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Things wouldn't be so bad now if we had listened to Frank Field By Simon Heffer Last Updated: 12:01am BST 23/07/2008 Have your say Read comments When one talks to older politicians they often observe that their lives consist of cyclical re-runs of the same old film. After 15 years of boom, the cycles have become somewhat extended. Now, the impending bust brings back to our screens a rather scary old favourite: unemployment. Barely a day passes that some analyst doesn't pitch in with a projection for the additional numbers that will go on the dole in the next year...

Bluetooth Big Brother uses mobiles and laptops to track thousands of Britons Last updated at 12:04pm on 21.07.08    Thousands of people in Bath are unaware their movements may have been tracked through their bluetooth mobiles Thousands of Britons' movements have been covertly tracked by scanners placed in streets, pubs and offices for a technology experiment.  The Cityware project run by the University of Bath has secretly placed scanners around the Somerset city, with the first 10 installed 2006. The scanners pick up bluetooth radio signals transmitted from mobile phones and laptops. In a scene reminiscent of the Will Smith...

Gordon Brown aide a victim of honeytrap operation by Chinese agents David Leppard and Claire Newell A top aide to Gordon Brown has been a suspected victim of a “honeytrap” operation by Chinese intelligence agents. The aide, a senior Downing Street adviser who was with the prime minister on a trip to China earlier this year, had his BlackBerry phone stolen after being picked up by a Chinese woman who had approached him in a Shanghai hotel disco. The aide agreed to return to his hotel with the woman. He reported the BlackBerry missing the next morning. The aide, whose...

Gordon Brown’s rule book goes into dustbin of history Economic Outlook: David Smith ON my bookshelf there is a tome I have been meaning to dip back into for some time. It is called Reforming Britain’s Economic and Financial Policy. Written by Ed Balls, then Treasury chief economic adviser, now in charge of what used to be the education department, and Gus O’Donnell, then head of the government’s economic service, now head of the civil service, it was intended to be the bible of new Labour macroeconomic policy. The foreword was by Gordon Brown, who was inspired by his own...

UK economy heads for ‘horror movie’ David Smith and Dominic O’Connell BRITAIN is facing an “economic horror movie” because of a “toxic mixture” of a moribund credit market and volatile oil prices, according to a leading forecasting group. The Ernst & Young Item club, which uses the Treasury’s economic model, will argue in a report tomorrow that the economy will struggle to avoid recession. This comes as a survey by the Institute of Directors shows that business confidence has slumped to the lowest level ever recorded, with company chiefs increasingly gloomy about the investment climate. These reports follow an interview...

‘Harassed for being a Christian’- the policeman who objected to gay ribbons and is turning to a tribunal Last updated at 01:08am on 20.07.08    A policeman is taking his force to an employment tribunal, claiming that he has been harassed because of his Christian beliefs.Constable Graham Cogman says he has been persecuted since he objected to wearing ribbons to mark a gay event.The controversy echoes the case of Lillian Ladele, the Christian registrar who successfully took on Islington Council in London over her refusal to conduct civil-partnership ceremonies for gay couples.  Making a stand: PC Graham Cogman says...

Exclusive: US rocker Ted Nugent's outrageous rant on UK knife crime By Jody Thompson, 17/07/2008 (What's this?)American rock star Ted Nugent has followed in Lily Allen's footsteps to be the latest celebrity to comment on the UK's knife crime problem. However, unlike Lily, he's set to spark controversy with his outrageous views. An advocate of hunting and gun-ownership rights, Nugent currently serves on the Board of Directors of the National Rifle Association and thinks the problem would stop if Britons were allowed to arm themselves with guns. Talking mid-set during his gig at London's Indigo venue in the 02 Arena...

"Two policemen were attacked by a 30-strong mob including schoolchildren after asking a 15-year-old to pick up her litter. They were bitten, punched and kicked and had to call for back-up to escape serious injury. Witnesses to the attack, on a busy shopping street in Croydon, South London, feared that the uniformed officers would be beaten to death."

