Social Smokers 'In Denial' Over Their Habit

Almost a quarter of smokers believe they only have a social habit despite the fact many smoke six to 20 cigarettes a day, new research reveals.

A poll of 2,000 smokers found 24% class themselves as social smokers - but more than one in three of these buy up to a packet a day.

Around 60% of all those questioned said they have tried giving up in the past, with women being slightly more likely than men to have tried quitting.

One in six of those who had attempted to stop smoking succeeded for over a year but then slipped back to their old habits.

Some 13% said part of the reason they took up smoking again was because their friends smoked and they did not like being left alone on nights out.

Of those who did go back to smoking, 47% said they had initially cut down how many cigarettes they smoked.

The poll also found that 54% of smokers admitted to smoking in banned areas, such as indoors in public spaces.

Catherine Cox, primary care manager at The Co-operative Pharmacy, which carried out the poll, said: "The smoking ban in public places has had a major effect on the health of the nation with a significant number of people giving up.

"But many smokers are convincing themselves they are consuming less tobacco than they actually are by classing their habit as a 'social' one.

"People see it as more acceptable to be a social smoker than admitting they regularly light up each day, even though our research shows that this is the case.

"Just smoking a few cigarettes a day has an impact on your health and the wellbeing of those around you."

Public Health England's national director of health and wellbeing, Kevin Fenton, offered this advice: "There are a variety of different ways to help people stop smoking and it is important that everyone finds a way that works for them.

"Pharmacists are easily accessible and well-placed to offer ongoing support, keeping motivation levels high along the way."

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Bingo Hall Burden: MPs Call For Tax Cuts

By Adele Robinson, Sky News Correspondent

The UK's bingo hall business will "stagnate" if the Government does not cut tax on it, campaigners say.

More than 50 MPs are backing calls to reduce duty and bring levies on the game in line with other forms of gambling.

Bingo hall profits are currently taxed at 20% compared with a 15% rate for most other gambling activities.

Campaigners estimate that reducing bingo duty is expected to raise around £40m for the Exchequer over four years.

Miles Baron, from the Bingo Association, says investment is vital for growth.

"By building new clubs and investing in new clubs, attendances would improve that would generate more income, that would generate new taxes, that would employ more people ... this is at the heart of the community, this is a vital and important part of some people's social repertoire."

Campaigners claim gambling taxes are forcing more and more clubs to close

The Government says it would have to carefully consider before reducing the rate because its priority is to cut the budget deficit.

Jim Cunningham, Labour MP for Coventry South, says if more support is not given then the "social service" side of bingo will be lost.

"The implications can be that some of these places may have to close because they're not profitable and if that happens then there is a problem for some of these elderly people, during the day in particular, to find somewhere else to go."

Nearly 400 bingo clubs across England, Scotland and Wales are hosting free bingo games this weekend to support the campaign to cut tax.

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Mikaeel's Mum Detained As Body Discovered

Police searching for missing three-year-old Mikaeel Kular have found the body of a young boy.

Assistant Chief Constable Malcolm Graham announced the discovery just after 1am at a hastily convened news conference at Police Scotland's Edinburgh HQ.

There were gasps from people who had gathered for the update as he announced that the body had been found shortly before midnight

One person - understood to be Mikaeel's 33-year-old mother Rosdeep - has been detained in connection with his disappearance.

The body is understood to have been found at a property in Kirkcaldy, Fife, where the family lived before moving to Edinburgh, Sky News Scotland Correspondent James Matthews said.

ACC Graham said: "The investigation into the disappearance of Mikaeel Kular has been wide-ranging and fast moving.

Rosdeep Kular is said to have been detained

"As a result of enquiries the body of a young child was recovered in Fife just before midnight.

"We strongly believe this to be the body of Mikaeel.

"A person has been detained in connection with the recovery of the body and members of Mikaeel's family have been informed of the recovery."

Mikaeel was reported missing from his home in Edinburgh on Thursday morning.

Hundreds of police officers from across the UK joined the search and lines of volunteers swept the local area, searching for clues about his disappearance.

There was shock when ACC Malcolm Graham announced a body had been found

Police were told that Mikaeel had not been seen since his mother put him to bed on Wednesday night.

On Friday evening ACC Graham revealed the boy had not attended nursery since before Christmas and said there were "grave concerns" for his safety.

Sky News Crime Correspondent Martin Brunt in Edinburgh said: "We know that according to the police, a person was detained last night.

"The police haven't named that person detained, but we understand from our sources that it's Mikaeel's mother Rosdeep, known as Rosie.

