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In the News

WAG:  Green route to sustainable energy - The Welsh Assembly Government’s (WAG) has taken a major step on the path to making Wales a low carbon energy economy with the launch of its Renewable Energy Route Map, which sets out a programme aimed at transforming the way Wales produces & uses energy (consultation closes on 13 May 2008).

It is intended to demonstrate to the world what even small countries can be doing to maximise the use of their natural renewable resources. Among the proposals addressed by the Route Map are:
* Encouraging innovation to capture the power of the seas around Wales
* Utilising the wind resource of Wales
* Changes to planning guidance to make it easier for people to install domestic micro-generation technology
* Ensuring all new buildings in Wales are built to the highest possible low carbon standards
* Developing a strong ‘green jobs’ strategy to provide the skills base to be a leader in renewable energy

The document claims that Wales is fortunate to have considerable natural renewable energy resources, which if sensitively, but extensively exploited, could make Wales self sufficient in renewable electricity within 20 years - with half of this from marine, a third from wind and the rest from biomass and micro-generation.
STFC:  Will this mean we can maintain our love affair with the car? - The possibility of generating hydrogen from sea water using sunlight energy is now one step closer, thanks to the scientists at Atmos Technologies, based at the Science and Technology Facilities Council's Daresbury Laboratory, who have successfully developed an environmentally friendly technique for the production of photo voltaic diodes, at a fraction of the previous cost and carbon footprint.

Photo voltaic diodes work by using sunlight to generate electrical power, which is applied to two terminals submerged in sea water.  The sea water is separated by the electrical power, generating hydrogen at one terminal and oxygen at the other.  The hydrogen is collected & stored for use either in fuel cells which can power electric motors or in conventional engines.
Defra:  Ensuring your offset is not ruled offside - Environment Secretary Hilary Benn has challenged the voluntary offsetting industry to provide strong standards for offsetting products so that they can be part of the Government Code of Best Practice for consumer offsetting products, which will be backed by a quality mark.

The Government's decision claims to recognise the efforts of the industry so far to develop different standards for Voluntary Emission Reductions (VERs), and encourages the industry to come together & build on the existing groundwork.  The principles that will need to be addressed by an industry standard are:
* additionality, meaning that the carbon savings must be in addition to reductions that would be made anyway
* avoiding carbon leakage, or emissions avoided on one site simply being moved somewhere else
* permanence, ensuring that emissions reductions were not simply put off until later (as with trees)
* verification systems for emissions reductions
* transparency on the methodologies & procedures used, and
* avoiding double counting, ensuring that emissions counted in an offset product are not counted elsewhere, for example as savings through an emissions trading scheme

AEA have been appointed to become the accreditation body for the Code and they have issued the final draft of the Code for industry comment on accreditation procedures. The quality mark associated with the work is currently being developed and will be ready to be used when the first products are accredited later in 2008.
NAO:  Classical Degree still favoured over professional financial qualification? - A follow-up to the National Audit Office’s (NAO) 2003 report looks at how capable departments are at managing their financial resources.  With Treasury guidance & support, Departments are producing better information about their financial performance.  Most departments now have a professionally qualified Finance Director on their main Board, and non-executive Directors are providing robust, independent challenge to these Boards.

However, six departments, accounting for over £45bn (8%) of total central government expenditure, still do not have a professionally qualified Finance Director on their main Board, despite the Treasury requirement that they do so by December 2006.

Only 40% of departments invariably provide decision-makers with a full analysis of the financial implications of policy proposals.  Financial management matters are not automatically included in the performance assessment criteria of Permanent Secretaries & other Senior Civil Servants and not a single Permanent Secretary holds a professional finance qualification.

The Treasury and other stakeholders have taken steps – such as through their Finance Skills for All training course, to improve the financial skills & awareness of non-finance staff, who are usually the budget holders responsible for the day-to-day management of departments’ financial resources.  But nearly 70% of departments cited the level of skills of non-finance staff as one of the three most significant barriers to improving financial resource management across government.
CRC:  Is local democracy still alive & kicking outside urban areas? - Crispin Moor, Whitehall Director for the Commission for Rural Communities, has written about the CRC’s participation inquiry 'Strengthening the role of local councillors' for the latest issue of Whitehall and Westminster World.

