Should Justice Secretary Jack Straw press ahead with plans to build three massive “Titan” jails housing up to 2,500 inmates each?

An alliance of 34 criminal justice charities and associations have written an open letter to Straw urging him to scrap the plans, arguing they will do nothing to reduce crime or tackle “sky-high” reoffending rates.

Prisons Minster James Hanson says in a consultation document the supersized Titan prisons will “ensure that we can respond to the needs of different offenders whilst capturing the best of what we do and the economies of scale available to us.”

But Chief Inspector of Prisons Anne Owers disagrees, describing Titans as “flying in the face of our and others’ evidence that smaller prisons work better than large ones.”

“They may be more efficient, but at the cost of being less effective” she says in her latest annual report.

Many jails today have as few as 200 places, while the largest — Wandsworth in London — has 1,500.

It’s not only special interest groups who are complaining.

The Conservatives also say smaller is better — both in schools and in jails — and note that the planned 60 acre size for the Titan prisons means that each would cover an area twice the size of Wembley Stadium.

Life peer Lord Carter, who came up with the idea of the Titan jails, told me in an interview last year they are designed to achieve supermarket efficiencies, saying they would be the equivalent of five 500-place prisons but with “shared services, like the gate and the catering.”

However, it appears the Titans won’t eradicate the problem of inmates doubling up in cells — the government’s own consultation document talks about achieving their 2,500 prisoner target by “planned overcrowding” from their basic 2,100 inmate capacity.

People often don’t care what happens to prisoners as long as they are locked up.

But should the government ignore the advice of the criminal justice charities who say the plans will “cement this country’s position as the prison capital of western Europe”?

Should the brightest pupils be required to study extra science subjects?

The Confederation of British Industry wants the 250,000 pupils who get top marks in national science SAT exams at age 14 to be automatically opted in for a two-year “triple science” GCSE course covering physics, chemistry and biology.

The CBI says three-fifths of firms are having trouble recruiting science graduates and blame the problem on a long-term decline in science teaching at schools.

The number of specialist science teachers has halved over the past 20 years and only 7 percent of pupils currently take the triple science GCSE option — most take a double or single science course.

The CBI proposal would require a huge boost to science teaching — already promised by the government — but the industry body says its ambition could be reached by 2013.

Schools Minister Jim Knight maintains that increasing the number of science graduates is a top government priority but says opting-in the best pupils is not the answer.

What do you think should be done?

Teenagers love music and films - but today’s generation don’t expect to pay for them when they can download them for free over the Internet.

The entertainment industry says it is losing millions of pounds from online piracy but Internet service providers have been reluctant to police the activities of their customers.

Now six of Britain’s largest Internet providers have agreed a plan to tackle piracy, agreeing to send warning letters to those suspected of illegal file-sharing.

If the tactic doesn’t succeed, sanctions could be introduced such as disconnection for those warned three times, or filtering to prevent illegal tracks from being downloaded.

What do you think? Are the plans fair and workable? Do you expect to get a warning letter?

A simmering row between family doctors and the government has erupted after Health Minister Ben Bradshaw accused GPs of stifling competition by operating “gentlemen’s agreements” not to poach each others’ patients.

Laurence Buckman, chair of the British Medical Association’s GP Committee, told the BBC the claim was “absolute nonsense”, but then rather undermined his own argument by adding:

“Nor are we going to compete for patients, that is not the way general practice works.”

But that is precisely the way the government wants general practice in England to work in future. It wants to improve patient access to family doctors and believes offering the public a choice of GP surgeries will be a popular and vital element of its plan.

It has already arm-twisted doctors into agreeing to offer extra evening and weekend appointments and is building 150 polyclinics — now referred to as “GP-led health centres” — open early till late, seven days a week, where patients can get seen without needing to register.

“My view is you can compete and collaborate at the same time,” David Colin-Thorne, the government’s national clinical director for patient care, told a media briefing. “Patients need choice to drive up quality and for flexibility.”

Mayur Lakhani, a former chairman of the Royal College of General Practitioners, told the same briefing that his research into the medical experience of black and minority ethnic people had found they were afraid they would be struck off their surgery’s register if they complained about their GP.

When they did try to change to another practice, they were faced with a long list of questions asking why they wanted to move.

“That shows the big culture change we have to undertake. The receiving practice, instead of welcoming a change, were actually putting barriers up,” said Lakhani.

“I don’t think patients will change GPs and practices every six months, but I think the ability to do that is very important.”

