September 2010 Archives

A magistrate judge who fell asleep during a trial last year has been relieved of his position following an investigation by the Office for Judicial Complaints.

The trial of a 17-year-old youth accused of assault, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had to be abandoned after the defendant's mother noticed John Harrison dozing at the bench.

'I was not asleep but I rested my eyes for five minutes or so,' Mr Harrison said. 'It was just a normal reaction in the middle of the afternoon. The court was warm -- the heating was on and the sun was pouring in through the window.

A Scottish government plan to allow local "licensing boards" to increase the minimum age at which young people can buy alcohol from off-licences has been blocked by opposition MSPs.

This is the second blow inside a week for the SNP's Alcohol Bill after MSPs earlier blocked the introduction of minimum pricing on alcohol.

Opposition MSPs argued allowing local licensing boards to ban off-licence sales to under-21s discriminated against young people.

Labour's Dr Richard Simpson MSP also highlighted that teenagers could easily get around a ban in one area by travelling to neighbouring areas without bans.

The headmaster of a Catholic school in Merseyside has been found guilty of endangering his students after he led a group of "inebriated" sixth-formers onto a school roof -- which was normally "out of bounds" -- and one of them fell through a skylight.

The incident occurred during an A-level results party at Sacred Heart Catholic College in Crosby in 2008. Eighteen-year-old student Joel Murray fractured his skull, perforated an eardrum, broke his ribs, and suffered permanent damage to his eye as a result of the fall. Appearing at Liverpool Crown Court, however, headmaster John Summerfield, 65, denied breaching the Health and Safety at Work Act by failing to take reasonable care for the boy's safety.

This week, the French National Assembly is debating a new immigration law, which has been proposed by Nicolas Sarkozy's right-wing UMP government, and would strip naturalised French citizens of their nationality for committing certain crimes.

The sponsor of the legislation, Immigration Minister Eric Besson, says the change is necessary "to produce good French citizens." "Last year we gave French nationality to 108,000 foreigners," he said. "Being a 'good French person' doesn't mean denying your history, your roots or your French culture."

If passed, the law would mean that the government could revoke French nationality from citizens who have been naturalized for less than 10 years and who have been convicted of killing or attacking a policeman or any public official. It would also allow France to deport foreigners, including EU citizens, for theft, aggressive begging or abusing the right to remain in France for 30 days without permission by leaving and re-entering the country to renew that right.

A former area manager for Clinton Cards has won more than £100,000 in compensation for unfair dismissal and disability discrimination after the company decided to sack her shortly after she returned to work following chemotherapy and radiotherapy treatment.

Breast cancer survivor Sally-Ann Burke, 54, of Rhuddlan, Denbighshire in North Wales, was dismissed in January 2009. Leading up to her dismissal, manager John Walker claimed she was working at "50% capacity" and "frightened" her so much during one meeting she was reduced to tears.

A 62-year-old Scottish barmaid who was sacked by the bowling club where she worked for allegedly clobbering a member has won almost £3,500 in compensation for unfair dismissal.

Mary MacDonald worked part-time at the Vale of Leven Bowling Club in Alexandria, West Dunbartonshire for 10 years until she was fired following a row during a club social event.

At the UK Labour Party's annual conference in Manchester yesterday, its leader in the Scottish Holyrood parliament, Iain Gray, pledged to increase the minimum wage for public sector workers to more than £7 an hour.

The national minimum wage is currently £5.80 an hour for those above the age of 22, £4.83 an hour for workers aged 18-21, and £3.57 an hour for workers aged 16-17.

From October 2010, the rates will increase to £5.93 an hour for workers aged 21 and over (NB. this extends the so-called 'adult minimum wage' to 21-year-olds), £4.92 an hour for workers aged 18-20, and £3.64 an hour for workers aged 16-17. A new £2.50 an hour 'apprentice minimum wage' will also be introduced for apprentices aged under 19 or over 19 but in the first year of their apprenticeship.

These rates will continue to apply for workers in the private sector in Scotland -- at least initially -- even if Mr Gray's proposals for a 'Scottish living wage' are implemented.

