Review of the Papers, Thursday 22 February

Government

• Britain's scientific research budget is to be cut by almost £100 million to pay for overspending by the Department of Trade and Industry. Despite repeated claims by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown that science is the key to the country's economic future, ministers have diverted £98 million from planned spending to cover the collapse of Rover and other unexpected costs at the DTI. The cuts will affect medical research, which must find £10.7 million in savings, as well as the funding body that supports global warming research, which will be £9.7 million poorer. Both areas are considered priorities by the Government. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article1421323.ece
• O2 Airwave, the £2 billion emergency services radio business that is up for sale, is facing a multimillion-pound government fine after delays on a key contract. The business has received a formal warning about a penalty for missing a deadline on a £350 million contract to provide a new radio system to the fire and rescue service. The warning, from the Department of Communities and Local Government, comes as Telefonica, O2's owner, is seeking approval from the Government to sell Airwave. Because of the sensitivity of the business, which supplies a secure radio system to the national emergency services, the Government has been given a draft of the sale prospectus before it is sent out to potential bidders. However, the Government is highly unlikely to veto the plans. http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry-sectors/telecoms/article1421114.ece
• Hundreds of killers and rapists may have escaped justice because of blunders by the government-owned forensic science laboratory that were uncovered by senior police officers reviewing the unsolved murder of Rachel Nickell on Wimbledon Common. Over a five-year period, the Forensic Science Service (FSS) failed to detect tiny samples of DNA in 2,500 cases involving murders, rapes and serious assaults. Senior officers believe that in many of those cases DNA samples could have been found and matched to suspects, had the FSS used different techniques that were being used by other privately run laboratories. http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,,2018512,00.html
• Gordon Brown has bailed out his cabinet colleague David Miliband with more than £300m of taxpayers' money to pay for the Whitehall computer fiasco last year, which left thousands of farmers without cash subsidies from the European community, it has emerged. The payment was slipped out on Tuesday from the Treasury's contingency fund, which is normally used to cover unforeseen disasters and top up spending on the Iraq war and security. The failure of the computer system, classed as a high-risk project by the Treasury, meant it was unable to cope with a new EU single payment system which should have distributed £1.5bn to farmers last spring. Instead, farmers were left to wait up to six months for payments, missing a deadline for the government to claim the money back from the EU. http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianpolitics/story/0,,2018603,00.html

• Struggling councils risk being left behind as top performers continue to improve at a greater rate, a government watchdog warned today. While overall local authority standards in England are improving, the Audit Commission warned that lower-performing councils would need to "accelerate the pace of improvement" to prevent the gap between high and low performance widening further over time. http://society.guardian.co.uk/localgovt/story/0,,2018059,00.html
• Thousands of health care therapists will face a system of profession standards and regulation for the first time, under plans unveiled by the Government yesterday. Psychologists, counsellors and psychotherapists will have to reach fixed standards of proficiency and could be struck-off in the same way as doctors if complaints are unpheld by independent adjudicators. Ministers have proposed that responsibility for regulating the "talking therapy professions" will go to the Health Professions Council (HPC), a body which protects the public from rogue practitioners. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/22/ntherapy22.xml

• The number of Britons choosing to marry has fallen to the lowest levels in a hundred and eleven years. David Cameron will outline a series of plans designed to encourage couples to marry and then stay together. The Conservative party is considering proposals for premarital counselling and relationship classes. Less than 5 per cent of cohabiting couples stay together for longer than ten years. The Conservative leader will visit Manchester today to look at a project offering strong male role models for children from broken homes. http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life-and-style/women/article1421313.ece