Review of the Papers, Monday 08 May

Government

• Alex Salmond, almost certain to be elected Scotland's next First Minister, conceded last night that his failure to attract the Liberal Democrats into a ruling coalition meant that the country was now heading for minority devolved government for the first time. The Scottish National Party leader, speaking the day after the Lib Dems had comprehensively rejected a power-sharing coalition, said that the bulk of his party's preparations for taking power for the first time was now based on "the responsibilities of government as a minority". Mr Salmond, who led his party to an historic one-seat victory in last week's Scottish elections, said that minority rule was "not entirely a bad thing" and that, while his preference was still for a majority coalition, it could be "exciting" to govern without a majority. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article1760129.ece
• The official launch on Wednesday of a newly titled Ministry of Justice as part of the biggest reform of the Home Office in decades will mark the final Whitehall shake-up of the Blair premiership. Home Office officials have conjured up the phrase "a metaphorical transfer" to describe the event, since most of the 50,000 civil servants transferring from the Home Office to the new ministry will not in fact be moving in the short term. The current building occupied by the defunct Department for Constitutional Affairs is too small for the National Offender Management staff responsible for prisons and probation. Officials assert reform is nonetheless proceeding in an orderly fashion, with a slimmed down Home Office - down from 75,000 to 25,000 staff - anxious to bring a sharper focus to dealing with issues the department believes matter to the electorate: terrorism, crime-prevention and immigration. However, exactly how much the Home Office split will end up costing the taxpayer remains hidden in an internal Cabinet Office paper. The Home Office can provide only estimates. "The starting budgets of the [slimmed down] Home Office and the Ministry of Justice will be about £8bn-£9bn each," one official suggested. That is more than the Foreign Office's projected spending limit for 2007-08 of £2bn, but reasonably modest compared with the Ministry of Defence (£33bn), the Department of Health (£90bn) and the Department for Education and Skills (£57bn). http://www.ft.com/cms/s/c183584a-fd01-11db-9971-000b5df10621.html
• A package of measures to head off a summer prison overcrowding crisis, including abolishing the option of custody for shoplifting offences, has been vetoed by Tony Blair. The Prime Minister has turned down a series of proposals from Lord Falconer of Thoroton, the Lord Chancellor, who will head the new Ministry of Justice, for reducing the use of custody for low-level offences. Lord Falconer also suggested shorter sentences for nonviolent offences, restricting the use of suspended sentences that tend automatically to lead to prison after reoffending, and ending the prison option for shoplifting where the value stolen is less than £200. Ministerial sources say that Mr Blair, who will leave office in two months, is adamant that part of his legacy will not be a relaxation of sentencing policy. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article1760330.ece
• Delays of up to four months in dealing with tax correspondence from the public are being caused by the introduction of "efficiency" measures, it was claimed yesterday. Up to 1.5 million items of mail are affected by the backlogs at tax offices, according to the Public and Commercial Services Union, which said some store rooms were "packed with mail". The union said the problems stemmed from the introduction last year of new working practices by HM Revenue and Customs, which had left staff struggling to deal with the huge volume of incoming mail. The fears are that the problem will grow as the efficiency drive continues. HMRC has a government target to cut its workforce by 12,500 by March 2008, and plans further cuts to meet 2011 spending targets. It is also committed to relocating 1,950 jobs out of London and the South-East by 2008. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/05/08/ntax08.xml
• Britain's biggest train company is facing an investigation into claims that it is abusing its monopoly on key routes by imposing the highest fare increases since privatisation. South West Trains (SWT) is raising morning off-peak fares by 20 per cent from May 20 on services into Waterloo. The increase will affect thousands of people who work flexible hours and wait until after the peak to take advantage of cheaper tickets. The company claims that the increases are necessary to reduce overcrowding on trains arriving in London before noon. But passenger groups believe the real reason for the rises is that the company wants to raise its profits from passengers who would find it difficult to travel later. http://travel.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life-and-style/travel/article1760055.ece
• Schools with large numbers of white pupils may be taken over or closed if they fail to promote race relations and links between different religious groups, according to Government guidance. Those in rural areas or leafy suburbs should be twinned with ethnically mixed schools in the inner city, it suggests. Christian faith schools should strike up partnerships with Muslim and Jewish institutions, while other community schools should organise more trips to churches, mosques and synagogues. In a move designed to stop children drifting toward extremism, all schools will have a legal duty from September to break down barriers and promote "community cohesion". http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/05/08/nschools08.xml
• A council has recommended that its parking attendants hand out at least 840 tickets and 36 clampings a day. The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London said the private firm that runs its parking enforcement, National Car Parks (NCP), should issue at least 306,000 tickets and clamp 15,000 vehicles a year. To beat their targets attendants will need to slap tickets on about 100 cars for every hour that the restrictions are in force - more than one ticket every minute. The revelation has prompted an investigation by the British Parking Association (BPA) and drawn criticism from the RAC Foundation. The BPA has produced a model parking enforcement contract for councils but cannot insist they use it. It urges councils to measure the efficiency of their parking companies using indicators such as how many tickets are subject to appeal rather than how many are issued. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/05/08/nwarden08.xml
• The Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) is wasting millions of pounds on lavish offices at some of the best addresses in London. A damning report by the watchdog on public spending reveals that £40 million a year of taxpayers' money is being spent to house its 5,000 staff. Half the offices in London are in the expensive postcodes SW1 and W1. One office for six people costs £180,000 a year. Most offices outside London are too big. The Commons Committee of Public Accounts (PAC) adds that different bodies could share facilities, but there is no sign of joined-up government. The DCMS - headed by Tessa Jowell, the Culture Secretary - and 24 sponsored bodies occupy 95 offices in England. They include the UK Film Council, the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, the National Lottery Commission and the Football Licensing Authority. The rent comes to more than £20 million a year, plus service charges and security. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article1760231.ece