HO: The problem is that terrorists only have to succeed occasionally - Verdicts of unlawful killing have been recorded in the inquests into the deaths of the 52 victims of the July 7 London bombings.
Responding to the investigation by Lady Justice Hallett, the Home Secretary said: “Of course, no one will forget the tragic events of that day and nothing will ever be able to bring back the 52 people who were murdered. But I do hope that the conclusion of the inquests will bring some measure of comfort to the families and all of those affected……..
'The government, emergency responders and the security & intelligence community are always looking to learn lessons and to improve the response to the terrorist threat we face. This includes learning from the 7th July attacks and from other incidents and there have been a considerable number of improvements put in place since 2005”.
DfE: Getting the right balance between ‘intrusion’ and ‘concern’ is never going to be easy - Local areas should have more freedom to develop their own effective child protection services, rather than focusing on meeting central government targets, an independent review into child protection recommends. Professor Eileen Munro, who has conducted a wide ranging review into frontline child protection practice, concludes that a one-size-fits-all approach to child protection is preventing local areas from focusing on the child.
Her recommendations signal a radical shift from previous reforms that, while well-intentioned resulted in a tick-box culture and a loss of focus on the needs of the child. Currently local areas are judged on how well they have carried out certain processes & procedures rather than what the end result has been for children themselves.
Professor Munro has recommended that Local Safeguarding Children Boards (LSCBs) should be required to use a ‘systems approach’ for Serious Case Reviews (SCRs). This is similar to the approach taken by the health sector and aviation industry – other high risk areas of work with very complex systems, and where safety is an absolute priority. SCRs should consider what in the child protection system is causing professionals to make errors.
Newswire – CII: Who will be able to afford to retire? - The Chartered insurance Institute’s (CII) report, ‘An age-old problem – developing solutions for funding retirement’, estimates the UK retirement savings deficit at £9 trillion.
Using existing data the report’s analysis provides an insight into the savings required to fund retirement once costs associated with long-term care and debt are taken into consideration. Comment is provided by expert stakeholders from across the sector.
FOS: But will it be a ‘hollow victory’ with the banks recouping the money with other charges? - The Financial Ombudsman Service has a collection of online documents, reference materials & links – giving the background to their work on complaints involving payment protection insurance (PPI), which may be of particular interest to businesses & consumer advisers.
Forthcoming event: Gartner Application Architecture, Development & Integration Summit | 16 - 17 June 2011| London - Cloud, SOA, Agile and Applications Overhaul: A Modern Applications Strategy - As an application leader within Government and Public Sector you face many challenges. As cost is a major ongoing consideration, a relentless focus is required to determine what trends to embrace, what technologies to invest in and what deployment models to adopt. Cloud, web, mobile and social trends will have a major impact on governments and public sector institutions and the implications for overall application architectures will be significant.
The upcoming Gartner Application Architecture, Development & Integration Summit, 16 – 17 June 2011 in London, UK, is the must-attend event for application leaders who want to learn about the critical building blocks of a successful applications strategy: Cloud, SOA, Agile development and Applications Overhaul.
Click here View the full agenda and register.
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