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David Cameron has signed a deal with Scotland's First Minister, giving him the power to hold a referendum on independence. The Prime Minister and Alex Salmond met at the Scottish Government's headquarters to sign what has been called "The Edinburgh Agreement". It declares that the UK and Scottish governments will "work together to ensure that a referendum on Scottish independence can take place". The referendum will "deliver a fair test and a decisive expression of the views of people in Scotland", it adds, making clear that the result will be respected by all sides. The agreement is the launchpad for...

WH Smith has banned children from buying magazines about shooting – even though it is legal for them to own a gun.  Britain’s biggest newsagent has introduced an over-14s limit on all copies of country sports magazines following a campaign by animal rights activists.  The retailer, whose founding family owned a highly prized shoot in Buckinghamshire, will enforce the restriction on hobby magazines including Shooting Times, because it understood children are not allowed to obtain a firearms certificate until they are 14. However under the current law, there is no minimum age for applying for a shotgun certificate in the...

A former Scottish National Party leader will tell the party’s conference this week that Alex Salmond’s plans to legalize gay marriage are a step towards “state fascism”. Gordon Wilson will accuse SNP ministers of “intolerance” for pushing ahead with the change in the face of a public consultation that indicated overwhelming opposition.He will also warn those Nationalist MSPs who intend backing the move when it comes before the Scottish Parliament that voters will get their revenge by ousting them at the next election. …

Vince Cable has warned that Europe could be plunged into war if the crisis in the eurozone results in the collapse of the currency. The Liberal Democrat Business Secretary said that the potential consequences of the failure of the Euro were "incalculable" and that there was "no automatic guarantee" that the continent would not disintegrate into conflict. … Speaking at the Cheltenham Literary Festival, Mr. Cable said: "I think we need to take stock that if the eurozone were to unravel in a way that destroyed the European project—and there is a risk that could happen—the consequences would be absolutely...

Five Royal Marines have been charged with murder over the death of an injured Taliban fighter last year. Royal Military Police officers arrested the troops after video footage was found on a Marine’s laptop that allegedly showed members of 3 Commando Brigade discussing what to do with a wounded gunman caught inside a compound in Helmand. The images are said to have been discovered after one of the soldiers was arrested by civilian police who were investigating an unrelated crime in the UK.

Frail and vulnerable elderly people are being forced to rely on care in their homes from workers with convictions for theft and violence, an investigation has found.   Private care agencies, fulfilling contracts for councils across the country, have been employing convicted criminals to work in elderly people’s homes. In some cases, the criminals have been sent in without police checks or risk assessments being carried out, publicly available records show. One agency in Birmingham hired 23 people with criminal records, including assault and theft. Another in Sussex had five criminals on its books including a woman who was...

The world stopped getting warmer almost 16 years ago, according to new data released last week. The figures, which have triggered debate among climate scientists, reveal that from the beginning of 1997 until August 2012,there was no discernible rise in aggregate global temperatures. This means that the ‘plateau’ or ‘pause’ in global warming has now lasted for about the same time as the previous period when temperatures rose,1980 to 1996. Before that, temperatures had been stable or declining for about 40 years. The new data, compiled from more than 3,000 measuring points on land and sea, was issued quietly on...

One of Britain's most important Muslim leaders – who has a senior role in the NHS – is to be charged with 18 murders by a war crimes tribunal in his native Bangladesh... Chowdhury Mueen-Uddin, who is director of Muslim Spiritual Care Provision in the NHS and is also a chairman of the Multi-Faith Group for Healthcare Chaplaincy, is accused of abducting, torturing and killing 18 journalists, academics and doctors during the bloody war of independence in Bangladesh in 1971. ... Bangladesh's International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) – which has been set up to try the country's most notorious war criminals...

His Grace apologises for this post, but it is as unavoidable as the decline and fall of the Coalition. What two grown men or two grown women get up behind closed doors in the privacy of their own homes is not, of course, a matter for the Conservatively-inclined. But, thanks to the Government’s intention to legislate for same-sex marriage, it will, at some point very soon, be a very public matter for the courts to consider and the media to pore over in salacious detail. His Grace is merely prematurely jumping on a future bandwagon hereby foreseen and foretold with...

The chances of Britain leaving the EU rose dramatically last night after it emerged that one of David Cameron’s closest Cabinet allies believes it is time to tell Brussels bluntly: “We are ready to quit.” Education Secretary Michael Gove has told friends that, if there was a referendum today on whether the UK should cut its ties with Brussels, he would vote to leave. He wants Britain to give other EU nations an ultimatum: “Give us back our sovereignty or we will walk out.” …

Baroness Thatcher leaves her home in London on her 87th birthday with her son Sir Mark and his wife Sarah Photo: WARREN ALLOTT Baroness Thatcher marked yesterday's occasion by having lunch at Green's Restaurant and Oyster Bar in London's exclusive St James's district with her son Mark and his wife. Writing on Twitter, Mr Romney - the Republican challenger engaged in a close fight with Democrat Barack Obama for the White House in next month's election - said: ''The US is blessed with courageous friends. ''Happy birthday to the Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher - a tower of strength in...

