Author: xaurav

Queen unveils coalition programme

Peers await the Queen's Speech in 2008

David Cameron’s coalition government is due to outline what laws it wants to pass in the next year when the Queen’s Speech is delivered to Parliament.

Measures are set to include the repeal of ID cards, powers for parents to set up schools, reforms to policing and a referendum on the voting system.

The programme will reflect compromises reached by the Conservatives and Lib Dems when they agreed to share power.

The state opening of Parliament will feature its traditional pageantry.

It will be the 56th time that the Queen has opened a new session of Parliament during her reign.

However, it will be first time in 14 years that she has outlined a Conservative-led programme for government – albeit one that has been drawn up in partnership with the Liberal Democrats following their coalition agreement.

The Queen’s Speech, outlining the government’s legislative priorities for the year ahead, is expected to contain up to 21 bills and comes a day after the government revealed the details of plans to cut £6.2bn in spending this year.

Ministers have stressed that reducing the government’s huge deficit, while ensuring continued economic recovery, will be their priority over the lifetime of the Parliament.

Education focus

Details of likely bills appeared in a number of Sunday newspapers. Downing Street said it was "disappointed" by the apparent leak but will not hold an inquiry. It is likely that MPs will press for an explanation.

Flagship measures are likely to include plans to scrap ID cards and the next generation of biometric passports and a Great Repeal Bill – regulating the retention of DNA and the use of CCTV cameras among other measures. Ministers say this is needed to curb the excessive state intrusion of recent years and protect civil liberties.

Two education bills are expected to form the centrepiece of the programme, extending the academy school programme pioneered by Labour and giving parents and other groups the right to set up so-called "free schools" in the state sector.

Liberal Democrat proposals for a "pupil premium" to improve schooling for children from the most deprived backgrounds, which could see up to £2.5bn channelled into cutting class sizes, will be included in this.

One of the most complex and controversial bills is expected to cover parliamentary reform, a subject on which all parties agree action is needed after last year’s expenses scandal.

As well as giving the public the right to throw out corrupt MPs between elections, it will legislate for a referendum on changing how MPs are elected from the current first-past-the-post system to the Alternative Vote format.

Voting referendum

This was a central Liberal Democrat demand in their negotiations on forming a government.

Plans for fixed-term five-year Parliaments – including a controversial clause requiring 55% of MPs to vote to back the dissolution of Parliament – will also be announced and a review of options for reform of the House of Lords is expected.

Other expected proposals include elected officials to oversee local police forces, the restoration of the link between the state pension and earnings, a tax on bank profits, welfare reforms and a guarantee of a referendum on any treaty proposing more powers for the EU.

BBC political editor Nick Robinson said there was likely to be unease in both Conservative and Lib Dem ranks about aspects of the policy programme but Mr Cameron and his Lib Dem deputy Nick Clegg hoped the inclusion of flagship policies designed to appeal to their own side would quell any dissent.

After the Queen has officially opened Parliament, Mr Cameron will begin several days of debate in the Commons over the plans, which he has said will be underpinned by the goals of encouraging freedom, fairness and responsibility.

Acting Labour leader Harriet Harman will respond for the opposition in what will be their first clash across the despatch box.

The Queen’s Speech will be followed on Wednesday by the first Prime Minister’s Questions of the new parliamentary session and by the government’s emergency budget on 22 June.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Caution over abortion rate fall

Positive pregnancy test

The abortion rate has dropped for the second year running in England and Wales, statistics show.

But experts said it was still too early to say whether there was a downward trend.

The total number of abortions was 189,100 in 2009 – a rate of 17.5 per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44, according to the Department of Health figures.

This compares to 18.2 in 2008 and comes after a general upward trend for the past 40 years which peaked in 2007.

The abortion rate in Scotland also fell last year to 12.4 per 1,000.

Funding

Ann Furedi, of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, the largest abortion provider in the UK, said: "Abortion figures tend to fluctuate slightly year-on-year so we can’t call this a trend yet, especially with the background of the last few decades’ gradual rise."

And she added: "Unintended pregnancy and abortion will always be facts of life because women want to make sure the time is right for them to take on the important role of becoming a parent.

"Abortion statistics are reflective of women’s very serious consideration regarding that significant role within their current situation."

At the beginning of the 1970s the abortion rate was around the 8 per 1,000 figure, but after almost continuous year-on-year increases it rose to 18.6 two years ago.

Since then it has fallen, but experts remain cautious as in previous years there have been slight drops or a levelling off which have not been sustained in the long-term.

The figures also show that the proportion of abortions carried out before 10 weeks has risen, with many putting this down to the increase in funding which has improved access over the past decade.

