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Russia says no progress on Ukraine ceasefire

22 Aug 2014

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov says no progress has been made in Berlin talks on establishing a ceasefire between government and rebel forces in the east of Ukraine. Following the talks between Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine on Sunday, Lavrov said all issues related to sending a humanitarian convoy to Ukraine have been resolved. ‘One place where we cannot report positive results is in, first and foremost, establishing a ceasefire and [starting] a political process,’ Lavrov told a Berlin press conference that was carried live by Russian state television. Talks concluded with an agreement for the sides to meet again and continue trying to de-escalate the worst East-West crisis since the Cold War. Lavrov accused Kiev's new pro-European leaders of continually changing demands over what it would take to establish a truce after more than four months of fighting with pro-Russia separatists that has claimed more than 2,000 lives.

Tackle ‘national pandemic’ of alcohol abuse, say MPs

22 Aug 2014

Minimum pricing and tough new rules for drink-driving were amongst a host of recommendations unveiled by a group of MPs and peers this week, in response to a ‘national pandemic’ of alcohol abuse. The All Party Parliamentary Committee on Alcohol Misuse revealed its manifesto for 2015, which demonstrates the cost of alcohol-related incidents, and calls for new measures to minimise alcohol-related harm. Incidents ranging from drink-related crime to hospital admissions are thought to cost the UK economy as much as £21 billion annually. In the foreword to the manifesto, Tracey Crouch, who chairs the group, said: ‘The facts and figures of the scale of alcohol misuse in the UK speak for themselves’. She believes that there ‘must be a more thorough and full package of measures which tackles the problem more effectively and reduces the cost to people’s health of alcohol-related crime and treatment’.

Pensioner families to suffer social security cuts

22 Aug 2014

Pensioner families across the UK will suffer social security cuts worth £6.38 billion a year by the time the government’s welfare reforms have taken full effect, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) warned yesterday (18 August) ahead of a new report on the impact of social security cuts to be published later this week. In the run-up to the last general election, David Cameron pledged to protect pensioner benefits. However, the TUC-commissioned analysis of welfare cuts, undertaken by Howard Reed of Landman Economics, shows that this pledge has been broken as a result of changes announced by the government over the course of this parliament. The analysis looks at annual cash losses to a number of benefits. It shows that a quarter of all social security cuts implemented between 2010 and 2016/17 will fall on pensioner families.

David Cameron says policies must pass 'family test'

22 Aug 2014

All government policies will have to pass a ‘family test’, David Cameron has announced. He argued that parents and children were too often overlooked and could be left worse off by reforms. He said online music videos could be given age ratings and more money would be put towards relationship counselling services. Labour said he did not understand families' needs, as more households were now dependent on food banks. From October, every new domestic policy ‘will be examined for its impact on the family’, the prime minister said. Mr Cameron told BBC Breakfast that no politician wanted to be ‘accused of being judgemental’ over people's personal relationships, but added that government would ‘help people who come together to stay together’. In his speech he said: ‘I want every government department to be held to account for the impact of their policies on the family.’