Police are pursuing me, says Sheridan

Tommy Sheridan, the former MSP, has said that his family are the victims of a police vendetta.

Mr Sheridan has accused Lothian and Borders Police of “harassment and intimidation” after his wife, Gail, was charged with the theft of miniature bottles and suspended from her job as an air hostess by British Airways.

Mr Sheridan was charged with perjury before Christmas after a police investigation, following his success in a defamation action against the News of the World. Mrs Sheridan, 44, was charged with perjury last week, and several people, including her father, have also been charged in connection with the court case.

Speaking at the weekend Mr Sheridan, 43, accused the police of wasting time and money. He said: “The police have, in my opinion, been conducting a vendetta. It seems to be the most one-sided inquiry in history.”

Phone switch scam criticised by Ofcom

Telephone companies that switch customers to their service without their knowledge could face fines, Ofcom has said.

The independent regulator is receiving about 500 complaints every month from customers who discover that they have been signed up to a new telephone service without their permission, in a practice known as slamming. The new service often has a higher tariff than the customer’s previous provider.

Under the practice, a telephone call is made to a potential customer, who may express an interest in switching companies. However, the transfer may then take place automatically because a signature or written consent is not needed to switch the provider.

Ofcom has threatened to fine companies that use the scam by up to 10 per cent of their annual turnover. It has also said that sales staff need to change their tactics.

Eight die in crashes

Eight people were killed and ten others injured in road accidents across southern England within a 30-hour period. The deaths included a triple fatality when a taxi driver with two passengers hit a car in Bedford. A 17-year-old man was killed in Hertfordshire when his car ran into a lorry, and a woman in her thirties was killed when her car hit a tree near Salisbury, Wiltshire, on Saturday.

Additives in medicine

Additives linked to hyperactivity are still used as ingredients in some children’s medicines, according to a report. The Food Commission found that 28 out of 70 medicines suitable for under12s contained one or more of the additives. Of those, 16 could be used by children under the age of 3. A spokeswoman for the commission said: “We urge medicine manufacturers to clean up their act.”

Disposable hotel

A disposable hotel is to be built in Shoreditch, East London, in the summer. The design of the M-hotel means that the prefabricated building can be moved or broken up into separate units after fulfilling its original purpose. Tim Pyne, the architect who designed the building, said: “There are lots of times that you have to put up people for three or four weeks, things like big sports events.”

More women check on husband’s fidelity

Women are increasingly employing private investigators to check on their husbands, a survey of divorce lawyers shows (Frances Gibb writes).

More than two in three lawyers surveyed last year had at least one client who had used a private investigator to find out if their spouse was being unfaithful. In two thirds of the cases it was women who were checking on husbands, according to the survey of 100 lawyers by Grant Thornton’s forensic and investigation services.

Andrea McLaren, head of the firm’s matrimonial practice, said: “Marriages are meant to be built on trust, yet this figure shows this is not always the case. While it might seem an extreme length to go to use a private investigator, people just want to know the truth, even if it hurts . . . this is not just about the rich and famous – this is about everyday people.”

Last year 29 per cent of marriages broke down because of unfaithfulness. In most cases it was the husband who strayed.

Councils told to cut contact with public

The public will find it harder to speak to someone at their local councils under new performance targets to boost efficiency, it emerged. Councils are to minimise the number of times they respond to a customer making a request or chasing up a query, the latest guidance from Whitehall will say.

The new bureaucratic systems, revealed in the 450-page draft manual obtained by the Conservatives, are designed to eliminate “unnecessary contact” and make it more difficult for the public “to chase” when they cannot get the answer they want. Town halls that exceed the magic number risk being penalised while those that have fewer contacts with the public will jump up performance tables and earn greater freedoms.

Eric Pickles, the Shadow Local Government Secretary, accused the Government yesterday of creating a faceless Britain with personal contact replaced by call centres wired to say “no”.

Incentives to tempt midwives to return

Incentives aimed at recruiting an extra 4,000 midwives to the NHS over the next three years will be announced today by Alan Johnson, the Health Secretary (Nigel Hawkes writes). They include a £3,000 “golden hello” to former midwives to encourage them to return, free training, childcare support, travel costs and a grant of up to £1,500.

Mr Johnson is expected to give details during a visit to the Royal Victoria Infirmary’s maternity unit, in Newcastle upon Tyne.

Dame Karlene Davis, general secretary of the Royal College of Midwives, welcomed the move. She said: “This is a significant step on the road to delivering on Maternity Matters, the Government’s blueprint for maternity services.”

The Conservatives accused Mr Johnson of “chasing headlines”.

There are the equivalent of 18,862 full-time midwives in England. In 2006 there were 635,748 births, compared with 572,826 in 2000.

Student charged over knife killing

An 18-year-old student has been charged with the murder of a youth in broad daylight. Sunday Essiet, 15, from southeast London, was stabbed in Plumstead last week. Myles Maddy, from Abbey Wood, is due to appear at Greenwich Magistrates’ Court today. Another man arrested in connection with the attack has been bailed until March.

No happy end for McDonald’s

Liverpool City Council plans to create a bylaw to ban McDonald’s “Happy Meals”. Councillors say that the company is contributing to child obesity by offering gifts to encourage purchases of junk food. The city was the first to propose a smoking ban.

70% of children admit bullying

More than seven out of ten children admit bullying their classmates, according to a survey by the charity Beatbullying. Some felt that they had to act before they were bullied themselves, while others were motivated by anger, the study of 3,000 children found.

Footing the bill costs £33,000

Women spend more than £33,000 on footwear over their lifetime, buying an average of eight new pairs of shoes a year, a survey by Olay, the beauty company, suggests. The poll of 1,500 women also revealed that the average woman owned 44 pairs of shoes.

Call to censor pro-anorexic groups

One of Britain’s largest eating disorder units has called on MySpace, Facebook and Bebo to take responsibility for pro-anorexia support groups on their websites (Hannah Fletcher writes).

Doctors at Cheadle Royal Hospital, Cheshire, highlighted the role played by social networking sites as part of a campaign against a growing pro-anorexic and bulimic presence on the internet. Dozens of groups such as Anorexia for Life and Club Bulimia on Facebook offer tips on how to lose weight and encourage members’ quests to be thin. Ty Glover, consultant psychiatrist at the hospital’s eating disorders unit, said: “Sites can censor their material and we expect them to act responsibly.”

The campaign is backed by the eating disorders charity Beat. The websites claim that while they will work with the campaigners, it is hard to distinguish between harmful groups and true support groups.

A spokesperson for MySpace said: “Rather than censor these groups, we are working with organisations like Beat. We have also placed ads from the National Eating Disorder Association to target these groups.”

Hammond ‘still on mend’ after crash

Richard Hammond, the Top Gear presenter, still suffers ill effects from the brain injury caused when his jet car crashed at 288mph in September 2006 (Alexi Mostrous writes).

Hammond, 38, is prone to memory losses, has emotional difficulties and has damaged the part of his brain that controls spatial awareness, he told a Sunday newspaper.

The presenter, who lives near Cheltenham with his wife, Amanda, and two daughters, returned to the BBC show in January 2007 after five weeks in hospital. He said: “I’m still on the mend.”