To mandate that an automated inspector must jot down the fact of every exchange is to shrivel the domain of privacy

Trust us. It's for your own safety. Besides, it's not all that different from what we already do. Plans to monitor and log every form of electronic communication are heading towards the legislative slipway, and – as with many a dangerous idea – it is perfectly possible to pitch the case for them in a tone of sweet reason.

For as long as anyone can remember, the police have been able to interrogate the telephone bills of suspects to find out who they have been talking to. Valuable intelligence was often gleaned this way, and sometimes convictions for serious crimes. As the pattern of billing began to change in an evolving telecoms market, therefore, the previous government deemed it commonsensical to require operators to log calls in the traditional way, and persuaded Europe to agree. The claim now is that it is time for another incremental tweak, by adopting a new general presumption to monitor the myriad ways in which people nowadays get in touch with one another without recourse to the phone. There is no departure in principle, runs the argument, it is merely a case of the law catching up with the ways of a world in which the Twitter bird has long since knocked BT's Buzby off his perch.

This incremental logic masks the enormity of the change it is used to advance. In a society where people pursue their friendships, their interests and their romances online, to mandate that an automated inspector must jot down the fact of every exchange in a great cyber-notebook is to shrivel the domain of privacy. There are technical objections – experts say that to log a Skype call one might have to be in a position to eavesdrop on its content, potentially taking us from the well-trodden terrain of probing bills and towards the realm of tapping. The old distinction between glancing over a record of calls and listening in to their contents is in any case blurred where the records include web searches. An individual who had been Googling Gaydar or Alcoholics Anonymous could be as blackmailable as someone else whose bedroom was bugged. There are procedural alarms too. Why is the government rushing towards a bill without having set out and tested its plans in a green paper?

But the deepest challenge to the emerging official line flows from a difference in worldview. Whitehall starts out by observing that it is now possible to collate more information that it would be convenient to have, and then seeks to ensure that this gets collected. Very often the motive will be benign, but no outsider who recalls the steady stream of leaks from supposedly secure databases will be reassured. Knowledge is power, and power corrupts. Handing state servants privileged access to the lives of others will not end happily. The US supreme court understands that power derived from technology needs checking just like any other, ruling recently that it was unlawful to fit a suspect's car with a GPS, in a judgment which raises wider questions about prying through similar devices becoming ubiquitous in mobile phones. A coalition that once claimed liberty as its animating spirit ought to understand that the fact that a new form of surveillance is possible does not make it permissible.

During its first flush in power, this administration recognised that the undoubted utility of a vast DNA database was not sufficient reason for keeping intimate tabs on ever more innocent people. It talked about regulating CCTV, and – with both the Lib Dems and the Conservatives having set their face against Labour plans to snoop on internet use in opposition – the coalition agreement was explicit: "We will end the storage of internet and email records without good reason." Good reason, it appears, could now be deemed to apply wherever such records might potentially come in handy for the state, which is to say in every case.

Tomorrow the secret justice proposals will be in the spotlight – another case where the agencies put in an audacious opening bid for more powers, which ministers swallowed whole. The coalition once talked of a new reign of freedom, but the Empire is striking back.

The manager has been found wanting with British signings and his stance over the Luis Suárez affair did him no favours

The wail of anguish was both audible and unseemly. Steven Gerrard's attempted through-pass for Luis Suárez had not been well calibrated but the Uruguayan's petulant reaction to a badly weighted delivery appeared disproportionate. As Newcastle United exerted growing control during Sunday's 2-0 win over Liverpool on Tyneside, so the body language of Kenny Dalglish's players hinted at inter-camp tensions. Even worse, a few looked ready to wave white flags.

It was an impression reinforced by a post-game tweet from Suárez. "Difficult moments after the last matches," he posted. "We must continue to work until the end." By the time the final whistle blew on Liverpool's sixth defeat in seven Premier League games Andy Carroll had stormed down Newcastle's tunnel, swearing and looking close to tears after being substituted, while José Reina reflected on a needless red card after an idiotic attempted headbutt. As if the Anfield club's worst league run since 1953-54 and a haul of eight points from a possible 36 during 2012 was not bad enough, Dalglish's squad had added indiscipline to their problems.