Hundreds of people volunteered to help with the search for Mikaeel

"Under Scottish law, she can be detained initially for 12 hours during questioning and then on the say so of a senior officer can be held for another 12 hours.

"At the end of that period police must decide whether to release her, charge her or formally arrest her." 

Police analyst Graham Wettone told Sky News: "(His mother) will be questioned as police try to establish what has taken place."

Police Scotland officers have cordoned off a road and been carrying out searches at a property in Kirkcaldy understood to be connected to the Kular family.

The force has not disclosed exactly where in Fife the discovery of the body was made.

The body is being left in situ for forensic and scenes-of-crime officers to carry out investigations.

There was sadness and anger among families living near Rosdeep Kular's home in Ferry Gait, Edinburgh, as they woke up to news of the grim discovery.

Jackie Brownlee, 29, a mother-of-two who lives opposite the family home, told Sky News that local people will support each other as they try to come to terms with what has happened.

She said: "Everyone was hoping and now that hope's gone - we still can't believe it. But I think the community will come together because we have to."

Her son Darren, 11, added: "He was such a cute lad, always running around the street. I can't believe it's happened in my street - I'm really scared now." 

Denise Fergus, the mother of James Bulger, the two-year-old who was murdered in Liverpool in 1993, tweeted her condolences.

She said on Twitter: "My heart is aching for that poor boy Mikaeel Kular brings it all back so sad."

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£85m Secure College For 320 Young Offenders

An £85m secure college is to be built to educate up to 320 young offenders.

It will be built on land next to Glen Parva Youth Offenders Institute (YOI) in Leicestershire, and is part of a wider shake-up of youth custody.

A team of educational professionals and offender managers will be led by a head teacher at the college, with modern living blocks to accommodate the inmates.

A competition is to be launched for new organisations to bid for education contracts at the current publicly-run YOIs, as the government seeks to more than double the average of 12 hours a week education provided to up to 1,300 young offenders.

Labour says the Government has failed to explain how it would fund the new facility, due to open in 2017.

Meanwhile campaigners for prison reform say the money spent on the college would be better invested in community support for children.

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said: "We need to turn these young people into better citizens not better criminals.

"If we want to stop prisons being colleges of crime, we have to teach these kids how to do something else."

There were 1,323 young people in youth custody in England and Wales at the end of November last year.

In the 12 months ending June 2013, 6.3% of all young offenders sentenced received a custodial sentence.

For the 12 months ending December 2011, the most recent period for which figures are available, 71% of young offenders re-offended within a year of leaving custody, compared to 46% of adults leaving custody.

Frances Crook, chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said the Government had been successful at reducing the number of children sent to prison, but building a secure college would replicate "the mistakes of the past".

She said: "Privately run 'secure training centres' were designed to educate, yet they have failed to reduce re-offending and children have died within their walls."

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Police 'Cover Up Wrongdoing', Most Britons Say

By Mark White, Home Affairs Correspondent

More than half of Britons believe there is a culture of cover-ups within the police, a Sky News poll has found.

A total of 53% of members of the public questioned in the survey agreed that forces try to hide officers' wrongdoing. Just 18% of people polled disagreed that cover-ups take place.

The findings follow a series of controversies in which police have been accused of making serious mistakes and then attempting to shield officers from blame.

In 2012, it emerged that scores of statements from officers involved in the Hillsborough disaster in 1989 had been doctored to remove evidence of police failings.

Since September that year the Metropolitan Police has been embroiled in a damaging row with the former Chief Whip Andrew Mitchell, over whether he had called an officer guarding Downing Street a "pleb".

And last week the Met faced criticism in the wake of the shooting of Mark Duggan, whose death in 2011 prompted widespread rioting and looting.

An inquest jury found that armed police had acted lawfully in killing Mr Duggan, but his family have insisted officers shot an unarmed man.

However, the Sky News poll - commissioned as part of a series of reports on the police entitled A Fair Cop? -  found that despite these incidents, a large majority of the public still trust officers.

Asked whether their trust in police had changed over the past five years, 62% of those questioned said it had stayed the same, while 31% said it had gone down.

A total of 72% said they would trust the police to act if they reported a crime and 67% would trust officers to deal with them if they were the victim of a crime.

In relation to the conduct of officers over Hillsborough, 44% of those questioned said they now trust the police less, although 49% said it had made no difference.

Most people said the Mark Duggan case had not hit their trust in police

The so-called 'Plebgate' affair prompted 51% of those questioned to say they had less trust in police, with 43% saying it made no difference.

However, 61% said the Mark Duggan case had not affected their trust in police. A total of 21% said they had less faith in officers, a number that increased to 40% among people who described themselves as non-white. 15% said they now trusted the police more.

