Alarm at plan for less-qualified probation staff to deal with sex offenders in England and Wales

Domestic abusers and sex offenders in England and Wales will be rehabilitated by less-experienced staff with fewer qualifications from June, prompting warnings from a watchdog that the plans must be closely monitored to ensure public safety.Proposals approved by ministers will roll out behaviour programmes for offenders to be delivered by “band 3” staff who are not fully qualified probation officers.The work is currently carried out by highly skilled “band 4” probation officers who have extensive experience dealing with rapists, paedophiles, violent partners and online abusers.There are also plans to cut the number of low- and medium-risk offenders required to sit through the twice-weekly rehabilitation courses. Probation officers will instead be expected to manage these offenders through “toolkits” at weekly meetings rather than completing the specially designed programmes

MoJ readies extra prison places in case summer riots happen again

Prisons are being prepared to cope with a sudden influx of offenders in case there is a repeat of last summer’s riots, the justice minister, James Timpson, has told the Guardian.Hundreds of extra makeshift cells and newly refurbished cells will be in use by the end of this year, officials have disclosed, as the prisons minister said there will be “no more emergency measures” such as early release schemes.“We need to be prepared for the capacity that would be needed if we had the riots, the civil disobedience, [we saw] in the summer. We’re clear there are no more emergency measures to do. We just need to make sure we use all of the operational levers we have,” he said

Secret quotas behind medical schools’ bias against women and ethnic minorities | Letters

Your article brings most welcome news (Female doctors outnumber male peers in UK for first time, 6 February). It also reminds one that change takes an eternity.In 1985, Aggrey Burke and I published a study showing that secret quotas existed in all the London medical schools which limited the numbers of women and minority ethnic students that they allowed to be admitted to study medicine.A year later, we discovered that at St George’s hospital medical school, this quota was achieved by using “discriminatory” computer software to unfairly limit such students’ access.This discovery was investigated by the Commission for Racial Equality in 1988 and the discriminatory practices were exposed, and they immediately ceased throughout the UK

The NHS is broken, but not yet critical | Letters

I have recently retired after more than 30 years of NHS service. The NHS is indeed broken (Editorial, 3 March), but it’s not quite in critical care, and there are signs that Wes Streeting is addressing some of the problems, including the use of the “private sector”. While this may sit comfortably with parts of the Labour party and patient groups, it’s important to understand three things about the use of the private sector. First, it’s NHS staff who perform the surgery, second, the private sector is paid the same price per procedure as an NHS trust and, finally, using the private sector creates additional capacity in the NHS.There are a number of things that Mr Streeting should look at to expedite his plans

New treatment could cure one in 20 cases of high blood pressure

Half a million people in the UK with dangerously high blood pressure – a “silent killer” that causes tens of thousands of deaths a year – could be cured by a new treatment.Doctors have developed a technique to burn away nodules that lead to a large amount of salt building up in the body, which increases the risk of a stroke or heart attack.The breakthrough could mean people with primary aldosteronism – which causes one in 20 cases of high blood pressure – no longer have to have surgery or spend their lives taking the drug spironolactone to lower their risk of a stroke or heart attack.People with primary aldosteronism develop nodules on one or both of their adrenal glands. They sit beside the kidneys and make three key hormones: adrenaline, cortisol and aldosterone

English councils seeking more help to pay for rise in Send transport costs

Councils in England urgently need more money to help them pay for school transport for children with special needs.Many councils have told the Guardian that their obligations under the wider special educational needs and disabilities (Send) system are financially unsustainable, with the rapid increase in pupil transport costs becoming a particular issue.Sources in councils and education said transporting the children was essential, but that the system, which was set up about a decade ago, had expanded beyond its original intention.With no extra funding to support these services, some councils are now spending as much on transporting children as they are filling potholes.By law, councils must provide transport to Send pupils if they live more than a set distance from their nearest suitable school, with the great majority of them travelling by taxi rather than buses