In a cameo which can be interpreted as emblematic of his waning powers, Liverpool's manager marched on to the pitch in the wake of Reina's dismissal only for Gerrard to shoo him off it. While it would be cruel exaggeration to say that represented the England midfielder's most incisive contribution, the suspicion that Gerrard and Suárez have become disillusioned is inescapable. If Gerrard perhaps pines for the days when his perfect through balls serviced Fernando Torres, Suárez's record of three goals in his past 19 League appearances represents a poor return for such a gifted forward.

Fortunately for that pair most attention is now diverted to Carroll, the £35m former Newcastle striker with three League goals this season. Painfully unsuited to his new employer's playing style, Carroll must now recover from the very public, quite possibly misguided, humiliation of being substituted in front of his once adoring public. Should, as some now forecast, Liverpool's American owners, Fenway Sports Group, replace Dalglish during the summer, Carroll's signing in January 2011 will be identified as the moment decline set in for a man still rightly revered by his club's supporters.

In reality that ill-starred acquisition represents a symptom rather than a root cause of the malady afflicting Liverpool. When the Scot last won the title, at Blackburn Rovers in 1995, he did so with an almost exclusively British squad. Key components included a Geordie striker called Alan Shearer and a former Middlesbrough winger named Stuart Ripley but Dalglish's attempts to make history repeat itself at Anfield with a raft of British buys including the Gateshead born Carroll and the Teesside bred Stewart Downing threaten to ensure this season ends in tears.

Granted the Carling Cup has been secured and an FA Cup semi final against Everton looms but £55m spent on a winger who appears to have forgotten how to cross and a centre-forward whose feet seem to have turned to clay surely haunts the 61-year-old's nightmares. The mystery is that a manager who, right from the earliest days of satellite technology, has furnished his assorted homes with the equipment required to supply eclectic live televised football transmissions from assorted corners of the globe, remains so hooked on homegrown players' charms.

John W Henry and his Fenway colleagues must puzzle as to how a man boasting an exhaustively detailed knowledge of world footballers ever paid Sunderland £20m for Jordan Henderson, a midfielder whose initially promising form regressed dramatically at the Stadium of Light last season. Or imagined that Charlie Adam, recruited from Blackpool, could become the new Xabi Alonso.

"The biggest problem is that Adam, Downing, Carroll and Henderson between them have contributed six League goals," said Mark Lawrenson, the BBC pundit and former Liverpool defender who struggles to comprehend that his old team stand eighth, 16 points behind fourth placed Tottenham. "You should be looking at 25-30 goals between them. The four of them haven't done it; Carroll hasn't been the same player since he left Newcastle."

Of Dalglish's principal signings, the best three are the invariably impressive and increasingly mature Craig Bellamy, plus Suárez and the Spanish left backJosé Enrique. Nonetheless, the latter pair cost the best part of £30m, a sum which hardly chimes with the Champions League obsessed Liverpool hierarchy's supposed addiction to Sabermetrics. The theory underpinning the Moneyball concept, it essentially involves adopting Newcastle's successful policy of using statistics to unearth undervalued players in unlikely places.

When it comes to media strategy Dalglish has also been found wanting, his ridiculous defence of Suárez in the wake of the Patrice Evra affair merely serving to suggest he is operating in a pubic relations time warp. Charming, considerate, generous and amusing when microphones are switched off, he publicly presents a brusque brand of circumspection that is cringe-inducing and contrasts terribly with the savvy, press friendly personas of contemporaries such as Arsène Wenger and Harry Redknapp. Going into denial over Suárez's behaviour and Carroll's loss of form, the Liverpool manager sometimes resembles a child who, having covered his eyes with his fingers, believes no one can see him.

At a moment when Fenway are doubtless in scrutinising mood, Dalglish could do with moving into 21st-century mode.

The manner of the Swede's departure from Camp Nou has given this game edge and intrigue

Barcelona return to home comforts but they do not expect it to be comfortable. A 0-0 draw in the first leg at San Siro has left their passage to a fifth consecutive Champions League semi-final on edge. But if there was a doubt about whether they would seek to score goals or stop them – twist or stick – Pep Guardiola was adamant here. "I have the feeling," he said, "that Milan will score." Barcelona, then, must score twice at least. Leading by a solitary goal with the clock ticking down is an uncomfortable position in which the Barcelona coach does not wish to find himself.