On July 17, 1946, sixty-two years ago, the life of General Draza Mihailovich came to an end. Why should we care? Why did his life and death matter? He was a military officer who lived at a time in history when his dedication to democratic ideals would bring him into conflict with the fascists, the Nazis and, in the end, the communists. It would be the communists who would finally silence him, but not before he and his people fought valiantly to prevent his country, Yugoslavia, from falling into communist hands after the war. It would be too easy to...

A man who was found with his head severed by a chainsaw was fighting to stay in a block of 70 flats in Hampshire cleared for redevelopment. David Phyall, 50, was the last tenant at the Atlantic Housing Ltd housing association flats in Eastleigh. His body was found by police on 5 July, who said his death was not suspicious. Post-mortem tests showed he died of a "complete transection of the neck". An inquest was opened and adjourned at Winchester Coroner's Court on Friday. A spokesman for the coroner said: "As far as we know nobody else was involved. "There's...

Drivers who cause fatal accidents while on mobile phones face up to 14 years in jail Last updated at 11:09am on 15.07.08   Getting tough: The new sentencing rules target mobile phone use by drivers. Posed by model. Motorists who cause fatal accidents while texting or talking on mobiles could face up to 14 years in prison from today. Drivers involved in death crashes after drinking or taking drugs face similar penalties, as will those who were driving at greatly excessive speed over long distances. Under new sentencing guidelines sent to the courts today which come into immediate effect, there...

'Big Brother' warning over Government database that records EVERY phone call and e-mail in Britain Last updated at 16:09pm on 15.07.08    Cautious: Information Commissioner Richard Thomas warns a 'Big Brother' database would threaten the British way of life A 'Big Brother' database recording every single phone call and e-mail made in Britain would threaten the British way of life, the information watchdog has warned.Information Commissioner Richard Thomas said such a Government-run database would have serious data protection implications.Amid speculation a massive database is already being planned, he declared it would be a 'step too far'.May's draft legislative programme...

Public Diplomacy by: Ben Giles, July 14, 2008 Jim Murphy, Great Britain’s Minister for Europe, spoke at the Brookings Institution< as part of a trip to Washington D.C. for the release of his new publication on public diplomacy. The July 11 speech highlighted many of the concepts in Murphy’s publication, Engagement: Public Diplomacy in a Globalised World, a compilation of essays and papers stressing better communication as the future of global politics. “We have to stop equating public diplomacy with public relations,” said Murphy, “shouting our core messages and top lines, louder and louder, in the false belief that people...

Three men accused of plotting to blow up transatlantic planes have admitted to conspiring to cause explosions. Abdulla Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar and Tanvir Hussain also admitted conspiring to cause a public nuisance by making videos threatening bombings. Two other defendants, Ibrahim Savant and Umar Islam, also pleaded guilty to the public nuisance charges. The Woolwich Crown Court jury has yet to rule on conspiracy to murder charges which the five and three others deny. The men deny two charges, which have been amended, of conspiracy to murder between 1 January and 11 August 2006. One specifies the attacks would...

  Jack Straw ... law will back heroes            New law to back 'have-a-go-heroes'     By CLODAGH HARTLEY Home Affairs Correspondent Published: 12 Jul 2008     NEW legislation will protect “have-a-go heroes” who intervene in crimes or use force to defend themselves, Justice Secretary Jack Straw vowed last night. From Monday a person’s actions will be judged on the situation “as they saw it at the time” — even if in hindsight the force could be classed as unreasonable, according to insiders. Mr Straw told The Sun: “We’re not going to have a...

British spying chief Alex Allan, the chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, has regained consciousness having been in a coma for 10 days. Mr Allan's committee collates information from MI5, MI6 and GCHQ and briefs the prime minister, ministers and officials on intelligence assessments on issues such as security, defence and foreign affairs.

A rare white stag has been observed on the west coast of the Highlands. The animal has been seen with other red deer by a member of the John Muir Trust, which has kept its location a secret to protect it from poachers. The killing of a white stag on the Devon and Cornwall border last year sparked outrage. Fran Lockhart, partnership manager for the trust, caught the young Highland deer on camera. She described it as "ghost-like". She said: "I am thrilled to know that there is a white stag roaming free out there in the Scottish Highlands and...

