UK & Ireland in Brief

A website designed to educate children about Scotland’s controversial Named Person scheme has been described in late October as ‘blatant propaganda’ by critics, as it aims to convince children that state guardians will be their ‘friends’.

The site said that the Named Person would be like a ‘rosy-cheeked old lady’. This comes after surveys (described at the time as ‘creepy’ and now suspended) in trial areas of Scotland saw state-sponsored surveyors knocking on doors asking people if they knew of any children living in the street.

Stephen Hammersley, CBE, was announced in late October as the new chief executive of the Pilgrims’ Friend Society (PFS).

Stephen has been chief executive for the last ten years of UK Community Foundations, an umbrella body providing leadership and support to 48 community foundations across the country. He will take over the PFS reins from outgoing chief executive Peter Fullarton, who said that the Society’s vision is challenging and the needs of its beneficiaries are immense.

Pro-marriage and pro-life Christians have been listed next to terrorists by a group of secularists and atheists in a manifesto calling for the establishment of an ‘international front against the religious-right and for secularism’, launched in mid-October.

Signed by homosexual-rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, the National Secular Society’s president Terry Sanderson and prominent atheist A C Grayling, concerns have been raised that genuine concern about murderous terrorists is being hijacked to attack evangelical Christians.

The Liberal Democrats have backed a motion during their party conference in October, to end Christian assemblies in schools.

A motion to ban faith-based selection in state-funded schools was defeated, after Business Secretary Vince Cable and Justice Minister Simon Hughes said it risked ‘really serious harm’. The law requires that schools conduct acts of collective worship ‘wholly or mainly of a broadly Christian character’. Delegates also voted to allow transsexuals to identify as ‘X’ (unspecified) on their passports.

The Northern Ireland Assembly voted in mid-October to criminalise paying for sex, and voted to support the introduction of statutory child trafficking guardians alongside statutory victim support.

In voting for these provisions Northern Ireland now leads the way in having the very best anti-trafficking and exploitation legislation in the UK.

The Daily Telegraph and The Times report-ed in October that guidelines on assisted suicide have been relaxed, meaning that doctors are less likely to face prosecution for helping the terminally ill to take their own lives.

The articles highlight that the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Alison Saunders, has amended the guidelines so that only those caring directly for a terminally ill patient will be at risk of facing criminal charges if they assist that patient with committing suicide.

Muslim leaders have a duty to warn their own followers about the ‘indescribable tragedy’ of the persecution of Christians around the world, Prince Charles insisted in November.

He said that faith leaders must not remain silent. His comments coincided with the publication of a new report which concludes that Christians are the ‘most persecuted religious minority’ in the world and that Muslim countries dominate the list of places where religious freedom is most under threat.