He has learnt from hard experience. When these sides met in the group stage a last-minute header from Thiago Silva cost Barcelona a win; the same result would deny them the chance to defend their European title. "We will have to work to find the right way of attacking their defence," Guardiola said. "They have a very powerful counterattack. We must attack them as best we can, creating as many chances as possible. Milan will score; our objective is to create chances. We will need to be well positioned, impose intensity on the ball and move them round as much as possible, circulating the ball rapidly."

Barcelona may have to do so without their conductor, Xavi Hernández: the midfielder was included in the squad but will undergo a test on Tuesday morning after he missed Monday evening's session with a calf-achilles problem. "It has caused him a few problems over the last few days," Guardiola said, "but we have included him because we hope he can play. No one wants to miss these kinds of games, Xavi least of all."

Creating chances will not be simple. Reminded that Leo Messi, right, has scored only one goal – a penalty – in nine hours against Italian teams, Guardiola laughed: "It's not easy scoring against Italian defences; if they have to put eight men on the penalty spot, they will. And if you're saying he doesn't score against Italian defenders, watch out!"

As for Barcelona, they must watch out for Messi's former striker partner, a man forced from the Camp Nou. The threat is Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Towering over 6ft, a brooding and menacing presence, he casts a long shadow here. The manner of his dethroning and his departure, his bitterness since, has given this game edge and intrigue. It also gives Barcelona's defence a challenge. The Swede was no failure in his only season in Spain – he scored 22 times – but Messi's progression meant his eclipse. He has a score to settle.

Milan are seen in Spain as the least "Italian" of the Italian teams but there was little doubt that they will wait for their chance to pounce and the man they will look for is the man Barcelona know so well. "We have to be ready for anything," Carles Puyol said. "You never know, they might try to attack but they are comfortable waiting for their opportunity to break. They are very dangerous when they do, with Ibra[himovic], Robinho and Pato. Ibra is almost impossible to stop when it comes to a battle, body to body. He's physically very strong, difficult to mark. We have to make sure the ball doesn't reach him."

Guardiola went further. "If the ball goes up in the sky, it's his," the Barcelona coach said. "He's taller than us, he's stronger than us, we can forget it – that ball up in the air is his. You'd need a step-ladder to defend him. And when that ball's in the area, he is very dangerous. We have to keep him as far away as possible."

Much was made of Barcelona's difficulties in the first leg, with the San Siro pitch proving extremely slippery. Barcelona made a formal complaint after the game. But Puyol excused the Italians. "I don't think it was their fault," he said. "The stadium is very closed and I was talking to [Mark] van Bommel before the game and he says they are forced to change it six or seven times a season. We have had problems with our pitch before too. But now it is perfect and allows us to play our best football." Barcelona may need it.

For working women these are the worst of times. Whether it's job security, childcare or fair pay, we are going backwards

What kind of career trajectory do you need to caption a photograph of a topless Sienna Miller wearing birds? I ask because on Sunday Alexandra Shulman, the editor of British Vogue, expressed an opinion on women in the workplace.

"The reality is," she told the Observer, "if you take time out and have children, it does damage your trajectory in some way. I know it shouldn't, I know there should be a way round it, but I think it's really hard. Effectively, you're sort of out, really, for two or three years and that does make a difference. You can't pretend it doesn't."

So there it is, from one of the most senior women in British journalism – a sleepy acceptance, cut with an idle regret. She said much the same thing about the pay gap, which "kind of" interests her. "We ought to get paid absolutely equally for the work that we do," she said. "I don't think women are so good at fighting their corner as men."

Or maybe they aren't as good at having influential women acknowledge that someone has to have children, and that children and employment should not be incompatible? Shulman added that her infant son had disliked her working full time, which makes me wonder if he attended pre-budget meetings, and was listened to. "I hate that magazine," he would tell her. (That makes two of us, kid).

I will type until my fingers bleed; these are the worst of times for women, and the best of times for inequality, which is not a buzzword to be mocked but a phenomenon that is paid for in human tears. At a TUC event last month we lamented: we are going backwards. Women are leaving the workforce in ever greater numbers, to meet the usual fate of women who don't work in a shrinking state divesting itself even of free access to the Child Support Agency and legal aid – poverty, and indifference to poverty. When the current vogue for retro style rolled in – cupcakes and Mad Men and Julian Fellowes's reactionary fantasies – I thought it was a trend. I didn't realise it was a prophecy, hung with other assaults on women's needs, such as protesters standing like righteous zombies outside British abortion clinics. (Be pregnant, is their message. Be grateful).

