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An apology seems insufficient considering the circumstances. Telegraph: ******** Alexandra Hospital in Redditch is writing to 38 families after a massive legal action that exposed years of bad practice, ranging from nurses taunting patients to leaving an elderly woman unwashed for 11 weeks. In one of the worst cases, a man had starvation recorded as the cause of his death after being treated at the hospital for two months. Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, said last night that he was "disgusted and appalled" by what the families had been through, and that the Government was acting to ensure that failings...

SECURITY chiefs fear an al-Qaeda cell funded by the British “White Widow” plotted to bomb a German railway station, The Sun can reveal. The attack in Bonn would have resulted in a massacre like the one in the Spanish capital Madrid in 2004 which left 191 people dead. But the device failed to explode and was disarmed before it could detonate. Intelligence sources in Germany say that al-Qaeda was behind the conspiracy — which encompassed “many operatives” overseas, including wanted Brit Samantha Lewthwaite. Last night a source said: “Remember this was a primed device that was of the size of...

The nurse who committed suicide after answering a hoax phone call about the Duchess of Cambridge made two attempts to kill herself last winter, and had been prescribed antidepressants. Jacintha Saldanha, who took her own life days after the call from Australian DJs pretending to be the Queen and Prince Charles, attempted to commit suicide last December with an overdose of pills during a family visit to India. She survived after being rushed to hospital, but tried to commit suicide again just nine days later by apparently jumping from a building. … Although Saldanha’s family have previously said she did...

Britain pays out more on welfare than high spending social democratic nations in Scandinavia, according to a think-tank. Nearly seven out of ten children now live in a home that receives at least one cash handout other than child benefit, says the hard-hitting study by the Institute for Economic Affairs. And some 17 per cent of children – around 2.1 million – live in a home where no adult is working ‘easily the highest rate in Europe’. The think-tank’s report, Redefining the Poverty Debate, spells out how a generation of the less well-off have become enslaved to state benefits that...

The Archbishop of Canterbury backed stricter gun controls in the wake of the Sandy Hook school massacre, saying the ready availability of weapons in a society where fear is already "rampant" pushes people to extreme violence. Delivering BBC Radio 4's Thought for the Day, Dr Rowan Williams also warned that Britain had "better not be complacent" about the gang-related gun and knife crime affecting its own youngsters. A minute's silence was held in America on Friday to remember the 20 children and six adult victims of the Connecticut shootings which have thrust the fraught gun control debate back into the...

A Conservative MP who served as a soldier in Northern Ireland has questioned the need for prosecutions in the Bloody Sunday killings. On Thursday, it was revealed that a team of 15 detectives will head up a murder investigation into the 1972 shootings. They will be led by a senior investigating officer who will be based in Londonderry. Patrick Mercer said he is “confused” by this latest development and does not know what prosecutions will achieve. …

Vincent Banks, 44, from Smithfield, Dublin was brought before the Irish Special Criminal Court in Dublin on Wednesday where he was charged in connection with the murder in November of Northern Ireland prison officer David Black. Banks was charged with membership of an unlawful organization styling itself as the Irish Republican Army (IRA) on December 18th, 2012. Banks was also charged with withholding information in relation to the murder of David Black. …

Former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, the country’s first woman elective leader, is in hospital recovering from surgery to remove a growth on her bladder, a source close to the family said on Friday. After experiencing pain in her bladder earlier in the week, he 87-year-old went to hospital where she underwent a minimally invasive operation, Tim Bell, a public relations executive who once served as image maker to Thatcher, said. …

A wave of biker gangs from the US, Canada and Australia arriving in Europe has raised fears of deadly turf battle like the Nordic biker wars of the 1990s, European police agency Europol warned on Friday. Gangs such as the Comancheros and Rebels from Australia, Rock Machine from Canada and the Mongols and Vagos from the US were moving into Europe. ... The gangs were seeking out particularly a dangerous hard core of recruits in their bid to seize territory to traffic drugs, weapons and people... The gangs "have a propensity to use extreme forms of violence", including with Kalashnikov...

BAE unveils £2.5 bn deal for military jets to Oman LONDON — British defence giant BAE Systems unveiled on Friday a £2.5-billion ($4.1-billion, 3.1-billion-euro) deal to sell 12 Eurofighter Typhoon combat jets and eight Hawk trainer planes to Oman. The deal, which will help sustain thousands of jobs in Britain, is the first major order since BAE Systems failed to merge with European aerospace giant EADS earlier this year, but failed to boost shares in the British company. "BAE Systems and the government of the Sultanate of Oman have entered into a contract for the supply of Typhoon and Hawk...

