But Nigel de Gruchy general secretary of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers said:

But Nigel de Gruchy, general secretary of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers said: “The principle that education authorities should intervene in failing schools is unchallengeable. I wonder why, having had that this power for over 50 years, they fail lamentably to use it.”Doug McAvoy, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, attacked Mr Blair for his continual concentration on schools which were failing, when most were successful.n Gillian Shephard, Secretary of State for Education, yesterday refused to rule out a “hit squad” of educational experts for the Ridings School, Halifax, which was temporarily closed two months ago after discipline collapsed.. In a multi-million pound government package aimed at regenerating run-down town centres, the Secretary of State for the Environment, John Gummer, yesterday pledged pounds 900m in cash grants and approved a further pounds 600m priority borrowing schemes for councils. The funding will result in a variety of projects, including improving housing and transport and facilities for young people.

Schemes such as updating shopping centres and clearing land for industry will be boosted by public and private investment and aim to bring long-term jobs and prosperity to run-down areas.
But the awards met with criticism from local government associations who said that they did not make up for government cuts. The cash grants are part of the Government’s Single Regeneration Budget Challenge, which is in its third year. The 180 new schemes, plus 370 already approved, are expected to generate pounds 7.5bn of private-sector funding, in addition to pounds 3bn from the Government over seven years.Winning schemes chosen by Mr Gummer included a pounds 12m plan by the London Boroughs Recycling Consortium to provide every household in London with a recycling box for rubbish by the millennium. A spokesman for the consortium said: “This initial cash, though less than we hoped, is a good start to help boroughs get door-to-door recycling schemes off the ground.”There was pounds 9.5m for Stockport in Cheshire, which will receive pounds 5.18m to bring new life into its historic centre and can earmark a further pounds 3.75m for a scheme to improve the environment. And the Cross River Partnership in London was given pounds 11.6m for improving crossings along the Thames.Mr Gummer told a conference in London yesterday the Capital Challenge scheme had allowed local authorities rather than government to decide the priorities. He said: “The schemes will support a number of economic development projects, with elements of local area regeneration and development, education and training projects, and expenditure on infrastructure.”However, the awards were criticised last night by local government associations who said they were too small – and left too many bidders disappointed. A joint statement by the Association of County Councils, Association of District Councils and the Association of Metropolitan Authorities, said: “Money for regenerating local communities should be based on need, not competition.”.

The long-awaited Criminal Cases Review Commission will finally begin its work on 1 January, a full three years after its recommendation by the 1993 Royal Commission on Criminal Justice. The members of the commission, which takes over scrutiny of alleged miscarriages of justice from the discredited C3 section at the Home Office, will be disclosed tomorrow in a written Commons answer. But the list – the chairman, Sir Frederick Crawford, was named in the summer – could be as noteworthy for who is not on it asfor those who are.
One third of the commissioners must be lawyers and two-thirds must have knowledge and experience of the criminal justice system.Several candidates with knowledge of miscarriages of justice failed to make any headway. They include all three members of the independent Just Television company – David Jessel, Steve Hayward and Steve Phelps – who have campaigned for people who had been wrongly convicted.Chris Price, the formerLabour MP and director of the former Leeds Polytechnic, failed to get an interview after applying to be chairman, even though he had experience of running a big-budget organisation and had campaigned for the Confait brothers, whose convictions were quashed by the Court of Appeal.Martin Short, the author of a book on Freemasonry, was rejected as a potential member. Sir Frederick, a leading Freemason and former scientist, company director and vice-chancellor of Aston University, was picked from 124 candidates. The Home Office had failed to check whether he was a Freemason and the question was added as an afterthought to the application forms.Sir Frederick will be questioned on Freemasonry by the Commons Select Committee on Home Affairs in the new year.. The Government is expected to allow the transplant of specially- bred pigs’ hearts and kidneys into humans, in a report to be published next year.

The move is expected despite new scientific findings which have discovered that some genetic material from viruses in pigs could cross over into humans, where it might cause new diseases – or have no effect at all.
The Department of Health denied yesterday that it has delayed the publication of an advisory report, chaired by Professor Ian Kennedy of King’s College London, into “xenotransplantation”, which puts organs from a different species into humans.Such transplants, using animals which have been genetically engineered not to cause tissue rejection, could ease the enormous pressure for human organ donors, who presently meet only a small percentage of demand.David White, chief executive of Imutran, a Cambridge-based company which has produced pigs with human genes so that their organs would not be rejected when transplanted to humans, said that there is nothing to stop the company from beginning transplants to humans tomorrow “But if we did, we would be regarded as irresponsible. We have had a request from the Government not to proceed until the Kennedy report is published, and we have agreed.”He added that almost two years ago, Imutran’s research had shown the possibility of pig viruses crossing in a transplant to humans, and that it had informed the Kennedy committee and the US Food and Drug Administration “The FDA is happy with our data, and for us to go ahead. We are really waiting for the Kennedy findings.”Suggestions of a cover-up were raised yesterday by a newspaper story which suggested that the report’s publication was delayed because ministers feared that genetic material known as “retroviruses” in pigs could cross over to humans and cause as yet unknown diseases, while bypassing the body’s defence systems.But the Department of Health insisted yesterday that there has been no delay to the report’s publication, following its delivery in the summer to the Secretary of State for Health, Stephen Dorrell.”The Government will publish its report sometime in the new year, and we shall have to wait until then,” said a spokesman.One member of the Kennedy advisory group, which included experts in genetics and ethics, also insisted yesterday that the report is in favour of allowing xenotransplantation, provided adequate safeguards – including close monitoring of patients – are used.The members are believed to have thought that using pigs’ organs rather than those from monkeys or apes would reduce the risk of new diseases, because humans and pigs are further apart in evolutionary terms than primates such as baboons and chimpanzees, which are the other likely candidates for non-human organs.Retroviruses are the genetic codings for a virus which have become incorporated into an animal’s own DNA. They have no harmful effect on the animal, and are found in every cell.But if retroviruses cross to another species, they can have unpredictable effects.

HIV, which causes Aids, is a retrovirus which originally came from monkeys. Other illnesses, including forms of influenza and bacterial infections, have passed from animals to humans.Clive Patience, of the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR), said: “Basically, we have such early data on these retroviruses that we can’t predict the effect it might have on patients.” But a key ICR experiment had shown that pig retroviruses could grow in human cells.. Schools could be banned from shopping around the examination boards for a pick and mix of preferred syllabuses in an attempt to boost their results under proposals being considered by government curriculum advisers. Instead, schools could be forced to choose just one of three approved awarding bodies to cover all subjects. The step is among a package of measures under discussion aimed at restoring flagging public confidence in the consistency of standards across qualifications.
A powerful committee, including the heads of the agencies overseeing academic and vocational qualifications, the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority (SCAA) and the National Council for Vocational Qualifications (NCVQ), is examining the proposals, outlined in a paper seen by The Independent.