The truth is an irrelevance here; women do not plead for special treatment, begging to enter the workplace so they can buy pretty things. It is established wisdom that working women benefit the economy, their families and themselves. Just last week it emerged that depression is more widespread in non-working women and, in the long-hours macho working culture that thrills business because it enables men's psychological dominance, what is the cost to them? Even the prime minister acknowledges the benefit of working women as he legislates to make them unemployed, in that strange childish way he has of wishing for something with one hand, and demolishing it with the other, which brings to mind the rage of Shulman's tiny son: "If we fail to unlock the potential of women in the labour market," he said, "we're not only failing those individuals, we're failing our whole economy." He said it and forgot it because the budget came – £10bn more in cuts.

So, some facts that won't make it into Vogue, with or without topless actresses and birds: this is a perfect storm of growing inequality. Last month, there were 1.13 million unemployed women in Britain, a 19.1% increase since 2009, and the highest figure for 25 years. (In the same period, male unemployment has risen by a mere 0.32%). According to data collected by the Fawcett Society, in the last quarter 81% of those losing their jobs were women; in some local councils 100% of those fired were female and, as ever, the poorest are hit most: black and minority ethnic women and those in the north-east are the first to go, and in the greatest numbers.

Many women are leaving work due to the cuts in child tax credit and child benefit. Unable to pay for childcare, they cannot afford to work, which is senseless and destructive, and will keep alive the dogma that women should not work into the next generation and beyond. A survey conducted by the charity Working Mums last year found that 24% of mothers have left employment and 16% have reduced their hours to care for their children; this is regressive, poverty in poverty, depression into depression.

These cuts should be overturned, but how to pay? With the 50% tax rate a historical anomaly, who knows or cares? A strategy for women's employment is necessary, encompassing women's security in the workplace, decent provision of childcare and the scandal of occupational and gender segregation, which, together, bring forth the pay gap.

The private sector will boom, says the government, and employ (some of) these women, although it doesn't have the nerve to promise more. Well, maybe. Was it Emma Harrison, the jobs tsar (now tarnished), who said: "There are always jobs" – adding, as is customary, the scent of blame to the welfare claimant? If they are lucky, women can look forward to their time in the private sector, with its disgraceful full-time pay gap of 20.4%, its inflexible working hours and, of course, its smiling walls of Alexandra Shulmans, telling them "it's hard". Down at the TUC last week, all was misery; we are walking, too swiftly, into the past.

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It may not be long before "snow stopped play" becomes a more familiar cricket hazard than in the past

Combine the quixotic decision to start the domestic first-class cricket season in late March with this week's wintry forecast for the northern counties in early April and it may not be long before "snow stopped play" becomes a more familiar cricket hazard than in the past. Cricket famously revels in such quirks, of course, but snowfall and cricket are not strangers. In 1888 it snowed in July, while in 1975 snow in June stopped county matches in Buxton (where Clive Lloyd and Farokh Engineer had a snowball fight) and Colchester. This was also the occasion when John Arlott wrote in this paper that snow had even fallen at Lord's during a game between Middlesex and Surrey, a report which triggered a complaint to the Press Council, which eventually found in the Guardian's favour. These days, social media might settle such disputes more quickly, providing that anyone was eccentric enough to be watching at the time, of course.

Exclusive PC caught on tape allegedly assaulting teenager, hours after colleague was recorded making racial slur

A policeman has been captured on tape allegedly assaulting a young black teenager just hours after a colleague of his was recorded abusing another man with a serious racial slur.

PC Joe Harrington has been placed on restricted duties after he was allegedly seen kicking the 15-year-old to the ground and kneeing him, in the custody area of an east London police station. Part of the incident was recorded on CCTV.

An independent investigation into the alleged assault on the 15-year-old concluded last week and a report, understood to recommend disciplinary action, was submitted to the Metropolitan police on Monday. The force will now consider what action if any to take against Harrington.