British troops could return home from Afghanistan even “faster” than planned, David Cameron has said, as 3,800 troops are scheduled to be withdrawn by the end of next year. … Speaking to reporters at Camp Bastion, the main operational headquarters for British troops, Mr. Cameron said the proposed timetable for troop withdrawals was “flexible”. “Of course there is always flexibility in any plan,” he said. “But I would make the point that so far, things have surprised on the upside in terms of the capability of the Afghan forces. So we might be able to move a little bit faster....

... there are over 2,000 crimes recorded per 100,000 population in the UK, making it the most violent place in Europe. By comparison, America has an estimated rate of 466 violent crimes per 100,000 population.

It’s easy to chuckle at Starbucks’ tax troubles. The java merchant that has successfully enticed millions to pay for the privilege of hearing words like “barista” and “doppio” sprinkled over their morning jolt has made a specialty of offering a little dollop of sanctimony in every cup, promising to calm the conscience even as it raises the heartbeat. Shibboleths like “sustainable,” “fair trade” and “responsibly grown” seem to add value to its self-regarding clientele. Alas, Starbucks’ now-notorious “tax avoidance” policy in the United Kingdom proves that once you start chugging a Venti of self-righteousness, you may find yourself getting force-fed...

A scathing report into the BBC's handling of a shelved Newsnight exposé of Jimmy Savile revealed a culture of "suspicion and mistrust" at the corporation, riven by factions and in-fighting with "rigid management chains" that rendered it "completely incapable" of dealing with the scandal when it was exposed. One senior BBC executive resigned and another three were moved from their jobs following the publication of the 185-page report by Nick Pollard, the former head of Sky News. After a six-week inquiry that examined more than 10,000 emails and other documents and interviewed 19 people, at a cost of £2m, Pollard...

Barack Obama has warned Britain against leaving the European Union, it emerged today. The US President used a call to David Cameron to urge him to resist calls to abandon Brussels, ahead of the PM delivering a major speech on Europe in the New Year. But President Obama is understood to be backing Mr. Cameron’s approach in his fight for a “better deal for Britain”. …

More than 40,000 people have been slaughtered in Syria and the death toll rises daily. The European Union does not appear to be particularly concerned. North Korea's rulers have launched a three-stage rocket, moving closer to their goal of developing a nuclear-tipped ICBM, and they're sharing nuclear weapons technology with the world's leading sponsors of terrorism in Iran. The EU does not seem to be worrying about that, either. Israel is considering building homes on barren hills adjacent to Jerusalem. The EU's 27 foreign ministers said they were "deeply dismayed," and warned Israel of unspecified consequences if the plan is...

Israel's spate of settlement expansion around Jerusalem has increased again with the approval of 2,612 homes in a move likely to further inflame international criticism of Binyamin Netanyahu's government. Givat Hamatos, across the pre-1967 Green Line between southern Jerusalem and Bethlehem, will be the first new discrete settlement created since 1997. Critics say it will become part of a chain of settlements in the area, further impeding access between the two biblical cities. European diplomats in Jerusalem have warned that the construction of Givat Hamatos is a "game-changer" which could destroy the chance of a viable Palestinian state with East...

A MALE primary school teacher stunned parents today after revealing he would return to classes after the Christmas holidays as a woman. Transsexual Nathan Upton, 32, will become Miss Lucy Meadows in the New Year following his sex change. Pupils at St Mary Magdalen’s Church of England school – motto: Reaching our potential together in Christ – have been informed about the schoolmaster’s “transition”. Parents said Nathan told children he had been “born with a girl’s brain in a boy’s body”.

With David Cameron now saying a Britain out of Europe was now 'imaginable', US agitation has reached a new high The Obama administration has expressed concern at what US officials see as Britain's slide towards the European exit door. Washington firmly believes that the departure of its strongest partner in Europe would also reduce American influence on the continent, as Britain so often shares American views. An EU without Britain would be seen as weaker on free trade and less reliable on defence and foreign policy issues. With David Cameron now saying a Britain out of Europe was now "imaginable",...

LITTLE Maddalena Douse is one of the smallest premature babies ever to survive in the UK — thanks to a pair of SCISSORS. When she was born six months ago at just 23 weeks she was so tiny docs did not know if they should try to save her. But when they put her on the scales she weighed 1lb, the minimum weight for a baby to be considered viable — so they fought for her. Only when she was safely on a ventilator did medics discover the scissors had been accidentally left on the scales and that 8in Maddalena...