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Live – Stoke v West Brom
West Brom manager Roy Hodgson searches for his first victory in charge as his team travel to Stoke in the Premier League.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Christian couple lose foster case
Mr and Mrs Johns said they could not tell a child homosexuality was an acceptable lifestyle Related Stories
A decision to bar a Christian couple from fostering children because of their views on homosexuality has been backed at the High Court.
Eunice and Owen Johns, 62 and 65, of Derby, said the city council did not want them to become foster carers because of their traditional views.
The couple said they were “doomed not to be approved” because of their views.
The Pentecostal Christian couple had applied to Derby City Council to be respite carers.
The court heard the couple withdrew their application after a social worker expressed concerns when they said they could not tell a child a homosexual lifestyle was acceptable.
Lord Justice Munby and Mr Justice Beatson ruled that laws protecting people from discrimination because of their sexual orientation “should take precedence” over the right not to be discriminated against on religious grounds.
“All we were not willing to do was to tell a small child that the practice of homosexuality was a good thing”
Eunice Johns
The Johns are considering an appeal.
Derby City Council said previously its first duty was to the children in its care, some of whom were very vulnerable.
Speaking outside the court in London, Mrs Johns said: “All we wanted was to offer a loving home to a child in need. We have a good track record as foster parents.
“We have been excluded because we have moral opinions based on our faith and we feel sidelined because we are Christians with normal, mainstream, Christian views on sexual ethics.
“We are prepared to love and accept any child. All we were not willing to do was to tell a small child that the practice of homosexuality was a good thing.”
The couple cared for about 15 children in the 1990s.
Ben Summerskill, chief executive of Stonewall, the lesbian, gay and bisexual charity, said: “Thankfully, Mr and Mrs Johns’ out-dated views aren’t just out of step with the majority of people in modern Britain, but those of many Christians too.
“If you wish to be involved in the delivery of a public service, you should be prepared to provide it fairly to anyone.”
The Christian Legal Centre reacted to the ruling with dismay and warned that “fostering by Christians is now in doubt”.
The organisation said the judgment “sends out the clear message that orthodox Christian ethical beliefs are potentially harmful to children and that Christian parents with mainstream Christian views are not suitable to be considered as potential foster parents”.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
America’s last WWI veteran dies
Mr Buckles settled in the US state of West Virginia after the two world wars Related Stories
America’s last surviving veteran of World War I, Frank Buckles, has died aged 110.
Mr Buckles, who joined the US army in 1917, at the age of 16, lying about his age to get enlisted, died of natural causes at his home near Charles Town, West Virginia, on Sunday.
He was one of more than 4.7m Americans who signed up to fight in the Great War between 1917-18.
He served in England and France, as a driver and a warehouse clerk.
Mr Buckles was turned down by the marines and the navy for being too young to serve, but managed to convince an army recruiter he was 21.
“A knowledgeable old sergeant said if you want to get to France right away, go into the ambulance corps,” he said in a 2001 interview with the Library of Congress.
He sailed to Britain in December 1917 on board the ship which five years earlier had picked up survivors of the Titanic.
“During my stay in England, I drove a motorcycle sidecar, then Ford ambulances and cars. Perseverance paid off and I got assigned to follow an officer who had been left behind from his unit and I got to France,” he said.
Frank Buckles lied about his age to join the army. Mr Buckles rose to the rank of corporal but never got closer than 30 or so miles from the Western Front trenches. After the war he helped return prisoners to Germany – and became one himself during WWII.
In 1941, while working for a shipping company in the Philippines, he was captured by the Japanese, and spent more than three years in prison camps.
After the wars he settled in West Virginia with his family.
He remained committed to honouring the 100,000 Americans who had died in WWI and achieved fame as the last surviving link to that conflict in the United States.
In March 2008, Buckles was honored at a special ceremony at the Pentagon and the White House by president George W Bush.
In 2009 he travelled to Washington DC to lobby senators to rededicate a memorial on the national mall in honour of the Americans who had fought in the campaign.
The Frank Buckles World War I Memorial Act never became law.
There are only now two documented surviving veterans of The Great War, 109-year-old Claude Choules and 110-year-old Florence Green, both of whom are British.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Gaddafi: ‘All my people love me’
Col Gaddafi is trying to shore up support in and around the capital Libyan leader Col Muammar Gaddafi has told the BBC he is loved by all his people and has denied there have been any protests in Tripoli.
Col Gaddafi said that his people would die to protect him.
He laughed at the suggestion he would leave Libya and said he felt betrayed by leaders who had urged him to leave.
Earlier world governments condemned attacks on Libyan civilians, with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saying Col Gaddafi must “go now”.
The EU on Monday imposed sanctions including an arms embargo, asset freeze and travel ban on Col Gaddafi and his close entourage.
Col Gaddafi was speaking in an interview with the BBC’s Jeremy Bowen in Tripoli.
Col Gaddafi said the people who had come on to the streets were under the influence of drugs supplied by al-Qaeda.
He said those people had seized weapons and that his supporters were under orders not to shoot back.
Our correspondent says the colonel was relaxed as he talked in a restaurant overlooking the port in Tripoli, before departing at high speed in a motorcade of dozens of vehicles.
Col Gaddafi is facing a massive challenge to his 41-year rule, with protesters in control of towns in the east.
Unrest also continues in and around Tripoli, with reports of an anti-Gaddafi protest in a suburb of the capital as well as fighting in nearby Misrata and an attack by air force jets on ammunition dumps in the east of the country.
Foreign ministers who had gathered at a UN human rights conference in Geneva called earlier for Col Gaddafi to go.
Mrs Clinton accused Col Gaddafi and his followers of using “mercenaries and thugs” to attack unarmed civilians, and of executing soldiers who refused to turn their guns on fellow citizens.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
