent regulations, experts warned on Saturday.Banks, still unpopular for their leading role in the financial crisis, are keeping their avoidance plans under wraps, but industry figures were happy to boast privately that they could run rings round Brussels."Banks are pretty good at getting round rules," said one senior financier. "If there are restrictions on us paying bonuses, we will be looking at paying some other kind of allowances."The High Pay Centre said it feared banks would increase basic salaries to compensate for any bonus cap, arguing that such a move would be unjustified.Bonuses have risen to the top of the agenda before the publication this week of proposals from the European Banking Authority, which would limit extra payouts for anyone whose salary is above €500,000 (£420,000).This is in addition to earlier EBA proposals, which are scheduled to take effect in 2014-15, that will require bonuses for certain staff inside the EU to be capped at 100% of their salary – or 200% with the approval of shareholders.The new proposals – leaked at the end of last week – could lead to up to 10 times as many London bankers than previously expected being brought into the pay net, say experts. Many in the City warn that draconian EU measures against bonuses will chase staff to join rivals from Asia or the US.Nicholas Stretch, a tax partner with the City law firm CMS Cameron McKenna, said that basic salaries would have to be increased to compensate for any bonus cap. "People will have to increase salaries, but this will increase employers' fixed costs and means banks will have to pay more in the way of compensation should they want to lay off staff in the bad times," he said.The High Pay Centre said City bankers produce an endless stream of "unsubstantiated scaremongering" whenever the EU or other regulators threaten further action against banks."We should call their [bankers'] bluff," said Deborah Hargreaves, founding director of the High Pay Centre. "Let's see what happens. I do not think that they are such rare talents. There is a range of people who could do these jobs."But Hargreaves also fears that banks will find ways round any new rules and agrees they are "very good" at this. Nevertheless, she believes a bonus crackdown is still worthwhile and can be expected to extend eventually to the whole of big business.BankingExecutive pay and bonusesTerry Macalisterguardian.co.uk © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds    
(Sat, 18 May 2013 20:15:41 GMT)

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