The importance of Kingmakers for a wide American audience emerges slowly. At first, the book appears to be a quaint reminiscence of eccentric and often familiar British colonials of the early 20th century, strutting across Middle Eastern deserts in pith helmets, instructing the benighted native tribesmen about the fundamentals of governing. But as this beautifully written and researched book proceeds, it becomes abundantly clear that these skilled English soldier-diplomats are the progenitors of (and in some cases, role models for) the current crop of American diplomats and soldiers on the same turf. The issues that this country is now debating...

Modified Media Mea Culpa by: Malcolm A. Kline, July 09, 2008 A veteran journalist has found his profession wanting in fulfilling its basic mission—in Great Britain. Oddly, his book, Flat Earth News, is unavailable in the United States, although many American media critics might find that his findings hold true on this side of the Atlantic as well. Nick Davies asked researchers at Cardiff University to analyze coverage at The London Times, the Guardian, the Independent and the Daily Mail. “They found that a massive 60 percent of these quality-print stories consisted wholly or mainly of wire copy and/or PR...

In his address Lord Phillips praised the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, who famously said last February that it was “inevitable” that Sharia would come to Britain. “An approach to law which simply said – there’s one law for everybody – I think that’s a bit of a danger,” said the Archbishop. He had apparently forgotten, if he ever knew, that the idea of “one law for everybody” was one of the great achievements of Judeo-Christian civilization, and was rooted in the idea of the dignity of all human beings as created in the image of God.

Al-Qaeda Draws New Recruits Via Internet Al-Qaeda is using the Internet to recruit vulnerable young people to its terrorist network, according to a programme aired on Saudi Arabian TV late on Tuesday. Umm Osama, the founder of al-Qaeda's first women-only website, al-Khansa, joined several others on the programme to discuss how they renounced jihadist ideology. Among those who sought a response to this question was an imam from the Medina mosque, Saleh Ibn Awad al-Mudamsi, and the father of a young al-Qaeda suspect held in an Iraqi prison. Read More Qaeda Targets U.S. Oil Interests in North Africa U.S....

UK: CONSERVATIVE LEADER David Cameron called for "a presumption to prison" for people found carrying knives yesterday as he launched his party's campaign in what he called Britain's "broken society by-election" in Glasgow East. FRANK MILLAR , London Editor reports Scottish first minister Alex Salmond claimed a political earthquake could see his Scottish National Party win the previously "safe" Labour seat, amid speculation that failure to hold his Scottish stronghold could finally precipitate a challenge to prime minister Gordon Brown's leadership.

A council has been accused of discriminating against homosexuals over plans to clear undergrowth from a notorious gay cruising spot. Bristol City Council wants to prune bushes and remove cover from an area known as the Downs to improve the landscape and encourage rare wildlife. But its own gay rights group has opposed the move, claiming that cutting back the bushes was "discriminating" to homosexual men who used the area for late night outdoor sex known as dogging. Work on the beauty spot has been temporarily delayed while talks with gay rights groups take place to try and break the...

Minister calls for children to be locked in school to stop them buying junk food Last updated at 16:47pm on 06.07.08   Children's Minister Kevin Brennan has called for secondary school children to be locked inside school grounds during breaks to stop them buying unhealthy food Children should be locked inside school grounds to stop them buying unhealthy food from shops and takeaways, a minister said yesterday.The drastic proposal comes amid new evidence that the Jamie Oliver-inspired drive to ensure school canteens offer more nutritious meals is being shunned by pupils.Children's Minister Kevin Brennan said secondary school children should...

Russian agents came close to carrying out the perfect assassination on British soil when they killed Alexander Litvinenko... Security sources have disclosed that the former Russian spy would have died within hours had the poisoned tea he was given been served hot. Litvinenko, a former KGB agent who had become a critic of the government of Russia's then president, Vladimir Putin... Security sources say that during the meeting Litvinenko took just a few sips of the tea but left the remainder of the cup because it was cold. "If Litvinenko had drunk all the tea he would have been dead...

