News

A new poll has underlined growing concerns about the rise of far right politics in mainland Europe.

Reprinted from Hugh Muir's column -  Guardian. co. uk

African/Caribbeans struggle to get bank loans. Discrimination – or proof that banks help those who help themselves?

Early last December David Lammy MP highlighted the problem of the low number of black students admitted to Oxford and Cambridge Universities and called it the ‘Oxbridge Whitewash’. He wrote in the Guardian:

Such is our expectations of fearing for the worst it seems a near miracle that 14-year-old Serena Beakhurst who went missing for nearly three weeks has been found safe and well.

Talk show host and Amercian Black businesswoman Oprah Winfrey has launched her own television network called Oprah Winfrey Network or OWN for short. The new channel started broadcasting at noon on the 1st of January and aims to be a network without "mean-spirited" programming according to Winfrey.

A new poll has found that the Liberal Democrats are experiencing their lowest ever level of support. The coalition partner has slumped to its lowest level since the party was formed just over 20 years ago.

According to the Independent newspaper, Nick Clegg is now the most unpopular third party leader since David Owen led the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in 1989. The Liberal Democrats' 11 per cent rating in the first poll of polls since last May's election highlights the dramatic slide in their fortunes since they entered the coalition with the Conservatives.

The number of Britons converting to Islam has doubled in the last 10 years reports a new survey carried out by the inter-faith think-tank Faith Matters.

Faith Matters calculated that there were nearly 70,000 converts to Islam in the UK in 2001 and that 56% were white Britons.

In the year ahead, Britain’s Black and minority ethnic communities will face the greatest challenge for over a decade.

In the next few months the Coalition Government’s cuts will begin to bite and there is no hiding the fact that BME communities could be hardest hit. This is because historically too many within our communities have been either close to poverty or consumed by it.

President Barack Obama is to step up his involvement in Africa in an attempt to better engage with the continent. The move has been welcomed by supporters who felt disenchanted after his election by a seeming reluctance to place a greater emphasis on Africa.

Political analysts say that Obama, whose father was Kenyan, is paying much greater attention to the continent after pressing matters in Afghanistan and Russia were put on more secure footing.

Last year a law allowing police counter-terrorism stops without suspicion, under section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000, was scrapped by Home Secretary, Theresa May, after European judges overruled it as breaching human rights.

But last week Police went back to the government to ask for new powers to stop and search people without having to suspect them of involvement in crime.