Call for system that frees rape suspects as alternative to bail to be scrapped in England and Wales

Hundreds of suspected rapists in England and Wales are spending years released under investigation, under a system that the government has been urged to scrap as it “doesn’t serve anyone’s interests apart from the police”.Introduced under the Policing & Crime Act 2017, released under investigation (RUI) allows police an alternative to bail, without the set timeframes or conditions attached to police bail.However, it has meant that suspects are often spending many years “under investigation”, with no statutory time limits holding the police to account on charging decisions.Campaigners have called for RUI to be scrapped, saying it leads to uncertainty and distress for both the victim and the accused, and, particularly when coupled with delays in the court system, evidence can deteriorate over time and victims can withdraw their support for prosecutions, creating an overall barrier to justice being done.It is a particular problem in cases such as rape and sexual assault, in which there is often little physical evidence, and which often rely heavily on the account of the victim

People pulling own teeth due to lack of urgent NHS dental care in England, watchdog finds

People needing emergency dental care in England are being denied help from the NHS despite guidance saying that it should be available, in some cases resorting to risky self-treatment such as pulling out their own teeth, the patient watchdog has found.Patients who experience a sudden dental crisis such as a broken tooth, abscess or severe tooth pain are meant to be able to get help from their dentist or by calling NHS 111.But research by Healthwatch England shows that people in pain are unable to get an appointment and in some cases are being forced to travel more than 100 miles, spend hundreds of pounds going private or even travel abroad to get care.In some cases people are turning to self-treatment including pulling out teeth or taking unprescribed antibiotics.The Department of Health and Social Care has been contacted for comment

Hospitals in England ‘face dangerous winter overcrowding due to discharge delays’

Hospitals in England face dangerous overcrowding this winter because even more patients than last year are “stranded” in a bed, according to an analysis of NHS figures.The health service is struggling to cope with the early onset of its usual winter crisis driven by a crippling “flu-nami”, while the NHS in England is bracing itself for a five-day strike by resident doctors starting on Wednesday.Hospitals will have fewer beds available this winter than usual because “delayed discharges” – beds occupied by people who are medically fit to leave but have nowhere to go – have been even worse in the run-up to the cold season than they were last year, research by the Health Foundation has found.Senior doctors and NHS leaders said the lack of beds identified by the thinktank would make an already “truly shocking” situation this winter harder still for hospitals. They said it would lead to ambulance queues building up outside A&E departments, patients facing long waits to be seen, widespread “corridor care”, an increased spread of the flu virus – and even greater risk that seriously ill patients would die because of delays in finding them a bed

Wes Streeting is right to examine questions of overdiagnosis | Letters

John Harris is misguided in his criticism of Wes Streeting’s review of UK mental health services (The right’s callous overdiagnosis bandwagon is rolling. Wes Streeting should not be on it, 7 December). While this review will inevitably examine questions of overdiagnosis, Harris is wrong to imply that Streeting’s main motivation is political. There is nothing unusual, of course, about ministers making decisions based on political considerations, but there is rather more to the review than Harris indicates.It hardly needs restating that mental health services are grossly overstretched and underresourced, and an inquiry is necessary

NHS administrators are vital to patients | Letters

The finding that one in seven GP referrals are getting lost, with harm to most of the patients involved (Thousands of patients in England at risk as GP referrals vanish into NHS ‘black hole’, 7 December), is no surprise to me. But it is not confined to GP referrals. Hospital patients are constantly in a similar position. I have experienced this myself many times, with investigations and/or outpatient appointments promised but never happening. Sometimes this follows an appointment being cancelled, with a “we will be in contact soon” message that turns out not to be true

DWP needs overhaul to restore trust after carer’s allowance scandal, adviser says

The Department of Work and Pensions needs a management and cultural overhaul if it is to restore public trust after the benefits scandal which left hundreds of thousands of unpaid carers in debt, a key government adviser has warned.Prof Liz Sayce led a scathing review of the carer’s allowance scandal, which found the DWP system and leadership failures were responsible for carers unknowingly running up huge debts, some of which resulted in serious mental illness and, possibly, criminal convictions for fraud.Sayce told the Guardian she had been surprised by the DWP’s “lack of organisational curiosity” about the impact of the problems with carer’s allowance, as well as its reluctance to tackle the issue strategically, despite being aware of the issues for years.Her comments came days after the Guardian revealed a top DWP civil servant, Neil Couling, had insisted carers were to blame for the department’s failures in an internal message to staff, issued a few days after Sayce’s report was published.Sayce said it had been “distressing” to read Couling’s comments which she said were “clearly not right”