The Townswomen's Guild are meeting to debate a radical reform in the law on prostitution. Their template? The Swedish model. (edit) The debate comes as the Government here is drawing up proposals for law reform that could de-criminalise prostitutes who would, instead, be offered help to get out of the vice trade or given anti-social behaviour orders, in favour of a crackdown on men who trawl for sex.The approach, championed by women ministers such as Harriet Harman, has met with fierce resistance from the Home Office. While Diane Abbot has tabled an Early Day Motion, to date it has...

I don't know whether to laugh or cry at the reaction of the liberal Left to the epidemic of stabbed teenage boys that is not merely bereaving family upon family, but is also disfiguring society. They argue it is society's fault. The state, they say, is spending too little on giving the murderers pleasant places to live, and is failing to supply them with recreational facilities or "mentors". Inevitably, therefore, they feel the need to go out and kill: as one does. That this is self-serving, ignorant nonsense should not be in dispute. How to win the argument with these...

Aircraft carriers: plane sailing Britain is paying a high price, but not too high If diplomacy is the continuation of war by other means, and if the art of diplomacy is to speak softly and carry a big stick, then no stick comes much bigger, or looks more intimidating, than a 65,000-tonne aircraft carrier. Except maybe two 65,000-tonne aircraft carriers. The tricky part of the equation is that big sticks do not come cheap. The Government has signed a contract for two 65,000-tonne supercarriers for the Royal Navy. As big sticks go, these are the second-biggest of their kind. Only...

SUPERSPOOK Alex Allan may have been an assassination target of the Russians or al-Qaeda, security experts said last night. The 56-year-old chairman of the Government's Joint Intelligence Committee is in a coma in hospital and has had toxicology tests to see if he has been poisoned. Another theory is that Britain's top spy - whose 58-year-old Australian wife Katie Clemson died from cancer in November - may have taken a drugs overdose. Mr Allan had direct access to the PM and regularly updated him about terrorist threats facing Britain. The members of the Joint Intelligence Committee Mr Allan chairs are...

Diver catches giant crab   A giant crab with a shell 12in wide has been caught by an Aylesbury diver off the UK coast. The crustacean, weighing 17lb and with a claw span of 9in, was found by diver Paul Worsley during a recent diving trip in Lyme Regis, Dorset. Douglas Lanfear, who runs the dive boat Blue Turtle, said he was amazed at the size of the crab. He said: "It was truly a monster. It was the biggest crab I have ever seen in all my years and there were fishermen who have been working here for...

Police baffled by horrific end of Laurent Bonomo and Gabriel Ferez Students were bound, gagged and stabbed more than 200 times but the motive for attack is a mystery Adam Fresco, Fran Yeoman and Marcus Leroux As two talented biochemistry students and close friends, Laurent Bonomo and Gabriel Ferez had come to London to develop their skills as specialists in infectious disease and environmental engineering. Instead the two became the victims of an attack that, even by the standards of a city battling against the blight of knife crime, is among the most horrific in living memory. The bodies of...

Boris Johnson urged people to walk away if they see a crime committed rather than risk their own lives. The London mayor admitted he would tell his own children to "look after themselves" rather than play Good Samaritan to a victim. "Everybody is shocked by the level of violence we are seeing, particularly towards young people, and we must all work as hard as we can to reverse this dreadful trend."

Patients will be able to escape NHS queues by demanding treatment anywhere in the European Union without the prior approval of a doctor, under proposals to guarantee health rights unveiled today in Brussels. The NHS would then be duty bound to refund the British cost of the procedure under the new rules for cross-border healthcare. Today’s proposed EU directive will give patients in all 27 member states the same rights to treatment on the NHS as British patients. It also guarantees that the full cost of treatment abroad will be refunded when an NHS professional has agreed that it...

Changes in the way dentists are paid mean they effectively have no financial incentive to give appropriate treatment, the Commons Health Select Committee said. Under the new contract, dentists receive an agreed annual sum rather than being paid for each individual treatment. The committee found the number of dentists extracting a decaying tooth rather than carrying out a more complicated procedure had increased. As a result, the volume of more complex work like crowns, bridges and dentures has fallen by 57%. Evidence presented to the committee also suggested that patients were being pushed unnecessarily into the hospital system. A survey...