Regarding police tactics, 60% of people who took part in the poll said they believed that 'stop and search' - a policy that ethnic minorities claim unfairly targets them - does more good than harm.

However, the same number of people questioned said they did not believe police should be able to use people's ethnic background to decide who to stop, a strategy known as racial profiling.

:: The Sky News poll was conducted by Survation who questioned 1,005 people earlier this week.

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Miliband Promises 'Reckoning' With Big Banks

Ed Miliband has promised to force the big five banks to give up "significant" numbers of branches to make way for new competitors if Labour wins the next general election.

In a keynote speech on the economy at the University of London, Mr Miliband will say the financial services industry has been "an incredibly poor servant of the real economy".

He will blame a lack of competition in the sector for misselling scandals and a £56bn drop in lending to business since 2010.

The Labour leader is attempting to flesh out his party's economic policy for the next Parliament.

Ed Miliband will set out the Labour Party economic policy

But he risks being overshadowed by Chancellor George Osborne's backing of a significant rise in the national minimum wage.

Mr Miliband will promise to introduce a legal maximum threshold for any bank's share of the market in personal accounts and small business lending, with powers to force the sale of branches and block mergers and acquisitions to prevent it being breached.

Under the proposals, the Competition and Markets Authority would report within six months of the May 2015 general election on the level the threshold should be set at and the timetable for the sell-off of branches, which would be completed by 2020.

He will say: "We need a reckoning with our banking system, not for retribution, but for reform.

"If we carry on as we are, we will end up stuck with the same old banks dominating our high street: the old economy.

"In America, by law, they have a test so that no bank can get too big and dominate the market. We will follow the same principle for Britain and establish for the first time a threshold for the market share any one bank can have of personal accounts and small business lending."

Earlier this week, Bank of England governor Mark Carney said a cap on banks' market share "would not result in substantial improvement to competition".

He told the Commons Treasury Committee: "Just breaking up an institution doesn't necessarily create or enable a more intensive competitive structure."

Business Secretary Vince Cable said he agreed with Mr Miliband's desire for increased competition but insisted that "many of the things he is calling for have actually happened".

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Cancer: Ageing Population Blamed For Increase

By Hind Hassan, Sky News Reporter

Nearly a third of a million people are diagnosed with cancer every year, according to a UK charity.

Some 330,000 people were diagnosed with some form of the disease in 2011 - an increase of almost 50,000 per year over a decade. Researchers say an ageing population is one of the reasons for the increase.

Jessica Kirby from Cancer Research UK said: "People's risk of cancer goes up significantly as we get older; the more older people we have in our population the more people will develop cancer.

An aging population is one reason for the increase

"There are other reasons for the rise as well; changes in risk factors for example. We know that more and more people are overweight compared to the past which is one of the key factors for cancers."

But greater awareness, advanced technology and ongoing medical research means cancer is being detected earlier and those that have it are living longer.

Edward Scott believes an early diagnosis of testicular cancer saved his life. The 15-year-old discovered a lump last year and sought urgent advice.

"I went on the NHS website and I found all the symptoms for testicular cancer were symptoms that I had," he said.

"The same day I went to my mum and said 'Mum there is something really wrong, I have to go get this sorted out'.

"I went into the GP and the same day I found out I had cancer."

Cancer Research UK's chief executive Dr Harpal Kumar said: "These figures reinforce the vital need for more research to better prevent, treat and cure cancer.

"Research is the only way we'll be able to reduce the devastating impact of the disease. One day we will beat cancer. The more research we do, the sooner that day will come."

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Food Safety: Worst Councils Named And Shamed

Local councils that are failing to ensure food businesses comply with hygiene regulations have been named and shamed by a consumer watchdog.

The investigation into 395 local authorities by Which?, using data obtained from the Food Standards Agency (FSA), revealed more than a third of high and medium-risk food businesses are not complying with safety rules.

The hygiene risk of a business was based on the type of food, the number of consumers at risk, the method of processing and confidence in the management.

Local authority food checks are in decline according to the study

Local authority rankings were based upon criteria such as the number of premises compliant with hygiene requirements, the number of visits performed by council inspectors and the percentage of premises yet to receive a risk rating.

Bexley in London was exposed as the worst-performing local authority, with five further London councils appearing in the bottom 10, including Ealing, Enfield, Harrow, Richmond upon Thames and Southwark.

The study revealed that overall, food testing fell by 6.8% from the previous year, while testing for correct labelling and presentation fell by 16.2%.