Premier Foods, which makes Hovis bread, Branston pickle and Bisto gravy, was ordered to pay £17,000 yesterday after a man from Kidlington in Oxfordshire found a dead mouse in a loaf of bread as he made sandwiches for his children.

Stephen Forse says he had already eaten some slices from the loaf -- purchased online through a Tesco branch in Bicester in January 2009 -- before he noticed "a dark-coloured object embedded in the corner of three or four slices".

"Initially I thought it was where the dough had not mixed properly prior to baking," he said.

"As I looked closer I saw that the object had fur on it."

Mr Forse decided to call Cherwell District Council and environmental health officers paid him a visit to collect evidence. They concluded it was a squashed mouse -- minus its tail. "Their comments made me feel ill as there was no indication as to where the tail was... Had it fallen off prior to the bread being wrapped or had any of my family eaten it with another slice of bread on a previous day?"

BBC executives decided to drop a Panorama investigation into Conservative Party donor Michael Ashcroft at the last moment yesterday after new evidence surfaced about his tax affairs.

Ashcroft's tax status has been the subject of much debate ever since he secured a peerage in 2000 by promising to return from Belize and become a UK permanent resident.

Earlier this year, after a decade of "obfuscation and evasion", Ashcroft admitted that he was still a "non-domiciliary" for UK tax purposes.

Commentators (including coalition business secretary Vince Cable) believe Ashcroft avoided paying over £100m in UK tax as a result of being a "non-dom" and likely donated more money to the Conservative Party than he paid tax to HM Revenue & Customs between 2000-2010.

In economic hard times, grandparents really come into their own. Across the world, they often provide essential childcare and domestic cover for hardworking parents forced to work long hours to make ends meet.

But in Spain this week a call has gone out urging grandparents to down tools -- well, rattles and stuffed animals at any rate -- and go out on strike.

Pushing slogans like "learn to say no" and "don't feel guilty", the UGT general workers' union has called on Spanish grandparents to join this Wednesday's 'Huelga General' to protest against government spending cuts and changes to employment law.

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles has announced the government has no plans to revalue council tax bands during the current parliament.

Consumer champion Martin Lewis, of moneysavingexpert.com, says the decision means 400,000 homes will remain in the wrong council tax bands.

A 27-year-old trainee accountant from the north of England appeared in court on Friday to appeal a conviction and £1,000 fine for joking on Twitter about blowing up Robin Hood Airport.

Paul Chambers was arrested in January for sending a tweet deemed 'grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character' contrary to the Communications Act 2003.

The offending tweet read as follows: "Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky high!!"

In an attempt to head off mounting tension over the exploitation of oil, gas, and minerals in the Arctic, Russian premier Vladimir Putin has called on the five states in the region -- Russia, Norway, Canada, Denmark and the U.S. -- to resolve competing territorial claims in accordance with international law.

The Arctic zone is home to vast amounts of untapped natural resources, which have become increasingly accessible in recent years as a result of global warming and the ice cap melting.

But as the resources have become more accessible, the competition over who owns what has escalated -- and has resembled little more than a primitive land grab in recent years.

The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI) has indicated it plans to initiate legal proceedings in the high court today for judicial review of the government's decision to introduce an immigration cap.

The cap came into effect on 28 June, much to the consternation of the UK business community, and even some cabinet members -- including the Secretary of State for Business, Vince Cable, who remains a vocal opponent and has said it is doing "huge damage" to the economy.

The Law Society, City of London Immigration Working Group, the Greater London Authority, the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the British Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and London First have all echoed this criticism and called on the government to ditch the cap.

The crux of JCWI's complaint is that Home Office ministers sidestepped proper parliamentary approval in introducing an interim immigration cap before agreeing on a permanent one to take effect next year.

While they announced their intention to introduce the cap, they did not disclose who it would apply to or how it would operate until it came into force. Even then, details were only posted on the Home Office website but not presented to parliament.

The British Bankers Association (BBA) issued new data yesterday showing that home loan approvals from Britain's high-street banks fell to a 16-month low in August.

BBA members reported 31,767 new mortgages were approved last month, down from 34,219 in July, and 22.3% less than in August 2009.