He explains the reasons behind the inquiry and presents its recommendations for helping make citizens more fully engaged in local decision-making, enhance the democratic role for rural communities and create a stronger, more effective voice for local councillors.
Press release ~ Crispin's article ~ 'Strengthening the role of local councillors' ~ Full article ~ Inquiry report and recommendations ~ Whitehall and Westminster World

Upcoming Event:  Common issues when presenting the public face of an organisation - The pressure for simultaneous transparency, consistency and cost effectiveness is putting an ever higher premium on the integration of the public affairs function.

Internally, organisations are often plagued by rivalry between management functions each claiming to deal with the external environment.  Externally, the reform of the European Union and the intensification of global co-operation make new demands with each passing year.

Joined up public affairs is clearly desirable.  How can it be delivered at a time of increased budget stringency and public questioning of the role of lobbyists?

The European Centre for Public Affairs (ECPA) Annual Conference (05/03/2008) in Brussels is designed as a space in which the public affairs function can examine its own health and effectiveness.  The best brains in European public affairs will once again gather to discover new insights and find practical tools to make the practitioner more effective.
 
For Industry News please click HERE

General News

STFC:  UK neutron scientists are tackling the challenge of cosmic radiation and its damaging effect on sensitive microchips in the aviation industry in the drive to develop more robust electronic equipment.  Accelerated testing of microelectronic components at the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s (STFC) world leading ISIS neutron research centre replicates the effect of thousands of hours of flying time in just a few minutes.

A microchip in an aircraft can be struck by a cosmic neutron every few seconds.  When a neutron hits silicon, a nuclear reaction occurs causing an electrical charge shower that can interfere with the normal operation of electronic equipment. Results from this testing will allow manufacturers to mitigate against the problem and build triple redundancy into their electronic components.
 
DSA: The Driving Standards Agency has confirmed the driving test fee structure that was proposed last summer. Theory tests for car drivers and motorcycle riders from 1 April 2008 will be £30, while practical tests for car drivers will be £56.50 from that date.
 
When the new, more demanding, practical motorcycle test is introduced on 29 September, the fee for that test will be £80.  A new off-road part is being introduced to the test before riders will be allowed to progress to the on-road element, which requires a new network of test centres to be constructed.
 
DSTL: Butterflies are thriving on Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) land at Porton Down despite the floods last summer. The number & variety of rare species such as the heath butterfly, dingy skippers, marsh fratillaries and grizzled skippers have increased alongside common farmland butterflies.

The population surge is due to a reseeding programme carried out by Dstl where arable field margins were sown with combinations of seeds.  In 2007, 1,145 butterflies of 24 different species were recorded, showing a significant increase on 2005 despite very poor conditions during the wet summer months.
 
LDA: The solar panels on the roof of London's City Hall have been officially unveiled giving it a unique photovoltaic system designed to complement the rounded shape of one of London's most iconic buildings. The photovoltaic panels have a peak capacity of 67kW and are expected to generate about 50,000kWh of renewable electricity, saving up to 33 tonnes of CO2, each year. 
 
To develop the glass-glass laminate array for the ‘eyelash’ all 46 photovoltaic panels were of different size and cell layout to adjust to the curved design of the building and changing pitch.  The array includes some of the largest glass-glass laminated photovoltaic panels manufactured in the UK to date.

Policy Statements and Initiatives

Defra: A review of the target to reduce the UK's CO2 emissions by at least 60% by 2050 will become a statutory duty under the Climate Change Bill, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn has announced.  He announced the decision alongside other amendments to strengthen the Bill as it moves towards completing its passage through the House of Lords.
 
The Government has committed to ask the independent Committee on Climate Change to consider whether the 2050 target should be tightened up to 80%, as the Committee considers its advice on the first three five-year carbon budgets.
 
The Government proposes to strengthen compliance with the 2050 target by requiring the Secretary of State to bring forward proposals & policies that will enable the carbon budgets to be met, and to consider the duty to meet the 2050 target in developing those policies and measures.
 
A new requirement will see the Government setting out an annual indicative range (AIR) for the carbon account over the five-year budget.  This AIR, combined with greater clarity about the timescales for policies to take effect, is meant to ensure that the Government can be held to account for progress during each year of the budget period.
 
Home Office: Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has unveiled a new action plan focusing on serious violence.  It sets out what the Government, together with police and local agencies, will do over the next three years to cut homicide, knife crime, gun and gang-related crime and sexual and domestic violence.
 
