Media Watch - July 14
Top Birmingham City Council Stories:
A dangerous place to be a kid? (BBC One) Inside Out documentary on Birmingham children’s services, with director for people Peter Hay interviewed at length, including on how the authority is improving.
Call for ‘superhead’ to quit in failing academy fallout (Birmingham Mail) A member of Birmingham City Council’s education scrutiny committee has suggested that head teacher Liam Nolan should resign as chief executive of Perry Beeches Academy Trust following a damning Ofsted inspection of one of its schools, Perry Beeches III, which was rated ‘inadequate’. Quotes Cllr Barry Bowles and also references previous comments made by Cllr Brigid Jones.
Pastor’s apology after accusing Islam of being a ‘religion of hate’ (Birmingham Mail) Pastor Steve Crosthwaite, of the Hollywood Christian Life Centre in Birmingham, has apologised following comments he made about Islam during a Sunday sermon at the church. Quotes Cllr Waseem Zaffar offering to meet the churchman to discuss Islam.
Gull cull petition opposed by RSPB (Birmingham Mail) A petition calling for a cull of gulls in Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter has been shot down by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. More than 170 petitioners are calling on Birmingham City Council to apply to Natural England for a licence to cull the birds, which they say are a menace to members of the public.
Regional Headlines:
A gang who carried out a machete raid on a 67-year-old Post Office boss in Moseley have been jailed for a total of 17 years and four months. The trio were caught after the postmaster managed to call police while left alone for a few moments during the robbery.
Students at the University of Birmingham have hit out at ‘joyless professors’ after claiming they have been banned from throwing their graduation caps into the air – because of health and safety fears.
National Headlines:
A deal on limiting Iran’s nuclear programme in return for the lifting of sanctions has been reached at talks in Vienna, diplomats say. Under the agreement, access for nuclear inspectors monitoring Iran’s programme would reportedly not be automatic.
There has been a substantial increase in violence in jails in England and Wales, the chief prisons inspector is expected to say today in his annual report. Nick Hardwick is also set to say prisons are failing in their objective to rehabilitate inmates. There were more than 15,000 assaults in men’s prisons in England and Wales last year, National Offenders Management Service data shows – the highest annual figure in a decade.