These figures have surprised few in the housing sector as the UK government prepares to cut public spending by £100bn over the next four years.

Two of the social workers who worked on the tragic case involving baby Peter Connelly commenced legal action for unfair dismissal this week.

Baby Peter died in August 2007, aged seventeen months, as a result of terrible abuse at the hands of his mother Tracey Connolly, her neo-Nazi boyfriend Steven Barker, and Barker's brother Jason Owen.

Three former traffic wardens have claimed that they resigned after council bosses instructed them to issue illegal parking tickets.

Jo Pengilley, Tony Lewis and Sylvia Watts made the claims at an employment tribunal in Taunton this week as part of their case for unfair constructive dismissal against Exeter City Council.

The trio allege their supervisor wrote to all wardens to tell them to "ignore traffic regulation orders" -- the rules that govern where people can park -- and issue tickets in areas where the signs and lines were "ambiguous or not compliant with traffic regulation orders".

David Beckham is reportedly set to sue the U.S. magazine 'In Touch' over claims he had sex with a 26-year-old prostitute in New York.

The latest edition of the magazine accuses he former Manchester United and Real Madrid footballer of cheating on his wife Victoria, aka Posh Spice, five times in 2007 with a "high-class call girl" called Irma Nici.

"It was a high," Nici told the magazine. "All of these women dream of being with him, and I got to hook up with him. It was very exciting."

Responding to the story, the player's agent issued the following statement:

The number of children working part-time has almost halved in the last five years, according to BBC News.

A survey of 101 local authorities in England and Wales shows that the number of 13-15 year-olds licensed to work part-time jobs in 2004 stood at around 50,000. By 2009, this number fell to 30,500 -- a drop of almost 40%.

Figures from the Office for National Statistics show a similar trend among 16 and 17 year-olds in full-time education. Around four out of 10 teenagers in this age group had jobs during the late 1990s, but in the first quarter of this year little more than two out of 10 were working.

Liberal Democrat conference delegates have voted in favour of Vince Cable's plans to replace university tuition fees with a graduate tax.

Currently, some universities charge British students up to £3,290 a year in tuition fees. This could rise to £7,000 a year next month following an independent review led by Lord Browne. The fees become repayable after graduation as soon as the borrower starts earning over £15,000.

The graduate tax, as the name implies, would also be payable after a student obtains a degree. However, a graduate would have to start paying it much sooner -- i.e., on any income earned above the personal income tax threshold (currently £6,475 per annum) -- and may potentially have to continue paying it over the duration of his or her working life.

A senior family court judge has called for a less adversarial approach in the family justice system to stop parents using children as a "battlefield" and "ammunition".

Sir Nicholas Wall, president of the Family Division of the High Court, made his comments in a speech to the charity Families Need Fathers.

He said: "People think that post-separation parenting is easy -- in fact, it is exceedingly difficult, and as a rule of thumb my experience is that the more intelligent the parent, the more intractable the dispute.

"Parents simply do not realise the damage they do to their children by the battles they wage over them.

"Separating parents rarely behave reasonably, although they always believe that they are doing so, and that the other party is behaving unreasonably."

An industrial chemicals company has been fined £20,000 over the death of an employee in a machine used to manufacture construction, maintenance, and flooring products.

Building Chemical Research (BCR) employee, Paul Parker died in August 2005, aged 44, after he climbed into the 'blender' to clean it and the machine was inadvertently switched on by a co-worker.

Turning on the machine with someone inside should have been impossible, but two safety cut-out switches failed.

The Health and Safety Executive prosecuted the company and one of its directors, Stuart Reich, 62, of Gisburn, Lancashire, under section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 for failing to ensure the safety of employees.

A UK Border Agency inspections officer in the West Midlands is claiming compensation for sex discrimination after she was allegedly banned from visiting workplaces in the region while pregnant on health and safety grounds.

Mother-of-three Raynon Gakhal-Heron appeared before an employment tribunal in Birmingham last week and said: "I was told by management that I could no longer visit firms to find out if they were employing illegal immigrants because I was at risk due to my pregnancy."

She claims her manager told her: "You are pregnant and not allowed out."