DCSF: Schools Minister Jim Knight has announced that speaking assessments for GCSE modern foreign languages will change to ‘make them a more accurate reflection of pupils' ability and their capacity to respond to real life situations’. From September 2009 students will be assessed on different occasions during Key Stage 4, rather than face a single 'oral' examination at the end of the course.
 
The new assessments are supposed to test a broader range of linguistic skills, such as taking part in an interview or making a presentation to a group.  They will take part in debates, make presentations to their peers, explain, describe and explore topical issues that interest them.  Students might get involved in basic business-style negotiations or product pitches.
 
Defra: The first policy and action plan to help local communities manage feral wild boar populations where they live has been announced. Wild boar died out in the UK at least 300 years ago, but following escapes and illegal releases from farms in Britain, small populations of feral wild boar have been found in a small number of areas.
 
The Defra consultation on making it an offence (under schedule 9 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981) to release or allow wild boar to escape into the wild without a licence closed on the 31 January, and they are currently considering responses.
 
Two risk assessments also published show that feral wild boar do not pose a national threat to the environment, farming or public safety.
 
ScotGov: A Scotland-wide campaign urging people to speak out & help stop the abuse or neglect of young people, by reporting their concerns through a national phone line - 0800 022 3222, has been launched by the Scottish government.

A national eight week campaign will run to raise awareness of the Child Protection Line.  Targeted adverts on phone boxes will form part of the campaign, supported by posters & stickers in busy community sites such as GP surgeries, libraries and sports centres.
 
DH: Health Secretary Alan Johnson has called for all employers to do more to promote the health and well-being of their staff. He also launched Professor Louis Appleby's report 'Mental Health and Ill Health in Doctors', containing recommendations on how the NHS can support doctors to look after their own mental health.
 
Recommendations in 'Mental Health and Ill Health in Doctors' include:
* Doctors who are ill to be treated first & foremost as patients not colleagues
* Rules on confidentiality should be strictly observed with additional safeguards in place to ensure privacy
* Medical schools & Medical Royal Colleges to encourage the use of mental health services for doctors in training
 
WAG: The number of training places available for registered nurses who provide care in the community will more than double this year.  Some 98 nurses will be able to access training from September, compared with 45 in 2007, in an effort to meet the Welsh Assembly Government’s objectives of providing more care in the community.

This forms part of a package that will also see an increase in the number of training places available for students wishing to enter nursing (and other healthcare professions) including physiotherapy, occupational therapy, healthcare science, clinical psychology and pharmacy.
 
Home Office: Changes to the way newcomers are able to ‘earn their stay’ in Britain have been proposed by the Government in a Green Paper: 'The path to citizenship', which proposes:
* a new probationary period of citizenship
* full access to benefits being delayed until migrants have completed the probationary period
* migrants having to improve their command of English to pass probation
* anyone committing an offence resulting in prison being barred from becoming a citizen
 
Defra: Setting out details of Defra's 2008/09 budget settlement, Hilary Benn has announced an increase in funding for clean energy technologies, investments & enterprises to over £400m over the next 3 years. As part of the domestic Environmental Transformation Fund (ETF), the Carbon Trust will receive £47.4m to bring forward new energy technologies such as offshore wind, third-generation photovoltaic power, marine energy and biomass heating.
 
In addition, over the next three years the government will also provide around £10m for a new anaerobic digestion demonstration programme.  Up to four commercial-scale facilities will show the potential of this technology to create renewable energy, reduce greenhouse gas emissions & avoid waste being sent to landfill.
 
DCMS: The government has published its plan to provide support for the creative industries. The strategy - 'Creative Britain: New Talents for the New Economy' - makes 26 key commitments for Government and industry across every stage of the creative process.
 
It is designed to turn talent into jobs and help creative businesses thrive in the international market.  It recognises the growing success story that is Britain's creative economy and seeks to provide the industries with an unrivalled pool of talent to draw on, and the same formal, structured support associated with other industries.

Consultations

ScotGov: Reading, writing and spelling are to be embedded in all aspects of the new modern Scottish Curriculum for Excellence skills to give young people the best start in the 21st century workplace. There will be renewed attention on spelling, comprehension, punctuation and debate in all their learning, whether it's in the classroom or through new technology outside.

Guidance on teaching literacy skills forms part of the English Literacy ‘draft outcomes’ which ScotGov have just published, along with Gaidhlig, as part of the Government's plans to introduce a more holistic approach to education for children aged three to 18. This is the start of a continuous process of review to ensure that the curriculum remains up to date.
 
