UK News: Major losses continue in benefit claim errors

Published on Thursday 20 January 2011 10:41

THE Department for Work and Pensions is not doing enough to stem losses of £1.1 billion a year caused by benefit recipients making claim errors.

Three years into a five-year clampdown, there was "no discernable decrease" in the amount of cash lost to customer errors, said the National Audit Office.

Murder suspect quizzed

DETECTIVES were questioning a 32-year-old man today on suspicion of murdering landscape architect Joanna Yeates.

The suspect was detained in the early hours of yesterday. Dutch engineer Vincent Tabak, 32, is registered as living at a neighbouring flat where teams started searching yesterday.

Blair returns for fresh questions in Iraq probe

TONY Blair was set to face fresh questions about his decision to take Britain to war with Iraq when he made his second appearance before the Chilcot Inquiry today.

The former prime minister has been recalled to explain gaps in his earlier evidence and apparent discrepancies between his account and official documents and other witnesses' testimony.

He was expected to be grilled about what promises he made to former US president George Bush.

Record prices for petrol

THE price of petrol is rising at the highest rate for ten years. Average prices between mid-December and the middle of this month increased from 122.14p per litre to a new record of 128.27p, the AA said.

The previous highest monthly petrol price rise in the last decade was 5.6p a litre between May and June 2008.

Diesel went up from 126.19p a litre in mid-December to 132.75p a litre in mid-January.

Galloway makes Nazi jibe

HOLYROOD candidate George Galloway compared former Downing Street communications chief Alastair Campbell to Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels.

Mr Galloway made the comments on the BBC's Question Time last night, when asked about the Iraq war.

Dover: The largest ferry to journey across the busiest waterway in the world will set off on its maiden voyage today. P&O Ferries' new 152 million ship, Spirit of Britain, will set sail across the Channel from Dover to Calais with a capacity to hold up to 2000 passengers.

London: An appeal to trace a teenage mother who abandoned her newborn baby boy at a hospital was launched by police today. Baby Quy, pronounced Kwee and meaning "precious" in Vietnamese, was born at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow on Saturday, January 15. His mother left the next day and has not returned.