A day after Danny Alexander, the chief secretary to the Treasury, appeared before the Lib Dem conference promising new measures to tackle tax avoidance, a former economic advisor to Margaret Thatcher has rubbished the coalition's efforts as "a drop in the ocean".

John Christensen has advised both the UK and Jersey governments on tax, and has also worked within the tax haven industry. He believes around £120bn a year is lost as a result of tax avoidance -- twice the amount estimated by HM Revenue & Customs.

Speaking at a Lib Dem fringe meeting, Mr Christensen said tax avoidance had become too "respectable" and described plans to increase the number of investigations on top-rate taxpayers to raise an extra £7bn a year by 2014-15 as "too timid". He also criticised the UK's "permissive" tax laws and loopholes, which mean the country now leads the world on tax evasion.

An Edinburgh employment tribunal has awarded a delivery driver who was sacked for taking a photograph of a woman and joking that he would upload it to the internet £4,000 for unfair dismissal.

Robert Wiseman & Son dismissed Paul Burrows last November after he photographed Gemma Roy.

The tribunal heard that Mr Burrows took a picture of Ms Roy without her knowledge while making a delivery at Somerfield in Bonnyrigg on November 10 last year. He then showed her the photo and claimed he was going to upload it to his employer's website.

Mr Burrows took the picture with a mobile scanning device used to record confirmation of deliveries. He claims he took the picture accidentally and when he realised he simply made a joke about posting it online.

As the UK prepares to phase out compulsory retirement and the default retirement age (DRA) in 2011, a new study says that only 14% of UK managers consider their organisations are ready to cope with the demands of an ageing workforce.

In news that will set alarm bells ringing among the nation's HR directors and in-house lawyers, researchers predict that a third of UK workers will be aged over 50 by 2020.

And yet 43% of respondents taking part in the Managing an Ageing Workforce survey of over 1,000 managers said that they are 'not well informed' about their organisation's retirement policies and 40% have experienced age discrimination at some stage in their careers.

1,400 workers made redundant following the collapse of social-housing giant Connaught are reportedly considering legal action for unfair dismissal.

Many of the workers received no notice about potential redundancies before being laid off last Monday.

The government has missed a high court deadline in a case which may force it to reconsider £100bn worth of budget cuts.

Last month, the Fawcett Society commenced legal proceedings for judicial review of the government's failure to conduct a proper equality impact assessment of spending cuts and tax increases on women, the disabled and ethnic minority people -- which all departments are legally required to do before making major policy decisions.

Earlier this month a number of media organisations reported on Home Office statistics showing that one in five international students remains in the UK after their initial visa has expired.

Several newspapers described the former students as "overstayers", implying they remained in the UK illegally.

A pub manager who allegedly paid casual workers cash in hand to cover his shifts has agreed to settle his claim for constructive dismissal after only one day of an employment tribunal hearing in Glasgow.

John Madden worked at the Mitchells & Butler-owned Pullman Tavern in Kilmacolm, Renfrewshire, and resigned last winter after his boss said he would need to attend a disciplinary hearing.

Leading up to this, Stanley Campbell, a retail business manager at Mitchells & Butler, said he noticed serious problems with health and safety at the pub.

He arranged for a "manager in training", Diane Muckersie, to take over Mr Madden's responsibilities -- effectively demoting Mr Madden to "deputy manager" in the process.

A HR manager working at the BBC who challenged an executive's £250,000 redundancy payment has received a £30,000 payout after she agreed to drop allegations of detrimental treatment and bullying against the Corporation.

Indira Histon told Watford employment tribunal that she decided to challenge the £256,750 payment to Sue Lynas because it was two times the amount permitted under BBC guidelines.

"The team and I were shocked by the suggestion that we would pay this amount of money to an individual, particularly as we believed the payoff was excessive for a management interest termination and amounted to a misuse of licence fee payers' money," she said.

"In addition to this, the member of staff was due to retire on June 5, 2010. I also believed that the payoff was inappropriate given that the individual wanted to leave voluntarily."

The former immigration minister Phil Woolas yesterday said it would have been "political suicide" to risk breaking electoral law to win the parliamentary seat of Oldham East and Saddleworth.