DfT: New proposals aimed at helping reduce disruption by ensuring that road works are carried out efficiently, safely and to the highest standards - ensuring more work is done correctly the first time round – have been published for consultation (closes 15 May 2008).  New proposals on training would mean that from 2010 those carrying out road works in England will have to pass a test at an approved assessment centre every five years.
 
Councils will also be able to impose conditions on works, such as a ban on rush hour working and will also be to operate a permit scheme which set out specific durations for the work and conditions of how & when it is carried out.
 
BERR: New draft guidance published for consultation (closes on 16 May 2008) sets out how clauses in the Energy Bill requiring operators of new nuclear power stations to meet the full cost of decommissioning and their full share of waste management costs would work.  Mr Hutton said:  “Funds will be sufficient, secure and independent, it will be a criminal offence not to comply with the approved arrangements and we are taking powers to guard against unforeseen shortfalls."
 
Companies would be required to:
* Demonstrate detailed & costed plans for decommissioning, waste management and disposal, before they even begin construction of a nuclear power station
* Set money aside into a secure & independent fund from day one of generating electricity, and
* Have additional security in place to supplement the Fund should it be insufficient, for example, if the power station closes early
 
WAG: The Welsh Assembly Government’s (WAG) has taken a major step on the path to making Wales a low carbon energy economy with the launch of its Renewable Energy Route Map, which sets out a programme aimed at transforming the way Wales produces & uses energy (consultation closes on 13 May 2008) - See ‘In the News’ section for details.

Guidance Notes and Best Practice Guides

LR: Land & buildings are usually the most valuable assets people own and, because they can be sold & mortgaged to raise money, they are often attractive targets for fraudsters. Land Registry has, therefore, recently published two new guides which advise members of the public:
* how the risks of a successful fraud can be minimised(Public Guide 17 - How to safeguard against property fraud)
* when evidence of identity is required if lodging an application to register a property(Public Guide 20 - Identity checks)
 
As there is a higher risk of fraud when a solicitor or conveyancer does not represent the applicant, Land Registry is widening the types of applications where evidence of identity is required. From 3 March 2008, identity checks are being introduced to include situations where parties to transactions are not legally represented.
 
WYP: Emergency planning is the focus of a new website launched by the West Yorkshire Resilience Forum.  The onsite information aims to help people make their own plans to ensure their families would be safe and well-informed during an emergency situation affecting their community.

It covers issues such as establishing key contacts, making an emergency list and what items to gather as well as what to do in particular emergencies.

Annual Reports

Home Office: In his third annual report on control orders, the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, Lord Carlile of Berriew Q.C. said: "I remain of the view that, as a last resort (only), the control order system as operated currently in its non-derogating form is a justifiable and proportional safety valve for the proper protection of civil society."
 
Lord Carlile's report on the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 analyses the operation of the control order system in 2007 and concludes that he "would have reached the same decision as the Secretary of State in each case in which a control order has been made, so far as the actual making of the order is concerned".
 
BERR:  A new collaboration between the UK and United States will widen the geographical scope of efforts to address nuclear & radiological security and proliferation threats. As part of the programme, an initial £2m is being put into initiatives designed to secure high-risk nuclear & other radioactive materials and combat their illicit trafficking.
 
The Government has also published the fifth Annual Report on the Global Threat Reduction Programme, detailing progress made on reducing the threat of proliferation of dangerous nuclear, radiological, biological and chemical materials.  Specific progress has been made in assisting chemical weapon destruction in Russia.

General Reports and Other Publications

CLG: The largest ever survey of urban trees in England has revealed that although national tree health has improved markedly since the last survey in 1992, with trees being maintained much more regularly by councils,  although overall planting rates of new trees has fallen. The report found that most trees make a ‘considerable or outstanding’ contribution to the quality of neighbourhoods.
 
The report, written by ADAS and MyerscoughCollege, suggests 10 ways in which all councils can match the standards of the best. The Trees in Towns II report also reveals disparities between councils. Although some councils are already managing their tree stock well, findings show that many local authorities lack basic information about the nature & extent of the trees and woodlands in their district.
 
DWP: Public knowledge of the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) increased significantly between 1996 and 2006, and according to new research, the Act has improved the lives of disabled people across the board - from their access to public transport to shopping at their local grocer.
 
