New police stop and search powers to counter the IRA threat
THE GOVERNMENT was to rush through emergency legislation extending police powers to stop and search terrorist suspects, it was announced during this week of 1996.
Home Secretary Michael Howard told MPs that the measures to be introduced through amendments to the Prevention of Terrorism Act were urgently needed to counter the renewed IRA threat following the ending of the ceasefire in Northern Ireland.
The new measures would bring the law on the British mainland into line with that of Northern Ireland.
Shadow Home Secretary Jack Straw indicated that Labour would not stand in the way of the new powers.
However, a number of Labour MPs, Liberal Democrat deputy leader Alan Beith and the nationalist SDLP’s Seamus Mallon expressed dismay at the way they were being rushed through without proper debate. Meanwhile, Prime Minister John Major was gearing up for a live US-style televised debate with Tony Blair, in an attempt to revive Tory fortunes in the run-up to the general election.
For the first time, the Tories appeared to be ready to agree to a headto-head contest.
Mr Blair seized the opportunity and challenged the Tories to call an immediate general election.
Sitting prime ministers had traditionally regarded such presidential-style confrontations as high-risk - as likely to backfire as to boost ratings.
But Tory chiefs had come round to the idea following months of trailing Labour in opinion polls.
A new body to safeguard the environment started work, and one of its first tasks was to tackle the legacy of industrial pollution in Yorkshire and Humberside.
Decades of pollution by the region’s traditional heavy industries along with the increasing problems caused by traffic congestion were at the top of the agenda for the Environment Agency, one of the biggest organisations of its kind in the world.
The new body would bring together the work previously done by the National Rivers Authority, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Pollution, 83 waste regulatory authorities and parts of the Department of the Environment.
Among the most pressing problems in Yorkshire were polluted water seeping from abandoned mineworkings, the amount of waste entering the Humber, pesticide pollution of the Air and Calder, and the effects of power station emissions in Leeds and Sheffield.
Moves to encourage single mothers to transition from state benefits to paid work had been a resounding failure, according to York-based charity the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
Its study showed that measures introduced three years previously and enforced by the Child Support Agency had not achieved their aims.
Researchers said that recent changes had been directed more at easing the maintenance burden onto responsible fathers, and had failed to resolve problems faced by single mothers claiming benefits.
Findings, based on detailed interviews with 53 mothers, showed that there were too few cash incentives to wean mothers off state benefits and into paid employment.
And finally, astronomers were excited over the Comet Hale-Bopp passing very close to Jupiter.
It’s believed that previously the comet, on what might’ve been its first voyage around the sun thousands of years ago – almost collided with the planet.
Among the most pressing problems in Yorkshire were polluted water seeping from abandoned mineworkings