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David Cameron, the Prime Minister, in a speech designed to show that Britain was no longer to be a ‘soft touch’ for immigrants, said that people from the European Union would have to show they had a ‘genuine chance of getting work’ in order to claim UK unemployment benefits for more than six months. The UK Border Agency was to be abolished, the Home Secretary, Theresa May, told the Commons, because its performance was ‘not good enough’, and ‘the number of illegal immigrants removed does not keep up with the number of people who are here illegally’. The agency would be split up and returned to the Home Office, with one half focusing on the visa system and the other on immigration law enforcement. David Miliband, the former foreign secretary, announced that he was leaving politics to become head of the International Rescue Committee charity in New York.
In its annual report on counter-terrorism, the Home Office said that more than 500 people, including those who held extreme far-right views or were inspired by al-Qa’eda, had been put through a counter-terrorism deradicalisation programme called Channel. It also said that hundreds of European jihadists had gone to Syria to fight. Thousands in Scotland and Northern Ireland were left without electricity for days when snow formed deep drifts and ice brought down pylons. Castle View School in Canvey Island, Essex, banned triangular flapjacks after a boy was hit in the face by one.
The government response to the Francis report on failings at Stafford Hospital decided to place a duty of candour on NHS boards, to set up a new ratings system for hospitals and care homes, and to make trainee nurses spend up to a year working as healthcare assistants. During a television interview, Eddie Mair questioned the integrity of Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, asking him if he hadn’t lied when Michael Howard, the then Tory leader, asked him about an affair. ‘You’re a nasty piece of work, aren’t you?’ he asked. Boris Berezovsky, aged 67, the Russian oligarch and critic of President Vladimir Putin, was found dead at his house near Ascot in Berkshire. An app invented by Nick D’Aloisio, aged 17, was acquired by Yahoo, which gave him a job in a deal said to be worth millions of pounds.
Abroad
An answer to the Cyprus banking crisis that did not require a vote in its parliament was found by the European Union, European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Laiki bank was closed down, with deposits of more than €100,000 moved into a ‘bad bank’, smaller deposits being moved to a restructured Bank of Cyprus. Capital controls were to be introduced to stop money being taken out. Anyone with more than €100,000 in either bank would have 30 or 40 per cent expropriated. This was expected to raise the €5.8 billion required towards a €10 billion bailout. European bank shares fell after Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the Dutch finance minister who played a role in the Cyprus scheme, suggested it could be a model for future bailouts. President Nicos Anastasiades was said to have threatened to resign during negotiations in Brussels.
In Syria, Moaz al-Khatib resigned as head of the opposition National Coalition, but before he went he took Syria’s official seat at an Arab League summit in Qatar. Colonel Riad al-Asaad, who was instrumental in setting up the Free Syrian Army, had a leg amputated after an explosion in the rebel-controlled town of Mayadeen. Israel agreed to resume passing on tax revenues it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority. Buddhist monks joined in attacks on Muslims in Burma. Giulio Terzi, the foreign minister of Italy, resigned after two marines were returned to India to stand trial for killing fishermen instead of pirates. Hundreds of thousands marched through Paris in protest against a bill to legalise same-sex marriage. Pope Francis visited Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Castel Gandolfo.
France doubled to about 600 the number of its troops deployed to protect French citizens as rebels seized Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic. At least 13 South African troops were killed fighting the rebels. China agreed to buy 24 fighter jets and four submarines from Russia. Armoured personnel carriers were used in the Ukrainian capital, Kiev, to drag buses out of snowdrifts when a month’s snow fell in 24 hours. The number of dead pigs found in a fortnight in the river Huangpu at Shanghai rose to 16,000. –CSH
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