A spy camera, estimated to cost £10,000 and designed to catch fly-tippers, was cleared by council workers after it was concealed in a rubbish bag. The expensive camera was placed inside a black bag beside a notorious illegal fly-tipping site. The disguise was so good that workers for Chichester District Council, West Sussex, cleared the camera believing it was genuine rubbish. "Because the camera had been hidden in something that looked like rubbish, they cleared that away as well," said John Cherry, the deputy council...

A Royal Navy aircraft engineer claims to have seen a "glowing" UFO hover over the M5 motorway. Michael Madden, 25, said he watched in disbelief as the disc-shaped object floated above his head before it "zoomed off at incredible speed". He said the unidentified flying object flew for up to three minutes above junction 21 of the M5, near Weston-super-Mare, Somerset. Mr Madden was on his way back from Manchester with colleague Michael Casson, 22, at 9.50pm on Sunday June 29 when he saw the suspected 'extra-terrestrial' craft....

Hartlepool to break up France's toxic flagship Clemenceau Charles Bremner in Paris An asbestos-laden French aircraft carrier that was too toxic for Indian breakers' yards is to be towed to the UK for dismantling, it was announced yesterday. The agreement to send the Clemenceau, once the flagship of the French navy, to Able UK, near Hartlepool, ends an embarrassing five-year saga that saw the toxic vessel wander the high seas in a vain search for a final resting place. The stripped-down hulk, which once displaced 32,700 tons, has been moored off Brest since an odyssey that ended in 2006 when...

"When you're told that it will be impossible to have your partner's children, it feels like a bereavement. True, it's only the death of a fantasy – the fantasy that you and the love of your life might be able to produce a human being who's an endearing amalgamation of both your imperfections – but by the time you find out, you'll often have been trying for at least a year to make that fantasy flesh, and its loss feels substantial. So the decision to search for a sperm or egg donor is a difficult and emotional one from the...

It turns out that the U.S., whose Supreme Court last month ruled that non-American prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay may challenge their detention, isn't the only country where judges are hampering the war on terror... In June, a British court released the notorious Islamist preacher Abu Qatada, who had spent the previous three years in jail pending deportation to Jordan... Now ...the U.K. government is considering releasing an even more dangerous terrorist ...rather than deporting him to his native Algeria. The man known only as "U" (to protect his identity) was a close contact of Abu Qatada and allegedly was...

London (agencies) Agents of Robert Mugabe’s regime are harassing and intimidating Zimbabwean dissidents in Britain in an attempt to silence his political rivals and disrupt vital fundraising for Morgan Tsvangirai’s opposition Movement for Democratic Change. Mugabe’s feared security force, the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO), is waging a highly-organised campaign to terrify the 4,000 MDC members living in the UK. It involves surveillance, threats against family members in Zimbabwe, menacing late-night phone calls and bogus messages saying that fundraising activities are cancelled or disrupted. The existence of the campaign was confirmed last night by British security sources, who said the targeting...

Cameron hails by-election victory   Conservative leader David Cameron has hailed an "excellent result" in the Henley by-election, which saw Labour beaten into fifth place.Mr Cameron said his party's win showed people were starting to think of the Tories as an alternative government. But Gordon Brown - speaking a year after he became PM - said "by-elections come and by-elections go". Labour lost its deposit with just 1,066 votes - fewer than the BNP, Greens, Lib Dems and Tory victor John Howell. Mr Howell took the seat with 19,796 votes - a majority of 10,116 to the Lib Dem...

The baby they said would never be born         SO SPECIAL: Catherine Kent and Kevin Gray with baby Leona-Lee. Proud parents Kevin Gray and Catherine Kent cradle the daughter they were told would never be born. Three months into Catherine's pregnancy, doctors told the 27-year-old that her baby had died inside her. Turning down surgical treatment to remove the baby, she spent a month carrying what she believed was a dead child until a check-up at Sunderland Royal Hospital revealed a mistake had been made and her baby was alive. Six months after the devastating news,...