Family doctors will come under greater scrutiny, with their surgery’s performance against quality standards and the views of local patients published on the NHS Choices website.

The government wants to sweep away the days of being stuck with an unsatisfactory GP practice. The question will be whether it can keep pumping in the resources — and keep doctors sufficiently on-side — to make sure there are enough GPs around for patient choice to become a reality.

Annual inflation has hit 3.3 percent, its highest level since the Bank of England was given control of interest rates 11 years ago.

But for many their personal inflation rate will be much higher, depending on where they live, and how much of their income is devoted to basics like food and energy costs.

How are rising prices affecting you - have you barely noticed any change, or are you seriously cutting back?

Former Sun editor Kelvin MacKenzie has scored the first own goal of the Haltemprice & Howden by-election, just hours after saying he was a likely candidate for the Humberside seat.

In off-camera comments broadcast by BBC television he described Hull as “an absolute shocker, it’s beyond shock, actually.”

Asked by the BBC to explain, MacKenzie dismissed his comments as a “joke” and said he had never actually been to the port city, whose western suburbs fall within the constituency’s boundaries

The by-election was triggered by former Conservative Shadow Home Secretary David Davis on Thursday, who will defend his 5,000 majority on the single issue of opposing government plans to extend pre-charge detention for terrorism suspects to 42 days.

With the Liberal Democrats and Labour likely to stay away from the contest, we can look forward to further foot-in-mouth moments from the outspoken MacKenzie — the Guardian has helpfully listed some of his memorable bon mots.

That is, as long as MacKenzie doesn’t announce that talk of his candidature was itself just a joke.

“Courageous” is how Conservative Leader David Cameron described the decision by his shadow home secretary, David Davis, to quit his parliamentary seat and force a by-election over the issue of pre-charge detention.

Davis says he will contest the seat to take a stand on the erosion of civil liberties caused by the proposal to extend to 42 days the time police can hold terrorism suspects without charge.

The opposition Liberal Democrats — who also oppose the extension — have already said they will not field a candidate, leaving the by-election a clear contest between Davis and a Labour opponent.

But the high risk move has already lost Davis his shadow cabinet post — he has been replaced by shadow attorney general Dominic Grieve — and could backfire if Labour is able to portray it as a split at the top of Cameron’s party.

Is Davis being courageous? Or just foolish?

Health Minister Ben Bradshaw has used unparliamentary language to describe a campaign by doctors against plans for a network of 150 supersized surgeries — or polyclinics — across England.

More than 1.2 million people signed a British Medical Association petition that called for the government to support existing GP practices and to stop encouraging the entry of large commercial companies into primary healthcare.

Bradshaw said the doctors’ campaign against polyclinics was “misleading and mendacious”, a charge rejected by the BMA.

“If I were to run a campaign making false claims that something terrible was about to happen, a lot of people would sign my petition too,” he said.

The government says polyclinics will make it easier for patients to access healthcare by offering longer opening hours than existing GP practices, as well providing health services currently only available in hospitals.

It says polyclinics will not be imposed where they are not wanted and will not lead to the closure of traditional GP practices.

But doctors say polyclincs, grouping together teams of family doctors and nurses, will break the traditional relationship between patients and their GP.

They say commercial companies bidding to run these super-surgeries may put the interests of shareholders before the needs of patients.

Who do you believe - doctors or the government?

The over-60s will be able to take a dip at their local council pool for free across England from next year under government plans announced on Friday.

The scheme is costing 140 million pounds over two years, although part of the money will also be available for lifting admission costs for children under-16 and for maintainance work on ageing facilities. A similar scheme is already operating in Wales.

It’s all part of the government’s plan to get 2 million people off their couches ahead of the opening of the Olympic Games in London in July 2012.

Critics say it’s too little too late as Britain heads for an obesity crisis, with the government struggling to meet its target of reducing the proportion of overweight and obese children to 2000 levels by 2020.

What do you think? Is free swimming a good idea? Or just another unnecessary burden on the taxpayer?

Should Britain follow the lead of other countries and hold an annual Armed Forces Day?

The recommendation comes in a report commissioned by Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

It says the public is growing dangerously divorced from the military because of falling awareness of what it does.

For example, RAF personnel were told not to wear their uniform in parts of Peterborough because of abuse from members of the public.

An annual day to celebrate the armed forces as well as veterans could include parades, and special events, with sports matches taking on a “military flavour”, the report, by Conservative MP Quentin Davies says.

And it would ideally be held on a Saturday at the end of June so that children and working adults could attend events.

A good idea? Or an anachronism we can do without? What do you think?