Giving testimony on day three of the special 'Election Court' into his conduct during the 2010 general election campaign, Mr Woolas said his opponent, Lib Dem Elwyn Watkins, "pandered" to extremists by not condemning a controversial group -- the Muslim Public Affairs Committee -- which apparently endorsed him.

Mr Woolas beat Mr Watkins by 103 votes, but the Liberal Democrat says the vote was swayed by 'dirty tricks' after the Labour campaign team made an overt decision "to make the white folk angry" to vote against him.

One of the world's leading cannabinoid scientists, who pioneered early research on the effects of cannabis in the 1960s and 1970s, has proposed licensing certain forms of cannabis to reduce the risk of people being introduced to harder narcotics and stronger strains of marijuana, like "skunk".

Professor Roger Pertwee, a Professor of Neuropharmacology at the University of Aberdeen, says making less potent forms of cannabis available on the same basis as alcohol would prevent drug-related crime, and could potentially raise billions in additional tax revenue.

A 29-year-old Romanian footballer and director of Boston Town Football Club was jailed for 11 months yesterday for a string of immigration and fraud-related offences.

Lorand Borbely entered the UK in March 2004 under a Hungarian passport bearing the name of a relative called Laszlo Lovas.

He switched identities because he knew Hungary would join the EU sooner than Romania -- which meant that people with Hungarian passports could live and work in the UK commencing May 1, 2004, while Romanians had to wait until January 1, 2007.

After moving to the UK, Borbely played as Laszlo 'Lori' Lovas for Boston Town and Deeping Rangers in the United Counties League. He also played for Sunday League champions Magnet Tavern and appeared at Anfield in the FA Sunday Cup final in April. He then joined the board of Boston Town as a director last year.

A serious head of steam developed yesterday as more celebrities stepped forward to challenge the Metropolitan Police Service over its refusal to release information concerning alleged privacy violations by News of the World investigators.

Last week, Lord Prescott, Chris Bryant MP, former deputy assistant police commissioner Brian Paddick, and writer/journalist Brendan Montague announced they were joining forces to request judicial review of the Met's conduct. While this week, comedian Steve Coogan, TV presenter Chris Tarrant, actress Sienna Miller, footballer Paul Gascoigne, and jockey Kieren Fallon, among others, added their weight to the campaign.

The purpose of the inquiry is to hold Scotland Yard to account for dropping its investigation into alleged phone hacking by the News of the World and failing to tell victims about how they were affected.

Former Wham! star George Michael was sentenced to eight weeks imprisonment yesterday after he pleaded guilty to crashing through a shop window while under the influence of cannabis.

The police found the 47-year-old, whose real name is Georgios Panayiotou, slumped at the wheel of his luxury Range Rover with the engine still running in front of a branch of Snappy Snaps in Hampstead, north London, at around 3 a.m. on July 4th.

When police officers tried to rouse him, Michael attempted to put the car back into gear. He also appeared 'spaced out', was 'sweating profusely' and had 'dilated pupils'.

Later, after he was arrested on suspicion of drug driving, police found two cannabis cigarettes in his possession and a blood sample confirmed the presence of cannabis in his body.

In a bid to shave £230m from its annual budget, Birmingham City Council has sent 26,000 council staff letters advising them about possible changes to their terms of employment.

The council wants to "increase efficiency" by amending terms concerning car allowances, staff parking and flexible working.

Dave Prentis, General Secretary of UNISON, said: "This is a disgraceful way to treat loyal council workers. Birmingham City Council needs to think again and withdraw the threat of redundancy, hanging over the heads of 26,000 staff.

A special "Election Court" convened under the Representation of the People Act began hearing evidence yesterday in a case brought against Phil Woolas, the Labour MP for Oldham East and Saddleworth, by his defeated Lib Dem 2010 general election opponent Elwyn Watkins.

Mr Woolas beat Mr Watkins by 103 votes, but the Liberal Democrat says the vote was swayed by 'dirty tricks'.

He alleges Mr Woolas 'doctored photographs,' 'misrepresented facts,' and 'stooped to fomenting racial and religious divisions' to guarantee his victory.