The figures showed no hygiene sampling at all was carried out by Bexley, Christchurch, Isles of Scilly, Medway, Tamworth, West Lindsey and West Yorkshire authorities.

Which? executive director Richard Lloyd, said: "No one wants another horse meat fiasco, so it is very worrying that local authority food checks are in decline.

"We want to see a more strategic approach to food law enforcement that makes the best use of limited resources and responds effectively to the huge challenges facing the food supply chain."

But the Local Government Association defended local authorities it said were "working hard" to improve food hygiene standards in the face of government funding cuts.

The Local Government Association's regulation spokesman Nick Worth said: "Random sampling is just one tool available to councils and a reduction in testing does not mean an increased safety risk to the public.

"Targeting high-risk businesses and acting on complaints is a far more effective use of their limited resources and also allows councils to free up responsible businesses from unnecessary inspections and red tape."

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Sam Wanamaker Playhouse To Open Its Doors

By Richard Suchet, Arts And Entertainment Correspondent

A new indoor space next to Shakespeare's Globe theatre will be opened officially on Wednesday, fulfilling the dream of the theatre's founder - the late Sam Wanamaker.

The newly-built Jacobean theatre called the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse - a candlelit venue - will stage plays throughout the year, to complement the open-air Globe theatre on London's South Bank.

The playhouse will seat 340 people with two tiers of galleried seating and an historically-accurate pit seating area. 

A memorial plaque to Sam Wanamaker near the Globe theatre (pic: Oosoom)

Artistic director Dominic Dromgoole said: "The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse offers us a unique opportunity to explore the theatre practice of Shakespeare's day and the theatrical context within which he worked.

"We hope that the Wanamaker Playhouse will afford as many insights, and prove as theatrically rejuvenating, as the Globe has proved over the last 16 years."

The inaugural production to be staged at the new venue is John Webster's The Duchess Of Malfi, starring Gemma Arterton.

It will be followed by a production of Francis Beaumont's The Knight of the Burning Pestle.

The first part of Sam Wanamaker's vision was realised in 1997 with the completion of Shakespeare's Globe.

The second phase was to build an amphitheatre next to the Globe that would replicate the indoor playhouses of the Jacobean era (1603-1625).

Unlike the Globe, it is not a replica of one particular theatre.

The layout has been based on drawings found in a book in the 1960s that would appear to be a design for an indoor playhouse and £7.5m has been spent fitting out its wooden interior.

Every performance will be lit by candlelight and in many cases the cast will carry their own candles, as they would have done 400 years ago.

Sam Wanamaker (R) with a model of the proposed Globe Theatre in 1972

As well as William Shakespeare, Jacobean theatre is associated with playwrights such as Ben Jonson, John Marston and Thomas Dekker.

The official opening kicks off a season of early modern drama, opera and exclusive one-off performances and concerts, with tickets starting at £10 each.

American film director and actor Sam Wanamaker died in 1993. He is the father of British actress Zoe Wanamaker, who has starred in the Harry Potter series of films and the sitcom My Family.

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N Ireland Child Abuse Inquiry: Hundreds Respond

By David Blevins, Ireland Correspondent

More than 400 people have applied to speak to the state inquiry into historical institutional abuse in Northern Ireland, the largest tribunal of its kind anywhere in the UK.

Most applications, some 280, were from people living in Northern Ireland, but 63 came from Great Britain, 61 from Australia, 20 from the Republic of Ireland and the remainder from elsewhere.

The Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry was established by the Stormont Executive this time last year and will hold its first public evidence session today at Banbridge Courthouse in County Down.

It has a remit to investigate historical child abuse and/or neglect in institutions over a 73-year period up to 1995 and is currently investigating 13 establishments, including Kincora Boys' Home in Belfast.

Kincora was the scene of a notorious sex scandal and while three members of staff were convicted in the 1980s, questions remain about who knew what and why it continued.

The inquiry's chairman, Sir Anthony Hart, a retired senior high court judge, will make a short statement before an opening address from senior counsel to the inquiry, Christine Smith QC.

More than 300 witnesses are expected to give evidence during the public sessions, the majority in person although some may give their evidence in writing or via a live video-link.

Applications to participate in the statutory inquiry are now closed but potential witnesses can still apply to speak to the Acknowledgment Forum, a less formal evidence-gathering process operating in parallel.

The first "thematic module of evidence" will focus on two former institutions run by the Sisters of Nazareth: St Joseph's Home and Nazareth House Children's Home, both in County Londonderry.

The public hearings are expected to continue until June 2015 and under the terms of reference, the inquiry must complete its investigation by mid-summer and submit its report by January 2016.

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