The research uses data from the Disability Module of the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Omnibus Survey between 1996 and 2006 which looked at awareness of the Act, access to goods and services, access to transport (2005, 2006) and renting or buying a home. It shows that over 70% of people are now aware of the Act by name, compared to only 40% in 1996, a year after DDA was first introduced.
 
ScotGov: The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has published its review into rural policy in Scotland, highlighting a number of key areas, which the Scottish Government is already addressing, including:
* Reducing the number of government bodies involved
* Harnessing Scotland's potential as a producer of energy from renewable sources
* Creating opportunities for business & economic diversification through regional delivery of the £1.6bn Scottish Rural Development Programme
 
NAO: The NAO has reported that the Home Office’s inconsistent delivery of funding, poor data sharing between local agencies and limited capacity at a local level to analyse the risks of violent crime are combining to reduce the effectiveness of wider efforts to reduce violent crime.  Fewer than 30% of Crime and Disorder Partnerships responding to the NAO’s survey had a written strategy specifically for tackling violent crime.
 
Although crime is falling, and England’s homicide rate is low in international comparison, the threat of violence remains a significant concern: 17% of adults say they worry about becoming a victim of violent crime.
 
HL: Last week, Homeless Link and Resource Information Service (RIS) launched independent research in the field of adult disadvantage and homelessness.  This is the first time the sector has had baseline demographic data on the state of the sector, showing the true complexity & vulnerability of the client group it supports.

Key messages are:
*Homelessness agencies are working with some of the most socially excluded individuals in our society.
* The majority of services estimate that most of the people they work with have multiple problems, for example drug & alcohol issues, mental health problems, benefits and debt problems.
* While the government is doing much excellent work with homelessness, these complex & vulnerable individuals are being failed by a number of services.
 
HEFCE: The Higher Education Funding Council for England claims to welcome a report on student retention published last week by the Public Accounts Committee of the House of Commons.
 
Professor David Eastwood, Chief Executive of HEFCE, said: “As the report points out there is a disparity of performance across the sector and there is no cause for complacency.  We will be holding a number of workshops with the National Audit Office and higher education representatives in March and April on how we can improve performance and retention, which will inform our response to this report”.
 
Ofsted: Courses for people wanting to qualify as teachers of ‘community’ or ‘heritage’ languages such as Arabic, Bengali, Japanese, Mandarin, Panjabi, Turkish, and Urdu should be expanded, Ofsted has stated in its new report - Every language matters – which evaluates the supply & uptake of the postgraduate certificate in education (PGCE) courses in languages other than French, German, Spanish, Irish and Welsh.

The report found the quality of teaching by those who had a PGCE in community languages was consistently good, which contrasts with the more variable quality of teaching of community languages generally. However, inspectors found that the number of initial teacher training courses leading to a PGCE available in these languages was limited and the way courses were structured sometimes deterred applicants.
 
NAO:   The Jobcentre Plus programme rolled out a network of over 800 offices, combining the functions of the former jobcentres and social security offices, and was completed for £314m less than the original £2.2bn budget according to a National Audit Office report.
 
The project was well managed, particularly the procurement aspect, where between £120m and £140m worth of savings were made.  The project has clear lessons for other public sector procurement programmes.
 
QCA: The Qualifications and Curriculum Authority has published a report called Inter-subject comparability studies and a book titled Techniques for monitoring the comparability of examination standards. The intention of the book is to describe the different methods, to highlight their various strengths & weaknesses and to consider the progress made in monitoring comparability over the past half a century.
 
The Inter-subject comparability study includes four investigations that focussed on the following areas:
Study 1a: comparisons at GCSE, AS and A level using selected specifications across geography and history
Study 1b: comparisons at GCSE, AS and A level using selected specifications across biology, chemistry and physics and additional science (double award) at GCSE
Study 2a: comparisons at A level using selected specifications across biology, psychology and sociology
Study 2b: comparisons at A level using selected specifications across English literature, history and media studies.

Legislation / Legal

SGC: Violent offenders who carry weapons to the scene of a crime and use them on victims should face severe sentences – says a definitive guideline published by the Sentencing Guidelines Council. Sentences for such offenders who inflict particularly grave injuries should be in a range of 10 and 16 years imprisonment.