Under section 106 of the Representation of the People Act 1983, making or publishing a false statement of fact in relation to a candidate's personal character or conduct is illegal unless you have 'reasonable grounds' for believing the statement to be true.

A man from Tamworth in Staffordshire has secured £15,000 in compensation after his employer failed to pay him wages and provide written terms of employment.

Barry Pemberton worked as a labour manager for Edgbaston-based TRH Electrical Ltd for less than two years, a Birmingham employment tribunal heard. The company took on Mr Pemberton as an employee after it acquired his former employer's business.

Mr Pemberton's solicitor Roy Summerfield said the firm not only failed to send him written terms of employment, it also failed to respond to his complaints.

Four former social workers sacked for distributing an email containing a gag about convicted paedophile Gary Glitter have launched claims for unfair dismissal before an employment tribunal in Glasgow.

Jim Wilson, South Lanarkshire Council's head of adult and older people services, told the tribunal that he dismissed Deborah Reilly, Angela Nelson, Anne Lang and Rosemary Boyle in November 2008 after he discovered that they had emailed a picture of Glitter carrying a bag with a youngster inside "as you would do with whatever you collected from duty free."

Early last week social-housing maintenance company Connaught called in administrators after government spending cuts pushed the firm into financial difficulties.

Connaught's demise led many to speculate on the future of thousands of social-housing homes left in limbo -- who would step in to perform the maintenance contracts?

Responding to a question from Greg Mulholland MP over the future of Yarl's Wood detention centre last week, immigration minister Damian Green said: "We are looking at alternatives to detention for children... It is our intention to minimise the detention of children..."

Many commentators saw this as a climbdown on the coalition's earlier promise to go one step further and abolish child detention for immigration purposes.

Well, thankfully, the minister has now come out and clarified his position...

A former employee of medical equipment makers Lifescan has commenced legal action against the company after it sacked him for failing to wear glasses at work.

Duncan MacKenzie, 38, of Forres, near Inverness, worked at Lifescan for eight years and was responsible for weeding out defects in sheets of diabetic blood glucose testing strips.

As discussed on Wednesday, a number of commentators have been calling on the government to write off billions of pounds in unpaid tax following the PAYE errors unearthed last week.

They argue it would be unfair to expect people to budget for HMRC's PAYE coding errors, which in some cases stretch back as far as 2004/05.

Well, yesterday Treasury Minister David Gauke announced that anyone who has been undercharged up to £300 in the past six tax years will have it written off, while those who owe more than £300 may be given up to three years to pay it back.

He said: "In cases of genuine hardship, HMRC will allow payments to be spread across a period of three years. As was already the case, HMRC will not pursue cases where the amount owed is for less than £300 - that's an increase from the previous threshold of £50 - and this applies to 40% of all underpayments."

One of the Pakistani cricketers at the centre of the Test match betting scandal has consulted an immigration lawyer about possibly applying for asylum, according to The Telegraph.

Fast bowler Mohammad Asif, 27, apparently met with a solicitor at London firm Malik and Malik last week because he is concerned about a 'potentially violent backlash' from criminal gangs linked to the illegal betting underworld in his native Pakistan.

Asif reportedly asked the lawyer what avenues were open to him to remain in the UK. "He didn't say anything about asylum at first," said the source. "He just said, 'what's the way to stay?' Then we told him there's the student way - you can come here to study - or you can apply for a work permit. But then he asked about asylum."

Around 60 electrical engineers laid off earlier this year have won compensation because their employer failed to consult them about redundancy.

J&G Engineering went bust at Christmas with debts totalling £2.3m, but a Belfast industrial tribunal found it still had assets worth almost £750,000 to pay its preferential creditors, including staff.

The tribunal ordered the workers be paid for a full 90-day period of consultation, which should be carried out when employers dismiss 20 or more workers, having found that it took "no steps at all to provide any consultation" and there was "no evidence of any special circumstances in existence to mitigate the failure".

A beefeater sacked for allegedly harassing the Tower of London's first and only female yeoman warder has reportedly won £100,000 in compensation following an out-of-court settlement.

