Paedo rethink
THE major sentencing review which could increase the likelihood of jail for paedophiles is hugely welcome.
After the scandalous leniency last week towards BBC star Huw Edwards, The Sun launched our Keep Our Kids Safe campaign, demanding prison for anyone caught with the worst images.
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We called for “a new intolerance towards perverts fuelling a heinous global trade which destroys children’s lives”.
We are delighted Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood listened and will include it in her shake-up of the sentencing regime.
Edwards possessed unthinkably foul Category A material. Yet like 80 per cent of similar offenders he walked free.
The court even gave a hearing to truly pathetic efforts at mitigation: That Edwards was a fragile soul who had a domineering dad and hid his true sexuality for years. That he felt inferior at the BBC because he did not go to Oxbridge.
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Imperfect childhoods and university disappointment cannot possibly excuse paedophilia. We need a fitting punishment for warped men like Edwards — and a meaningful deterrent for others.
We hope the review concludes the same.
Nurse ratchet
MANY will be aghast to see nurses overwhelmingly reject a wage rise at well over twice the rate of inflation.
Labour too must have thought the chaos the RCN union inflicted on the NHS by striking under the Tories was finally sorted by the 5.5 per cent award.
The RCN may be misjudging the mood of a nation which wants a better NHS but is wary of public sector union greed.
But the danger is that any union — having seen the staggering no-strings-attached pay hikes for militant train drivers and junior doctors — thinks it can now expect the same.
RCN chief Professor Nicola Ranger candidly admits her members’ “expectations of Government are far higher”.
If the Tories were still in power the union would already have called a strike ballot. But they are giving their favourite party a chance to up the offer.
The test for Labour, what with its “£22billion black hole”, is whether they are prepared finally to say No.
Rayning cash
WHO said this?
“Balancing my own department’s budgets brought me back to the old days when I had 60 quid to get me and my son through the week. I know more than most that every pound counts.”
That was Angela Rayner, Labour’s Deputy PM, two days ago.
Next day it was revealed she has hired a personal vanity photographer on £67,000 a year paid by the public.
Every pound may count when it comes to her own cash.
With taxpayers’ moneyanything goes.