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Tuesday, June 1, 2004 |
Major insurance companies are denying home insurance or refusing claims to households where somebody has a criminal conviction, according to a new study.
Five out of six leading companies approached by a researcher posing as an ex-offender - with a conviction for assault rather than fraud or theft - refused him building or contents cover because of his criminal record. Direct Line and Lombard Direct said they could not offer cover until 10 years after the conviction; Egg and Churchill would only offer cover after five years; and Eagle Star said it would not offer cover under any circumstances.
Guardian
9:37:34 AM 
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A new authority made up of the merged Prison and Probation Services officially goes live today.
The creation of the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) is part of a Government strategy to cut prisoner numbers and reduce re-offending.
Home Secretary David Blunkett announced the merger earlier this year as part of a wider package of reforms.
Scotsman
9:37:05 AM
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The world-renowned Forensic Science Service could be controlled by venture capitalists in a controversial partial privatisation that could fetch close to £100 million.
The news will spread panic among trade unions, police and backbench MPs who fear that the service, which provides the police with forensic experts at crime scenes, will increase the price it charges the constabularies.
Observer
9:36:37 AM
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Residents living in some of Manchester's gun crime hotspots are getting first aid training to use at the scenes of shootings.
Red Cross officials are due to give lessons on basic first aid in Moss Side and Hulme on Tuesday.
The aim is to give them the skills to treat gun victims in the vital few minutes before emergency crews arrive.
BBC
9:36:01 AM
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A team dedicated to reducing youth crime is celebrating being named as the best in the country.
West Berkshire Youth Offending Team (YOT) has been ranked top of the nationwide performance tables for the first four months of 2004.
The team is staffed by around 40 workers and volunteers.
BBCA team dedicated to reducing youth crime is celebrating being named as the best in the country.
West Berkshire Youth Offending Team (YOT) has been ranked top of the nationwide performance tables for the first four months of 2004.
The team is staffed by around 40 workers and volunteers.
BBC
9:35:25 AM
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Babies in prison mother-and-baby units are being taken from their mothers well before the age of one year as a matter of policy, without any research to back it up.
The Prison Service policy of separating "sooner rather than later" has come under the spotlight through a court battle by a reformed drug addict to keep her daughter with her for as long as possible.
Claire Frost, whose story is told on BBC2 tonight, launched her legal battle when the authorities decided to send her baby, Lia-Jade, away at nine months to be cared for by Ms Frost's parents. Several other women have taken similar cases to court, but their identities have been protected.
Guardian
9:34:38 AM
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Prison officers set inmates from different social backgrounds against one another in an effort to maintain control of overcrowded jails, penal reform campaigners claimed today.
Inmates from different ethnic or religious backgrounds, or even supporters of rival football clubs, are placed together in cells to "divide and rule" the prison population, said Frances Crook, director of the Howard League for Penal Reform.
Guardian
9:34:02 AM
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"Having problems with crack cocaine?" asks a leaflet pinned on the packed advice noticeboard at the Barton community centre in the middle of one of Oxford's satellite council estates.
Upstairs in the bar the home secretary, David Blunkett, is making clear to a packed local audience that the pressure on Britain's prisons will carry on growing until the "people who are behaving abominably" get the message that they will be dealt with toughly.
But it quickly becomes apparent that the invited audience, which includes police and probation officers, crime reduction managers, neighbourhood watch people and local residents, are not afraid to criticise or put forward their own ideas.
Guardian
9:33:29 AM
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An unprecedented number of female prisoners have killed themselves over the last two months, prompting fears of a suicide "epidemic" in women's jails.
New Prison Service figures reveal that a total of six female inmates have taken their lives since 1 April. That compares to a total of 14 prisoners who killed themselves throughout the whole of last year - itself a record for women suicides in jails.
Independent
9:32:47 AM
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People aged 18 to 20 convicted of a social offence have a 72 per cent chance of reoffending. But pilot community schemes may help them go straight.
Independent
9:31:10 AM
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Civil liberty campaigners said last night they would raise no fundamental objections to plans to introduce compulsory lie detector tests and satellite tracking of sex offenders in Britain.
Guardian
9:30:31 AM
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"Neighbours from hell" who are evicted from their council homes will have to agree to take compulsory rehabilitation programmes to get rehoused under new government plans.
The home secretary, David Blunkett, has acknowledged the criticism that evicting anti- social families and simply rehousing them means that someone else gets the nuisance neighbour.
He wants to use little-known powers in the new anti-social behaviour legislation to ensure that they take part in a rehabilitation programme when they are rehoused.
Guardian
9:27:33 AM
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Barristers vowed last night to continue their boycott of a new criminal legal aid payment scheme, an act of defiance which may force judges to release defendants accused of some of the most serious murders and terrorist offences.
Guardian
9:26:54 AM
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© Copyright 2005 Nick Page.
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Updated: 17/8/05; 12:52:34.
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