Scientists are testing the idea that the stress of modern city life is a breeding ground for psychosis. In 1965, health authorities in Camberwell, a bustling quarter of London's southward sprawl, began an unusual tally. They started to keep case records for every person in the area who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, depression, bipolar disorder or any other psychiatric condition. Decades later, when psychiatrists looked... --snip-- Yet the results of his study, published last year in Nature (F. Lederbogen et al. Nature 474, 498–501; 2011), clearly showed that people who grow up in cities process negative emotions such as stress...

ABOVE: Jamaal Uddin was pictured putting up Sharia controlled zone stickers in Walthamstow. HARDCORE Islamists have vowed to ban booze and mixing between the sexes in new Sharia law enforcement zones across the UK. The move will see specific areas flooded with thousands of stickers saying "no gambling", "no music or concerts", "no porn or prostitution" and "no drugs or smoking". The posters declare: "You are entering a Sharia controlled zone - Islamic rules enforced." The radicals will kick off their controlled zones in the London borough of Waltham Forest later this month. They also claim their hardline rules will...

The traditional Tory blue outfit is immaculate and the famous ‘helmet hair’ – now platinum white – is perfectly coiffed. This is former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on her 87th birthday heading for a celebratory lunch yesterday with her son Mark and his wife Sarah. Baroness Thatcher – nicknamed The Iron Lady after she made a typically scathing speech about the Soviet Union – walked arm-in-arm with Mark as she left her home in London’s Belgravia.

The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland has granted an exemption for the advertising of cheeses There was grate news for Ireland’s cheesemakers who got their whey this morning when the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) confirmed that when it comes to advertising cheeses on television, it has decided to let it brie. Last March, the State’s broadcasting watchdog published a draft advertising code that proposed banning cheese advertising from children’s television because of its high fat content. “You gouda be kidding,” was the response from the general public and the dairy farming lobby who feared the ban might be a feta...

Keith Campbell, the scientist who helped pioneer the birth of Dolly the sheep, the world's first mammal cloned from fully developed adult cells, has died, according to The University of Nottingham. Campbell, 58, died on October 5, according to a university statement released Thursday. His funeral has been scheduled for October 24. The university did not say how he died. Campbell was part of a team at the Roslin Institute near Edinburgh, Scotland, that cloned Dolly in 1996. Her birth made headlines worldwide, capturing the scientific imagination of many while generating intense controversy over the ethics of cloning. While Campbell...

At age 11, Ghulam was married off to 40-year-old Jaiz in a rural Afghan village, making her only one of more than 10 million young girls who are being forced to wed men old enough to be their fathers or grandfather every year. In an effort to start a global conversation about the devastating effects of early marriages, which are currently practiced in more than 50 developing countries, the United Nations designated October 11 as International Day of the Girl Child this year. To mark the occasion and draw attention to the problem of child brides, photojournalist Stephanie Sinclair teamed...

'Where most people saw a crumbling, rust-stained hunk of concrete and steel, Paddy Roy Bates saw a kingdom. Bates, who has died aged 91, occupied an abandoned wartime fort in the North Sea and declared it the sovereign Principality of Sealand, with its own passports, flag, anthem and stamps — and himself as its monarch. What began as a swinging 60s attempt to set up a radio station became a micro-state that is still going strong more than 45 years later — although it has not been recognized by any government. "I might die young or I might die old,...

HMS Conqueror is famous, some would say notorious, for sinking the Argentinian cruiser General Belgrano. The nuclear-powered attack submarine, a type also known menacingly as a hunter-killer, that year became the first of her kind to fire in anger..... But the ship now in the crosswires was not the Belgrano. This was August, almost two months after the liberation of the Falklands, and on the other side of the world, in the Barents Sea, backyard of the mighty Soviet Northern Fleet..... This one was special: [the trawler] was pulling a device long coveted by the British and Americans, a two-mile...

Surviving war and time, a Canadian flyer that's roamed the skies for 70 years -- losing some heritage along the way -- is about to find a new home. But it would take top dollar to get the veteran back to the place it first protected. A rare Hawker Hurricane fighter aircraft that flew along Canada's East Coast during the Second World War -- possibly helping to protect convoys from German U-boats -- is going up for auction and bids could reach a lofty $2.6 million. Sholto Gilbertson, with the London, England-based Bonhams auctioneers, which is selling off the Hurricane...