'Speak when you're spoken to!' The Queen sharply interrupted her. 'But if everybody obeyed that rule,' said Alice, who was always ready for a little argument, 'and if you only spoke when you were spoken to, and the other person always waited for you to begin, you see nobody would ever say anything, so that -- ' --Lewis CarrollBritish Justice. BrokenEver wonder where the American Justice system will wind up? How about the propensity of Judges to disregard legislation, make up law, tell elected officials how to run the nation? Apparently, they inhabit a make-believe world wherein they are kings....

The US has removed its nuclear weapons from Britain, ending a contentious presence spanning more than half a century, a report will say today. According to the study by the Federation of American Scientists, the last 110 American nuclear weapons on UK soil were withdrawn from RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk on the orders of President George Bush. The report's author, Hans Kristensen, one of the leading experts on Washington's nuclear arsenal, said the move had happened in the past few years, but had only come to light yesterday. He described the withdrawal of the B-61 "freefall", or "gravity", bombs as...

LONDON (Reuters) - The United States has quietly withdrawn its last nuclear weapons from Britain after more than half a century, a watchdog said on Thursday. Anti-nuclear campaigners welcomed the apparent end of an era, brought about by changes in warfare and world politics rather than their dogged protests over the decades. The Federation of American Scientists, which studies the U.S. nuclear arsenal, said in a report that Washington had removed its last atomic bombs from the British Royal Air Force base at Lakenheath, where they had been stationed since 1954. The withdrawal has not been announced officially, but was...

Rape by gangs of immigrants is an assertion of dominance, and in that sense it is a political act. It says, “We are in charge here, and we do as we please with non-Muslims. No one may stop us; we operate with impunity.” There’s been a lot of talk here recently about the increased incidence of rapes, many of them committed by Muslim immigrants, in both Europe and Australia. We’ve highlighted the situation in Sweden, Norway, and Britain. Now it’s time to look at Belgium as well. If the Belgium government fails to prove such assertions wrong, then immigrant-dominated areas...

Redating Caesar’s invasion of Britain TxSt astronomers come to bury long-accepted date, not to praise it Julius Caesar landed an invasion fleet on the shores of Britain in 55 B.C., expanding the boundaries of the so-called “Known World” and inadvertently sparking a dispute between historians and scientists for centuries to come. Now, astronomers from Texas State University have applied their unique brand of forensic astronomy to the enduring controversy surrounding the precise location of Caesar’s landfall, concluding that the historically accepted date for the event--Aug. 26-27, 55 B.C. – is incorrect. The Texas State team’s proposed new date of Aug....

Nuclear missiles could blow up 'like popcorn' By Duncan Gardham, Security Correspondent Last Updated: 8:59PM BST 25/06/2008 A design flaw in Britain's nuclear arsenal means that warheads could set off a chain reaction "like popcorn" if they were accidentally dropped, according to Ministry of Defence documents. More than 1,700 warheads are affected by the problem which would cause them to explode one after another, an effect known as "popcorning." A typical Trident nuclear missile contains three to six warheads, and some submarines carry up to 24 missiles, meaning the potential for disaster could be huge. Defence companies try to prevent...

Britain's Armed Forces 'stretched beyond their capabilities' by fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan By James Kirkup, Political Correspondent Last Updated: 10:12PM BST 24/06/2008 Britain's Armed Forces cannot go on running two major military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, the head of the Armed Forces has admitted. There are 4,000 British troops in Iraq and numbers in Afghanistan will soon exceed 8,000 The two wars have left the Forces "stretched beyond the capabilities we have," Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup said. It is the first time the most senior officer in the British military has expressed such grave doubts about...

Free parking for electric cars axed - for being too successfulDavid Williams, Motoring Editor 24.06.08   Charging time: owners of electric cars like this Nice Mega City will now have to pay to park in the City of London   A pioneering scheme that rewards owners of electric vehicles with free parking is being scrapped - because it works too well. Since 2001, the City of London has issued free roadside parking passes to nearly 500 drivers of the zero-emission cars in a bid to encourage other people to buy one. It has also handed out 539 permits for...