The abortion rate was highest at 33 per 1,000 among women aged 19, 20 and 21, although that too has dropped since last year.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Live – French Open

Live video - French Open tennis

LIVE TEXT COMMENTARY (all times BST)To get involved, please useTwitter,606or text us your views & comments on 81111 (UK) or +44 7786200666 (worldwide). (Not all contributions can be used. Messages will be charged at your standard operator rate)
1010: TheDaily Mailappear to have learned more French than me. Yes indeed. Here’s how they describe yesterday’s drama on Court Suzanne Lenglen: "Andy Murray spent four hours and four minutes on Monday trying to haunt Richard Gasquet with that most felicitous French phrase: deja vu." TheDaily Telegraphsuggest that "perhaps next time Murray should just leave the locker room imagining that he is two sets down", whilethe Timescompares Murray to a tree: "The transformation of Murray from a teenage sapling with a tendency to wilt in the breeze to sturdy professional oak was further demonstrated… yesterday." Fair enough. And whilethe Sunfret about Murray "putting his fans through the wringer" when it’s not even Wimbledon yet,the Guardiancalls the match "the Battle of Wounded Knees" in which "Murray’s right ultimately proved to be in better shape than Gasquet’s left". More on Murray’s wonky knee later.

1004: And here is Justine Henin and she receives a rapturous reception on her long-awaited return to Roland Garros from the 23 people who have managed to show up on time at Court Philippe Chatrier.

1000: Ah bonjour to you. I’m already starting to fear I will run out of French words before week one is out. Oh, hang on, I already have. Tant pis! Anyway, top-drawer start to the day in Paris where we’ll see Justine Henin play her first match at Roland Garros since winning the title three years ago, while on Court 4, Britain’s last remaining female participant (in singles) Katie O’Brien is up against veteran American Jill Craybas.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Mark Easton

The Crown Prosecution Service’s attempts to convict primary-school children of rape have consistently failed. According to court statistics, they have tried six times in the last decade and six times the 10-or-11-year-olds in the dock have been acquitted of that charge.

Old BaileyYesterday, two more small boys were found not guilty – a divided Old Bailey jury instead convicted them of attempted rape. Their names have been placed on the sex offenders register, a status that is likely to have repercussions on the rest of their lives. They will be sentenced in eight weeks.

Chief Crown Prosecutor, Alison Saunders, stood outside the court yesterday afternoon to justify putting the boys and their eight-year-old victim through the ordeal of a full trial.

“The decision to prosecute was not taken lightly,” she insisted, reminding reporters that the CPS has a “duty to prosecute where there is sufficient evidence to do so and a prosecution is in the public interest”. This morning, however, some are questioning whether the public interest was served.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, columnist Philip Johnston asks whether there is “any other country in the world where the pre-pubescent fumblings of children would result in a rape trial?” He regards it as “astonishing” that the little boys were convicted “but even more amazing is that it even came to court at all”. It is a view echoed by other commentators today – see this round-up of responses.

Prosecutors in England and Wales are certainly under pressure to take more alleged rapists to court, particularly those accused of unlawful intercourse with a minor – statutory rape. Guidance states that “the public interest requires the prosecution of an offence of unlawful sexual intercourse with a girl under 13 unless exceptional circumstances exist”.

So were there “exceptional circumstances” in this case?

Some would argue that the fact the alleged perpetrators were only 10-years-old was just that. The law of statutory rape was clearly not devised to criminalise very young children whose first sexual encounters go too far.

Many rape statutes specify that statutory rape occurs when the complainant is under a certain age but also that the perpetrator is over a certain age. No such distinction applies in England and Wales.

In a speech last year, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer, reminded staff that “the Code for Crown Prosecutors makes clear that the interests of a youth must be considered” when deciding whether it is in the public interest to go ahead with the prosecution of a young child. He also said that prosecutors are obliged by law to “have regard to the welfare of any children appearing in court, whether as defendants or not”.

He pointed out that “England and Wales has one of the lowest ages of criminal responsibility in the world, much lower than in the majority of our European counterparts”.

Few other Western nations would even consider prosecuting a 10-year-old for any crime, never mind statutory rape.

“For example in the Scandinavian nations the age of criminal responsibility is 15, in Portugal and Spain it is 16, and in Belgium and Luxembourg it is 18,” Mr Starmer said. Having taken the decision to treat very young children as criminally responsible for their actions in Britain (the age of criminal responsibility in Scotland is currently eight), the youth prosecutor “makes important decisions regarding outcomes for very young offenders that are made by care and social services agencies in most European countries,” Mr Starmer told his audience.

The fact that the boys were accused of “statutory rape” raises further questions. The issue of consent from the eight-year-old girl did not apply in this case because the law assumes she is too young to give it. The jury did not need to consider whether this was a game of “doctors and nurses” that got out of hand, or even whether the girl had participated or encouraged the activities.

Their conclusion was simply that the boys tried and failed to have intercourse with her. With very young defendants there must be a question as to whether they can be expected to have an understanding of the complexities of the law in this area. It is one thing to “know right from wrong” but another to understand that the criminal justice system would regard touching private parts with a play-mate as potentially a matter which risks years in jail and a lifetime on the sex offenders register.

The CPS code reminds prosecutors that the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 states “it shall be the principal aim of the youth justice system to prevent offending by children and young persons”. The reason for taking children to court is primarily to stop them breaking the law in future, not simply for retribution or to punish misdemeanours in the past.

As the act makes clear, that preventive approach “provides a new guiding principle to which all agencies and individuals can relate their work and responsibilities”. So a further question for the CPS is whether prosecution in this case made it less likely that the two boys will re-offend.

“I don’t think anyone who has sat through this trial would think for a moment that the system that we employ is ideal,” the judge, Mr Justice Saunders, said. He was reflecting on the proceedings but his remark has been seized upon by those who think the case should never have come to court in the first place.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.