9am Briefing: Mark Beaumont rescued in Atlantic after boat capsizes

ADVENTURER Mark Beaumont was in a team of rowers rescued from a life raft in the North Atlantic after their boat capsized.

The six crew members of the Sara G were taking part in the Atlantic Odyssey challenge from Morocco to Barbados, and were 27 days into their journey when the 36ft vessel overturned at 11am yesterday 520 miles from their destination. Coastguards in Falmouth, Cornwall, said the rowers were picked up from the raft, which they had lashed to the hull of their overturned boat, at 1.10am by the Nord Taipei, a Panamanian-flagged cargo ship.

A coastguard spokesman said: “They are all safe and well on board and proceeding to Gibraltar, where they are due to arrive on February 9.”

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• THE daughter of woman stabbed to death in Wester Hailes has been told the murderer is to be released from prison within weeks, it was reported today.

Michelle Williamson was just 15 when her mother Marie Annis was killed by Steven McIlvaney. He had been baby-sitting his sister’s five children with Marie in January 1996 when he attacked her. He was jailed for life in May that year, but is now set to get out on parole.

Ms Williamson said: “I’m absolutely gutted. Life should mean life - this murder should not be let out.”

• A NEW poll on independence shows support for the Union slipping.

The Ipsos Mori survey found 39 per cent in favour of independence - up one point since December - while 50 per cent said they were against independence, compared with 57 per cent two months ago.

The poll, which followed last week’s launch by First Minister Alex Salmond of the referendum consultation, asked 1005 people the question which the SNP says will appear on the ballot paper: “Do you agree that Scotland should be an independent country?”

SNP campaign director Angus Robertson said: “This is an excellent poll, confirming that the momentum is with the independence case.”

• DAVID Cameron has urged the Royal Bank of Scotland to show “restraint” in its bonus packages for senior colleagues of chief executive Stephen Hester.

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The Prime Minister said the remuneration arrangements put in place by the former Labour government for executives at the part-nationalised bank had to be followed.

But he added: “They have got to have proper regard in terms of restraint when they have had so much money from the taxpayer and they have made so many mistakes in the past.”

Mr Cameron’s comments come as a number of executives in RBS’s investment branch are expected to be offered large payments in the coming weeks.

• VIOLENCE against Scottish prison officers has reached a five year high.

New figures show there were 188 assaults on officers in 2011 - a 50 per cent rise over four years - and 698 prisoner-on prisoner attacks.

But Addiewell in West Lothian is one of the better performing prisons, with attacks on staff falling from 45 in 2009 to 19 last year, and prisoner-on prisoner incidents down from 83 to 43.