Review of the Papers, Thursday 05 July

Government

• A survey of British business has delivered a damning verdict on the Government's environmental policies. The study, carried out by PricewaterhouseCoopers, concludes that "current economic policy instruments to reduce the environmental impact of industry are not encouraging sufficient behavioural change". Some 71 per cent of respondents said that climate change and environmental issues were affecting the way they conduct business. However, almost half said that Government policy and economic instruments - taxes, duties, the climate-change levy and investment allowances - are "not effective" in encouraging business to "significantly" change its behaviour. Of all the measures at the state's disposal, regulation is seen by business as the most effective, with taxes ranked next and emissions-trading schemes least favoured (though more liked by those involved in them). The draft Climate Change Bill published in March proposed a legally binding target of a 60 per cent reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050, and a 26-to-32 per cent cut by 2020. http://news.independent.co.uk/business/news/article2737149.ece
• Voters will be given powers to decide how ten of millions of pounds should be spent in their neighbourhood under radical plans being unveiled today. In a potentially dramatic extension of direct democracy, councils will have to hold ballots before deciding where money should be targeted. It would mean that, for the first time, people could direct cash to areas that concern them most, such as parks, curbing antisocial behaviour, targeting drug trouble spots or cleaning up litter. http://politics.guardian.co.uk/homeaffairs/story/0,,2118822,00.html
• The Child Support Agency has been condemned by MPs as "one of the greatest public administration disasters of all time". A report, ostensibly charting reforms undertaken in 2003, has calculated that attempts to improve the CSA will have cost more than £850 million by the time the ailing operation is scrapped. The Public Accounts Committee said that parents with caring responsibilities could be losing £520 a year in maintenance payments because of the agency's many failures. Edward Leigh, chairman of the committee, said that it was by no means clear that the new Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission (CMEC), which will replace the CSA from 2008 onwards, would win parents' confidence. The committee of MPs recommends that the Treasury considers giving the CMEC extra powers to look at individual tax records to determine absent parents' income, and use the tax system to collect arrears if they refused to cooperate, as happens in Australia. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life-and-style/health/child-health/article2028687.ece
• An urgent review of recruitment checks on overseas staff working in the NHS is to be launched by the new counter-terrorism minister Admiral Sir Alan West, Gordon Brown announced yesterday, in the wake of the revelations that all eight suspects in the London and Glasgow terror bombings worked in the health service. News of the review, unveiled at Mr Brown's first prime minister's questions, caught the Home Office and the Department of Health off guard, suggesting it was a last-minute decision. http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,2119000,00.html
• Alan Johnson, the health secretary, yesterday announced a thorough review of the NHS, with an admission that the government was responsible for the battered morale evident among its 1.3 million staff. Sir Ara Darzi, a world-renowned surgeon, who became a health minister in last week's reshuffle, will be conducting the 11-month reappraisal, looking at how doctors, nurses and other healthcare staff can regain ownership of NHS reform. Mr Johnson said the government had to accept blame for the low morale in the workforce. "The reality on the ground is that there is a gloomy mood. There has been an awful lot of change in a short period. Staff feel overwhelmed by it. They feel it all flowed down from Whitehall." http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianpolitics/story/0,,2118745,00.html
• Britain's reputation as a world leader for university education could be lost within 10 years, the vice-chancellor of Cambridge warned yesterday. Standards will plummet unless universities resist the temptation to take on poor-quality students in an attempt to plug funding gaps, Professor Alison Richard told MPs. At present Cambridge and Oxford are second and third respectively in the world university league table rankings, beaten only by Harvard. Britain also has 29 universities in the top 200 and has achieved a worldwide reputation for academic excellence in higher education. Prof Richard told the education select committee that standards could be seriously compromised by the Government's drive to increase student numbers. In particular, the trend to recruit foreign students for their higher fees could lead to "a downward spiral", she said. Ministers have set a target for 50 per cent of all 18- to 30-year-olds to have entered higher education by 2010. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/05/nuni105.xml
• Tax evaders could find their bank accounts raided directly by the Inland Revenue, under a government plan to get back some of the billions in annually lost payments. The powers would allow tax collectors to bypass the courts and order banks to pay outstanding tax debts. Hundreds of thousands of British businesses and individuals pay their taxes late - or not at all - each year. HM Revenue & Customs has to make more than 400,000 visits a year to collect payment, and, where this fails, take action and pursue more than 200,000 court actions a year for unpaid tax. http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,2119038,00.html
• Victims of rape could be left without proper counselling or support because the Government has been unable to sustain reliable funding for support services. As many as half of England and Wales' Rape Crisis centres are facing closure or severe cuts this year as the Government pulls funds from the organisation. Rape Crisis believes up to half of its 32 centres, which offer specialised help to victims of sexual abuse, will be forced to close, or left in "severe trouble" if the Ministry of Justice does not renew the Victim Fund grants that were provided last year. The Victim Fund was established last year with a £1.25m government grant for distribution among organisations that help victims of sexual assault. The fund saved the support network from near collapse, but now, just one year from its inception, it has already cut funds from the charities it set out to help. http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/article2737133.ece

EU

• Under plans to shake up the European wine industry unveiled yesterday, a vintner, say, in the Czech Republic or Bulgaria will be able to mix his wine with that of a grower 2,000km away in Portugal. The result will be cheap, perhaps quaffable. It will bear a new euro-label stipulating the grape variety and year. And it might turn the tide of New World conquest of the Old World's supermarkets and off-licences. "At the moment blending wines from EU countries is not possible," said Michael Mann, the commission's agriculture spokesman. "It would become possible under the proposals. At the low end of the market. We think that possibility should exist. You can call it European wine." http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,2118792,00.html