Historic Royal Palaces, an independent charity that runs the Tower, Hampton Court and several other historic sites, dismissed 44-year-old Mark Sanders-Crook last November after investigating claims he bullied Moira Cameron.

A 57-year-old cross-dressing Madonna impersonator, who appeared as a contestant on Britain's Got Talent wearing a purple leotard, knee-high boots and blonde wig, has filed claims for unfair dismissal and discrimination on grounds of age, disability and sexual orientation against the show at a London employment tribunal.

Partially deaf Philip Grimmer, from Ilford, Essex, said: "I was discriminated against by Simon Cowell, the two presenters Ant and Dec and by one of the assistant producers. They singled me out for unfair and worse treatment and comments than other contestants."

Simon Cowell branded Mr Grimmer's performance "monstrous" and "horrendous", saying: "Madonna at 95 would look better and dance better than you."

The initial HM Revenue press release on the extent of the PAYE errors may have significantly underestimated the number of taxpayers impacted, say the Guardian.

Last Friday, HMRC said around 4.3 million people paid too much tax and are due refunds of about £420 each on average; while 1.4 million underpaid and will be asked to pay an additional £1,428 each on average.

HM Revenue's 2009-10 report and accounts, however, show 18.2 million unreconciled cases dating back to the 2004-05 tax year where taxpayers "may not be aware that they have overpaid tax and are due a refund or ... that they are liable to make further payments."

An Anglican vicar who illegally married 383 couples in sham weddings was sentenced to four years imprisonment yesterday.

Reverend Alexander Brown, 61, was convicted of knowingly breaching immigration laws at Lewes crown court in July, along with Vladymyr Buchak, a 33-year-old illegal immigrant from Ukraine, and Reverend Michael Adelasoye, a 50-year-old evangelical preacher.

The majority of the marriages were between African men, mainly from Nigeria and Rwanda, and jobless eastern European women who had a right to live in the UK through EU membership.

A sales assistant, sacked after she refused to clean the staff toilets, has won £2,400 for unfair dismissal.

Former Press Box employee Margaret Robertson told an employment tribunal in Glasgow how much she resented being asked to clean the loose on November 17 last year. Her boss Matthew Donald showed no sympathy, however, and immediately suspended her.

London law firms Bindmans and Collyer Bristow have announced that they are seeking judicial review of the Metropolitan Police Service's refusal to release information to potential victims of the Andy Coulson / News of the World phone-tapping scandal.

The firms are pursuing the claim on behalf of several high-profile clients, including the former deputy prime minister John Prescott, Chris Bryant MP, former Deputy Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Brian Paddick, and writer/journalist Brendan Montague.

England footballer Wayne Rooney is to sue the Sun newspaper for libel, it was announced yesterday.

The press has written extensively about Mr Rooney's private life in recent days after the News of the World and Mirror published claims that he had sex with a prostitute called Jennifer Thompson while his wife Coleen was pregnant.

The libel action relates to a different story, however, which appeared in the Sun in late June.

A former science teacher in Lancashire has won £63,000 for unfair dismissal after the school he worked at sacked him following a series of altercations with students.

David Roy worked for Collegiate High School in Blackpool for ten years before he was dismissed in July 2009 for gross misconduct.

A Manchester employment tribunal ruled that the school disciplinary panel tasked with investigating the complaints against Mr Roy acted in a 'wholly unfair' manner by conflating three claims of impropriety into a unified gross misconduct charge, particularly since officials had previously exonerated the teacher over two of the allegations.

In a crackdown on 'modern slavery', the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) have arrested three people suspected of sex trafficking after rescuing 15 women from brothels in Belfast.

Detective chief superintendent Roy McComb, of the PSNI organised crime branch, said: "This is modern-day slavery where human beings are treated like commodities by sophisticated organised crime gangs who are making substantial criminal profits from the sex trade.

"These gangs have no thought for the health and wellbeing of their victims. They see them simply as instruments to help them generate cash."

The widow of Mohammed Sidique Khan, one of the suicide bombers responsible for the 7/7 bombings, has failed to convince the High Court that she should receive public funding for legal representation at the inquest into the deaths caused by the bombings.

The woman, Sumaiya Patel, had applied for judicial review of the decision of the Lord Chancellor's Department to refuse her funding.

