News in Brief

“It has become a Revelation 13 Government rather than a Romans 13 Government,” he said.

Revelation 13 is one of the most quoted chapters of the Bible by those prophesying apocalypse. By contrast, Romans 13 advocates respect for the law, God and authority.

Bishop Dow was speaking at the release of God, Gays and the Church, a book intended to put the conservative evangelical side in the debate on gay rights.

Challenged afterwards about his comments, Bishop Dow said: “I didn’t mean to say the Government was demonic.

“The point I want to make is the change from a positive evaluation in Romans 13 to a negative one in Revelation.”

Bold granny’s grip puts robber in jail

A grandmother who clung on to a robber’s legs has seen him jailed because she forced him to run off while she hung on to his distinctive white trainers.

The mugger, David Newman, who is 6ft 5in, made the mistake of picking on 64-year-old Patricia Bourne, who fell to the ground and hung on until his shoes came off.

Newman, 31, fled the scene of the attack in Bournemouth on his bicycle with Mrs Bourne chasing after him, clutching a shoe in each hand.

Newman, a drug addict with 91 previous offences including theft and robbery, only admitted theft at first but finally admitted robbery when he realised that the trainers would prove there had been a struggle. He was sentenced to four years’ jail.

After the sentencing, Mrs Bourne, a retired nurse, said: “I was filled with anger and determination that this man should be stopped. I saw his ankles and just thought to myself that I had to stop him somehow and grabbed his trouser legs.

“That got him off balance but I remember him telling me to get off him. As I pulled at him his shoes just slipped off in my hands.”

Cerne Abbas top village by long chalk

A Dorset community watched over by the 180ft chalk figure of a naked giant has been identified as Britain’s most desirable village.

Cerne Abbas, population 800, came top in a survey that took into account house prices and lifestyle factors, including schools, pubs, shops, transport, lack of noise and the crime rate.

The village narrowly beat Much Wenlock in Shropshire and Coxwold in North Yorkshire in a survey organised by the estate agent Savills, which has a waiting list of clients wanting to buy a home in Cerne Abbas. Even a modest property will fetch £600,000.

Despite its small size, Cerne Abbas has three pubs, two tearooms, a post office, a primary school, a new village hall, sports fields, a doctor’s surgery and a 14th century church.

Wendy Charman, one of Cerne Abbas’s more recent arrivals, having moved there two years ago, said: “People have been known to buy any property they can in Cerne Abbas while they wait for the right one.”

Fireworks boss held over blaze deaths

The owner of a fireworks factory and his son have been arrested on suspicion of manslaughter over the deaths of two firefighters in a series of explosions at their plant, right. Martin Winter, 50, owner of Festival Fireworks UK, near Lewes, East Sussex, and his son Nathan Winter, 23, were questioned and released on police bail until April 23. The explosions, on December 3, 2006, killed Geoff Wicker, 49, and Brian Wembridge, 63. Festival Fireworks, one of the country’s biggest importers, had been responsible for the Millennium display on the River Thames.

£12,200 for Prince’s secret jewellery

An 18th-century Jacobite ring used by Bonnie Prince Charlie to pass on secret messages sold for £12,200 at auction yesterday.

An anonymous private collector paid four times the ring’s estimated value at Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh. The ring, which bears the inscription CRIII 1766, would have been worn by a messenger to prove that he or she was carrying official documents from the Prince, as anyone found with his papers would almost certainly have been sentenced to death. Bonnie Prince Charlie fled to France after his Jacobite army was defeated at Culloden in 1746.

London candidate wants numbering for cycle couriers

Cycle couriers would have to wear number plates under a proposal intended to clamp down on cyclists who ignore red lights, ride on the pavement and fail to stop at zebra crossings (Ben Webster writes).

Brian Paddick, the Liberal Democrat candidate in the London mayoral election in May, will pledge to introduce compulsory licensing for bike messengers.He said: “When I was in the police . . . I witnessed many near-collisions with pedestrians and countless examples of selfish, dangerous behaviour. Most complaints I get are about cycle couriers. If they had to wear licence plates, they would ride much more responsibly because they would know that they could be identified and traced. They are exploiting their anonymity.”

He said the public could report offending couriers to the Public Carriage Office, which would issue a warning letter. “Repeat offending would result in them losing their licence, as happens with taxi drivers.”

Lib Dems defy party

Nick Clegg is facing his first big test as Liberal Democrat leader after David Heath, the justice spokesman, and Nick Harvey, the defence spokesman, said that they would defy the party line over the Lisbon treaty and vote in favour of a referendum – which could cost them their frontbench positions.

Fast-food damage

One month of too much junk food and too little exercise can significantly harm the body, researchers have found.

In a study reminiscent of the film Super Size Me, experts from Linkoping University in Sweden said that volunteers who ate fast food twice a day for 30 days gained 14lb (6.4kg) on average, with one volunteer putting on two stones in two weeks. Most of them suffered damage to their livers. Varuna Aluvihare, a consultant hepatologist at King’s College Hospital in London, said: “The startling thing about the study is how fast it happens.”

Fewer homeowners

The number of homeowners fell by a record 83,000 last year as the high cost of housing pushed more Britons into rented accommodation. The fall was most acute for buyers aged under 44 and those in London and the rest of the South.

Research by the Halifax bank showed that a trend for increased home ownership had reversed, with a ten-year low of only 14.5 million homeowners. Martin Ellis, the Halifax chief economist, said: “Affordability issues are most pronounced among younger people and in southern parts of England.”

More want university

Record numbers of applications were made to universities this year according to Ucas, the admissions service. More than 430,000 people applied to start full-time undergraduate courses at British universities by the January 15 deadline. There was only a small increase in applications from working-class candidates – from 28.9 per cent to 29.6 per cent. Gemma Tumelty, the president of the National Union of Students, said: “Top-up fees could be seriously hampering the Government’s agenda to widen participation in higher education.”

Warning for hospitals

High-cost hospitals could go bust if they fail to become more efficient, according to an Audit Commission report. It says that the system under which hospitals are paid a fixed price for treatments – Payments by Results, a cornerstone of the NHS reforms – has had little effect on efficiency.

Quicker care cases

The Ministry of Justice has issued guidance designed to cut delays in care hearings in the family courts. The Public Law Outline, drawn up with the help of judges, will cut the six stages of the court process to four, and aims to reduce unnecessary hearings. The new guidance will come into force in April.

Farthest galaxy of all

A galaxy, which is 13 billion light years from Earth, is the most distant galaxy in the Universe, astronomers said. Light from the galaxy was observed by the Hubble Space Telescope. “This is the most detailed look to date at an object so far back in time,” Garth Illingworth, of the University of California, said.

Elderly pilot killed

A pilot believed to be in his 80s was killed when his light aircraft crashed on the edge of a reservoir, police said. The elderly man was flying the small privately owned plane alone when it came down near Empingham, by Rutland Water. Formal identification had yet to take place last night.