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News in Brief
The new Minister for Women and Equality is the most junior member of Tony Blair’s Government and will not be paid for her role, it emerged yesterday.
Meg Munn, 45, the MP for Sheffield Heeley, was appointed to her post after the Prime Minister completed his reshuffle of junior ministers last week and was the subject of a separate announcement a day later than her colleagues.
She will carry out her duties on a backbencher’s salary of £59,095, compared with the pay of a Parliamentary Under Secretary, the most junior minister, of £88,586, as Mr Blair had already reached the limit of the number of ministers entitled to a salary, although Downing Street denied that he had forgotten about the post.
She succeeds Jacqui Smith, the previous Deputy Minister for Women, who held the rank of Minister of State.
Climate warning
Britain’s policies on climate change are not working well enough, according to the vice-president of the Royal Society. The Government was still overestimating how much the country could cut carbon dioxide emissions without changes in its present policy, Sir David Wallace said.
Ben Nevis death
A woman slipped and fell 500ft to her death while walking on Ben Nevis on Saturday. The body of Amy Rudge, 29, of Shawlands, Glasgow, who was with a male companion, was recovered by Lochaber Mountain Rescue team from the base of a cliff face in the Aonach Beag area.
No entry
The heart of Edinburgh has been made vehicle-free from today. All traffic will be diverted from the westbound side of Princes Street between 7am and 8pm daily. Eastbound general traffic was removed from the main thoroughfare in 1996. The scheme affects nearly 40 streets.
Happy New Year
More than 80,000 people attended the Baishakhi Mela festival in Brick Lane, East London, to celebrate the Bangla New Year. The event is the largest Bengali celebration outside Bangladesh and promotes everything that “Banglatown” has to offer.
Memory errors cost elderly
People aged over 60 are ten times more likely than young adults to make memory errors that leave them vulnerable to scams. A test devised by psychologists at Washington University in St Louis found that older people have a greater tendency to agree with suggestions that they ought to know are false but which they misremember as true.
Con artists “prime” a target by alluding to something that has happened, but changing details such as price. Older people, the research suggests in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, are less likely to remember the deal correctly.
Rare bird vigil
A pair of black-winged stilts, relatives of the avocet, are thought to be about to breed on marshes near to the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust centre at Slimbridge, Gloucestershire, which will provide 24-hour protection. Should the birds succeed they will become only the third pair to raise young in Britain.
Train doors ruling
The Health and Safety Executive will allow heritage railway companies such as the Venice Simplon Orient Express to continue to use Mark 1 slam-door trains without central door locking, but says that those concerned must take all possible steps to make their rolling stock as safe as possible.
Mud pair rescued
Two men were rescued after becoming trapped in mudflats. The two 25-year-olds got into difficulty in Lower Heswall, Merseyside. One man had sunk up to his knees, while the other was submerged to his neck before firefighters pulled them clear using lines and ladders. Both men were treated for shock.
Life on the wave
A collection of posters from the prewar golden age of ocean travel sold for £77,042 at Christie’s in
Police protest on lost patrols
The leader of Britain’s 110,000 police constables sent an open letter to Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, to complain about the increasingly reduced role of beat officers.
Bob Elder, chairman of the Police Federation’s constables’ central committee, said that “a confusing array” of people, such as Police Community Support Officers and the Highways Agency, had taken many duties that once belonged to beat officers.
G8 summit benefit questioned
The Scottish Executive should be clearer about what benefits the G8 summit at Gleneagles, Perthshire, will bring to the Scottish economy, a Holyrood committee said yesterday.
Ministers should also sympathetically consider helping local authorities and other public bodies to meet the extra costs of hosting the event from July 6-8, it said.
The recommendations are contained in a report by the Scottish Parliament’s European and External Relations Committee.
The Executive responded that it expected the G8 summit to generate about £1 billion for the Scottish economy and said that it would consider more funding for councils to foot the G8 bill.
The Holyrood committee also backed the right to “peaceful demonstration” of the thousands of protesters expected to converge.
Missing camper
The search has been called off for a man who tried to swim to safety from an island off
Parasite warning
Picnickers are being warned not to take ticks home with them when they venture into the countryside. Ticks carry Lyme disease, caught by 250-300 people every year. The advice is to cover legs and feet, tuck trousers into socks, wear insect-repellent and check skin and that of pet dogs after a day out.
Digging for riches
Diggerland in Strood, Kent, is opening a theme park in Dubai. Visitors will be able to use JCBs and dumper trucks to build giant sand castles in the desert. A spokesman said: “At the Diggerland in Dubai there will be nearly 100 machines and more than 50 staff to supervise all of the diggers and dumpers.”
Body in Lough
A man’s body was pulled from Carlingford Lough, near Warrenpoint, Co Down, after he had jumped in while attempting to escape from police officers who had stopped his car. It had been reported by a taxi driver to be speeding. An investigation has begun into the death of the man, who was in his 40s.
Shot in stomach
A 47-year-old man who tried to stop two failed robbers was fighting for his life after being shot in the stomach. The victim was in the Britannia pub in Bow Common Lane, East London, when the men, who were carrying a firearm, burst in and demanded money from the landlord. The man was shot as he gave chase.
Democracy car
A BMW car signed by Nelson Mandela is to be auctioned for charity. The car maker has donated the 318i model, one of ten special “democracy cars” built to mark the tenth anniversary of the first democratic elections in South Africa. The car will be auctioned in London next month at Madame Tussauds.
Mother’s instinct
Sharon Stone, the actress, told of her joy at adopting her new baby son, Laird Vonne Stone, and declared: “Single women can do it all.” The 47-year-old divorcée already has a 4-year-old adopted son, Roan. Stone was in
Edinburgh murder
An attack on a man aged 25 in Piershill Square West, Edinburgh, is being treated as murder. The man, whose details were not given until his family has been informed, was taken to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary but died soon after admission. It is believed that several people were involved in the attack.