A Guernsey panel beater subjected to months of sustained abuse and victimisation after he raised concerns about the level of noise at his place of work has won £13,104 in compensation for constructive dismissal.

An employment tribunal said John Thompson Autorestorers Limited likely identified Ian England as a "trouble maker" after he decided to "blow the whistle" and take his concerns about workplace noise to a health and safety officer at the States of Guernsey's Commerce and Employment Department.

An ambulance paramedic endangered the life of a pregnant woman and her unborn baby by refusing to take her to hospital, a Health Professions Council tribunal has heard.

Midwife Shirley Pike of Weymouth, Dorest, called 999 after the mother she was working with experienced problems during a home birth last year.

Ian Radford responded to the call but refused to take the woman to hospital because he had been working seven hours without a break.

Although a second ambulance arrived 11 minutes after Radford and took the woman to hospital -- where she had a healthy baby in May 2009 -- he was sacked following an internal investigation into the incident.

The Scottish government has unveiled proposals to place a minimum price on alcoholic drinks of 45p per unit, the Guardian reports.

Scottish health secretary Nicola Sturgeon said setting a minimum price was essential to tackle the high death toll and health burden from alcohol abuse in Scotland, where people drink 25% more on average than people in the rest of the UK.

"For too long, too many Scots have been drinking themselves into an early grave," Sturgeon said. "It is no coincidence that as the affordability of alcohol has plummeted in recent decades, alcohol-related deaths, disease, crime and disorder have spiralled. It cannot be right that a man can exceed his weekly recommended alcohol limit for less than £3.50."

Setting a minimum price on alcohol of 45p per unit would double or treble the cost of some super-strength ciders. It would also raise the cost of vodka by nearly £4 a bottle and whiskey by £3.40 a bottle.

Sturgeon argues this would immediately save about 50 lives a year, cut hospital admissions by 1,200 a year and mean nearly 23,000 fewer days lost from work in the first year. Within a decade, nearly 225 lives a year would be saved.

The High Court judge who dismissed Sharon Shoesmith's judicial review application against Haringey Council, Ed Balls, and Ofsted yesterday allowed her to appeal the decision.

Mr Justice Foskett said: "It is by no means fanciful that the Court of Appeal may differ from my view."

He also slashed claims for legal costs made by the secretary of state, Haringey and Ofsted from £345,000 to £15,000, and reiterated his displeasure at the way the defendants handled the case.

He singled out Ed Balls for particular criticism and said his behaviour "contributed to the impetus" for Shoesmith's subsequent judicial review application.

The government could spur the creation of around 30,000 new jobs if it reformed the alcohol tax system, according to new research published yesterday by the British Beer and Pub Association (BBPA).

The authors of the study argue that the current UK tax system discourages the consumption of lower-strength drinks such as bitter, which is overwhelmingly UK-produced, in favour of higher-alcohol drinks like vodka and lager, which is largely made overseas.

The research shows that at present one unit of beer costs 42p on average, compared to 37p for vodka, 38p for gin, and 33p for cider.

The researchers looked at the impact on the UK economy of moving to a alcohol tax system more in line with Ireland, where the duty rate for difference types of drinks increases more significantly with strength.

It's rare for a white person to claim racial discrimination, but last week it was reported that six white officers are suing the Metropolitan police.

The claim stems from an incident that occurred in June 2007 after which PC Mark Jones was accused of subjecting two teenagers to a physical and verbal attack.

Increasing the minimum age at which workers can apply for their state retirement pension has featured high on the government's agenda in recent times.

Among the proposals to cut the deficit, raising the retirement age to 70, perhaps higher, has emerged as one possibility.

Over 20 charities, unions, and other non-profit groups have joined together to demand the government take action against irresponsible dog owners and increase funding for those tasked with policing dog control laws.

The TUC reports that a member of the RMT union who suffered a badly burned leg replacing rails at Cogan Station in the Vale of Glamorgan has won £9,750 compensation.

The railway worker, whose name has not been released, suffered the injury because a disc cutter ignited off a spark from the rail and caught fire, which burnt through his clothing and seared his leg.