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Lib Dems plotting council tax hike for second homes
Government runs up record parking fines
Miliband turns to Twitter to fill in policy blank sheet
The lost boys of St Athan
Sentence review to slash numbers of women in jail
Very cold comfort: Sub-zero snap will continue for at least another week
Jim Murphy: 'Unions must not block ex-forces MPs in Labour's ranks'
Miliband vows to make Labour 'party of aspirations'
British aid to help fight Haiti cholera epidemic

Lib Dems plotting council tax hike for second homes

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:00 PM PST

Owners of second homes could be stripped of their council tax discount under Liberal Democrat plans to raise millions of pounds for town halls.

Government runs up record parking fines

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:00 PM PST

David Cameron's promised drive to cut the cost of government cars is being undermined by his ministers running up record levels of parking fines.

Miliband turns to Twitter to fill in policy blank sheet

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:00 PM PST

Non-party members are to be given a say in Labour's policy and leadership under radical reforms unveiled by Ed Miliband. The Labour leader warned his party that it could no longer be a closed shop of constituency members or union levy payers but had to become "rooted" in local communities. He launched a new slogan – "New politics, fresh ideas" – and urged the public to submit policy suggestions online.

The lost boys of St Athan

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:00 PM PST

The boys have long gone from St Athan Boys' Village. Its dormitories, church and the canteen that fed 200 boisterous young colliers enjoying a free holiday are now burnt and dilapidated. The ruin, on a windswept plot near Barry, south Wales, is the only known monument to a unique experiment aimed at giving teenagers a respite from doing the work of men, six days a week, in the filthy blackness of their country's coal mines. But nowthe former holiday village faces the threat of total erasure.

Sentence review to slash numbers of women in jail

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:00 PM PST

Ministers plan to slash the number of women sent to prison amid complaints that women behind bars are exposed to increased risks of mental illness, self-harm and even suicide.

Very cold comfort: Sub-zero snap will continue for at least another week

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:00 PM PST

Britain will have to endure its current cold snap – making this month one of the coldest Novembers in nearly two decades – for at least another week, the Met Office said yesterday.

Jim Murphy: 'Unions must not block ex-forces MPs in Labour's ranks'

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:00 PM PST

Veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are to be recruited as Labour candidates at the next election under plans to address the party's "glaring gap" of military experience in the Commons.

Miliband vows to make Labour 'party of aspirations'

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 04:03 AM PST

Ed Miliband today promised to make Labour the party of people's "hopes and aspirations" as he launched a full-scale review of its policies.

British aid to help fight Haiti cholera epidemic

Posted: 27 Nov 2010 03:08 AM PST

Britain will supply more than 1,000 medical staff to help fight the worsening cholera epidemic in Haiti, the government announced today.