In the guideline (to be implemented on 3 March 2008) the Council sets out a series of factors that will specifically aggravate assaults and should result in greater sentences, including:
* Offenders operating in gangs or groups
* The deliberate targeting of vulnerable victims or choosing isolated places for carrying out an attack
* Attacks on victims working in the public sector or providing a service to the public

In a second guideline relating to assaults on children and the offence of cruelty to a child the Council says that where a child is the victim and the offender an adult, custody will normally result, particularly where the offence involves an abuse of trust. Where an offender only intended to administer lawful chastisement and relatively minor injury resulted that was neither foreseen nor intended, custody will not normally be appropriate.
 
MoJ: Plans to simplify family court procedures and modernise legal language have been announced as part of an ongoing programme to improve people's experience in court. The proposals, which follow public consultation, are intended to align currently differing procedures for different levels of courts and follow the example set by the Civil Procedure Rules.
 
The proposals are in response to an earlier consultation ‘Family Procedure Rules - a new procedural code for family proceedings’ which looked at the need for:
* modernisation of language
* harmonisation with the Civil Procedure Rules (CPR)
* a single unified code of practice and
* alignment of procedures in all levels of court
 
The next step in developing the Family Procedure Rules will be when the Family Procedure Rule Committee consults on the draft rules themselves.  This is currently planned for the end of the year.

Press release ~ Family Procedure Rules - a new procedural code for family proceedings ~ Family Procedure Rules ~ Civil Procedure Rules ~ Her Majesty's Courts Service

EU Legislation, Initiatives, etc.

YF: The latest European Investment programme for the Yorkshire and Humber region has £394m from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) to invest in the region by 2013.  Danuta Hübner, the European Commissioner responsible for Regional Policy launched the programme after visiting the Advanced Manufacturing Park (AMP) in Rotherham, which was developed by Yorkshire Forward on a large brownfield site, supported by European funds from the 2000-2006 Objective 1 Programme.

The Commissioner was shown the Factory of the Future development being undertaken by the University of Sheffield (in collaboration with Boeing) with funding from Europe and Yorkshire Forward, that is nearing completion.
 
This is a 4,200sqm manufacturing research facility, designed & built to the highest environmental sustainability standard and utilising renewable energy.  It will demonstrate & provide training in leading edge techniques & technologies and demonstrate how manufacturing can be profitable whilst working in sympathy with the environment.

Charity and Voluntary Sector

BIG: A play project to help children through the daunting experience of visiting a parent in jail is among those to benefit from awards announced by the Big Lottery Fund. The Fund’s Playful Ideas programme, that funds innovative approaches to play, has awarded £243,437 to Prison Advice and Care Trust (PACT) for a play project working with three prisons in the South West.

 Meanwhile in Lancashire, the RADPAC Play and Freetime Opportunities for All project, based in the special needs units of two new schools, will continue to remove barriers that exclude children from play and social interaction through developing awareness of issues surrounding children with disabilities and additional needs.
 
Cabinet Office: The Cabinet Office has published draft guidance for consultation (closes on 31 May 2008) to help professional fundraisers and retailers who raise money for charity through sales to comply with new laws. From 1 April 2008, fundraisers who are paid to raise money will be required to say up front to potential donors how much of each donation will go to charity and what proportion goes towards their own wages.  
 
This will affect street, telephone and door-to-door collectors.  Similarly, shops who donate a portion of the sale price on particular items to charity will be required to state explicitly the extent to which a charity will benefit. To help professional fundraisers and commercial participators provide the information required by the law the guidance offers suggested template statements.

Business and Other Briefings

FSA: The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has published a Consultation Paper containing proposals which aim to further help investment advisers provide consumers with clear & simple information about services and costs.  The FSA invites views on the questions set out in the Consultation Paper by 19 May 2008.
 
In placing this simplified document in guidance, the FSA is providing firms with an effective way of complying with a number of European Union disclosure requirements.  In line with European requirements, for firms that wish to use this document, it may further reduce the number of documents investment advisers provide at the point of sale and give firms greater flexibility in achieving clarity for consumers.
 
The FSA will publish feedback on responses to this Consultation Paper in a Policy Statement in July 2008 together with the final handbook text.  The new guidance will take effect on 6 August 2008.
 
HMRC: The Tax Law Rewrite project, which is modernising UK direct tax law so that it is clearer and easier to use, has published a draft of its fifth Bill (Corporation Tax). The Tax Law Rewrite project aims to rewrite the UK's primary direct tax legislation so that it is clearer and easier to use, but without changing its general effect.
 
This Brief gives details of an article: Weald Leasing Ltd.
 
This Brief gives details of an article: Three year time limit for VAT claims.

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