UK News

What should we do with MPs’ expenses?

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has apologised for using House of Commons expenses to claim the cost of two adult movies, watched by her husband while Smith was away from their family home.

The embarrassing incident is the latest in a series of rows over MPs’ expenses. Smith is already under investigation after claiming 116,000 pounds to pay for accommodation in London when she was living with her sister, while Works Minister Tony McNulty is under scrutiny after claiming 60,000 pounds for a house in Harrow, where his parents live, that is just 11 miles from the Commons.

Many people are also unhappy at the number of MPs employing family members at the taxpayers’ expense. The Committee on Standards in Public Life has announced that it will carry out a review of the whole system of expenses, but does not plan to report until after the next general election.

What reform do you think should be made to MPs’ pay and expenses? Is the current system acceptable? Should we raise their salary of 63,291 pounds a year and scrap the expenses system completely? Or should we just keep this sort of information private and let them get on with running the country?

How safe is your street?

Ever wanted to know how many crimes were committed in your local area?

Well, by the end of the year you’ll be able to get some idea with every police force required to produce online interactive “crime maps”.

West Midlands and West Yorkshire are two of the forces who have put information about the number of offences in different neighbourhoods on their Web sites and on Wednesday the country’s biggest force, London’s Metropolitan Police, activated its crime mapping site.

The government believes that the maps will help alleviate public perceptions about crime, revealing that the number of actual offences is far lower than many people fear.

“By rolling out up-to-date, interactive crime maps, we can better inform people about crime problems in their area, and enable them to have much more of a say in what their local police focus on,” said Home Secretary Jacqui Smith last month.

“The latest annual crime figures showed another drop in crime nationwide but it’s important that people understand what this means to them in their local area and where challenges remain.”

New London Mayor Boris Johnson, who made providing the maps a key manifesto commitment, said it gave people the chance to see how their local police were performing.

A policeman’s lot

A policeman’s lot is not a happy one, sing the officers in Gilbert and Sullivan’s “The Pirates of Penzance”.

Judging from views expressed by many delegates who gathered in Bournemouth for the Police Federation’s annual conference, it is a refrain that is appropriate for Britain’s bobbies today.

From anger over pay and talk of possible strikes, to underlying resentment about the growth in the number of community support officers, rank and file police are far from content.

“The sergeants of England and Wales are not happy,” said Paul McKeever, chairman of the Federation’s sergeant committee, as he began his speech before delivering a damning verdict of Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s government.

Brown was a “Mr Bean” figure he said, borrowing the scathing reference from Lib Dem MP Vince Cable, a “bean counter” who had broken the trust between government and police officers over the decision not to backdate a pay rise recommended by an independent panel as expected.

“How feckless, how incompetent and how very imprudent Gordon Brown must have been to get us into this dreadful state, McKeever went on, before reminding his colleagues that Brown has registered the fastest fall in popularity of any British Prime Minister.

It was hardly surprising that Home Secretary Jacqui Smith bore the brunt of the resentment over pay when she faced the delegates. A brave decision, said Jan Berry, the Federation’s chairman, but not one that spared her from ridicule or mockery.

On the rack in Bournemouth

Jacqui Smith has probably faced some unwelcoming audiences in her time as Home Secretary but it is unlikely she has faced one as tough as the 1,000 angry police officers she encountered on Wednesday.

Smith knew she was in for a grilling when she spoke to delegates at the Police Federation conference, furious that a pay rise, recommended by an independent panel, had not been honoured in full.

Only the day before, it was announced that police had voted in favour of seeking the right to strike and so she understandably looked apprehensive as officers filed into the vast conference centre in Bournemouth.

And barely had Jan Berry, the Federation’s outgoing chairman, begun her speech than the audience was putting the boot in.

Berry said she had seen a lot during her five years as chairman, including two Prime Ministers “and counting” and four Home Secretaries. “And counting” came a cry, to laughter from the delegates and a resigned smile from Smith.

It got worse. Berry said she admired Smith’s courage in coming to face the inquisition.

“I am sure when your Private Secretary reminded you of today’s event you felt like reaching for the nearest stab proof vest,” she said, in a mocking reference to recent pictures of Labour’s deputy leader Harriet Harman out in her constituency.

Should police turn the tables on the yobs?

The problem of yobs causing misery for their neighbours and local communities is a daily reality for many people.

Be it from gangs of drunken teenagers to more serious cases of vandalism, assaults or even murder, stories of problems involving young louts are rarely out of the newspapers.

However, coming up with an effective plan to deal with the troublemakers has proved difficult for politicians, police and local officials.

Anti-social behaviour orders (ASBOs) have probably been the best-known antidote the authorities have used. But experts say these have their limits and some serial offenders just view them as a “badge of honour”.

The latest initiative to get the backing of the government is a scheme to turn the tables on the yobs with the police hounding them to make their lives uncomfortable.

Residents in Essex, where the Operation Leopard idea was first introduced, say it was a great success.

But it is likely to alarm some civil rights groups, who have expressed concern about the use of ASBOs.

Thursday’s front pages: anti-social behaviour

The latest initiative to tackle anti-social behaviour and an apparent loophole in airport security feature prominently on Thursday’s front pages, along with the Chelsea gun siege and the Austrian house of horrors.

The Guardian says Home Secretary Jacqui Smith  wants police to harass anti-social youths and make life as unpleasant for them as they do for their victims. Young thugs should be hounded and filmed.  Story here

The Daily Telegraph is among several newspapers to pick up a BBC 2 “Newsnight” expose that foreign employees working in sensitive airport locations are not having their criminal records checked because of the time and effort that would involve. Story here 

The Daily Mail features a picture of the wife of the Chelsea siege gunman looking on in horror during the standoff and runs the story under the headline: “I Love My Wife Dearly” — the message the paper says he threw out of a window before his death. Story here

A report that suggests Britain wastes around 10 billion pounds worth of food a year is the subject of The Independent front page. The paper says most of the waste is made up of entirely untouched food products. Story here

The Sun splashes what it says is the last picture of Elisabeth Fritzl before she was imprisoned for 24 years in a cellar by her father. Story here, while the Daily Mirror leads on the father’s insistence that he is not a monster because at least he did not kill his daughter and the children he fathered with her. Story here

The Times carries allegations from an Iraqi cleaner and two cooks that a culture of sexual harassment, abuse and bullying exists at the British embassy in Baghdad. Story here