Hours earlier, Harrington was present when another officer, PC Alex MacFarlane, was recorded on a mobile phone telling Mauro Demetrio, 21, a black man from Beckton in east London, that "the problem with you is you will always be a nigger". Growing controversy over the two incidents, which occurred shortly after the riots last summer, have triggered urgent reviews by the Crown Prosecution Service into initial legal advice that neither officer should be charged.

The audio recording of the racist abuse caused a public outcry after it was released by the Guardian on Friday. It has unnerved senior officers at Scotland Yard, who are concerned about the fallout for the reputation of a force seeking to show it has recovered from recent controversies.

Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Metropolitan police commissioner, is understood to have told colleagues he was appalled when he listened to the recording.

The recording was made by Demetrio, who alleges he was strangled and racially abused after being arrested and placed in the back of a police van on 11 August – the day after the end of rioting in London last summer.

The mobile phone recording captured one officer saying that he strangled him because he was "a cunt". Moments later, PC MacFarlane abuses Demetrio and adds: "You'll always have black skin colour".

Harrington was not heard making any racist remarks on the recording, but was one of three officers initially investigated over the alleged mistreatment of Demetrio. MacFarlane, who can also be heard telling Demetrio "don't hide behind your black skin", has been suspended.

A CPS lawyer was asked to review the case in January, after an Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) investigation concluded that three officers – MacFarlane, Harrington and one other officer – may have committed criminal offences.

Carl Kelvin, from the CPS police complaints department, initially decided no charges should be brought against any of the police officers.

On Thursday, after being threatened with legal action by Demetrio, the CPS said it would ask a more senior lawyer to reconsider the initial decision, which was partly based on a belief that no alarm or distress was caused by the racist abuse.

Demetrio has spoken about how the racist abuse he suffered has left him feeling traumatised. Shortly after being driven to Forest Gate police station, he told police in the custody suite that he had been abused by police officers and urged them to listen to his mobile phone.

It was while he in the custody area that Demetrio witnessed Harrington allegedly assault the 15-year-old, who was handcuffed. Demetrio told investigators he saw Harrington kick the young teenager in the back of the leg and, once he was on the floor, knee him in the back.

He said the alleged assault made an "echoing" sound and the teenager cried out: "I am on the floor now – you can't do anything to me. I am handcuffed and I am on the floor."

Demetrio said that medical staff were called to the scene after the teenager, whose identity is not known, began making "strange" breathing noises for several minutes.

After Demetrio reported what he had seen, a separate IPCC investigation was launched into the case of the 15-year-old and CCTV of the incident was obtained – although the quality of the footage has been described as poor.

At an early stage of the investigation, IPCC investigators sought advice from the CPS to establish whether Harrington had committed a criminal offence.

"The CPS advised that on this occasion there was not a realistic prospect of a conviction in relation to the criminal offence of common assault," said IPCC Commissioner Mike Franklin.

The CPS lawyer who gave that advice was the same lawyer whose decision not to bring charges against officers recorded racially abusing Demetrio is now under review.

"This is clearly an important matter and I have this evening directed that urgent inquiries be made about any advice that may have been given," said Grace Ononiwu, deputy chief crown prosecutor for CPS London. "Once the full facts are known I intend to issue a further statement."

Keith Vaz MP, chair of the Commons home affairs select committee, wrote to the director of public prosecutions on Monday asking for detailed information about the decision-making process in the Demetrio case.

"You have on a number of occasions made it very clear that the CPS would act swiftly to resolve cases when it is in the public interest to do so," Vaz wrote to Keir Starmer. "I consider that this is such a case."

It may be in his own lunchtime – but Gorgeous George is definitely a 'ledgend'

• Delight at Diary HQ at the return to frontline politics of George Galloway, the Man They Could Not Satirise (or, it transpires, defeat in a byelection). And we're particularly chuffed that, thanks to technology's rampaging advance, admirers in Bradford West and beyond will be able to keep abreast of GG's movements to an extent undreamed of when he was last bothering parliament. Witness the GallowApp: "the comprehensive way of keeping up with George Galloway and everything he does", and available now for free download for Android or iPhones. We will resist stooping to some cheap gag about the Diary section of the app being entirely blank – as an irritated spokesman points out, the Galloway team have had a few other things on their plate of late – and instead congratulate them that, even with limited functionality before its full launch, it has already won 14 reviews on iTunes, every one of them a five-star rating. As user queraquera puts it under the headline "George is a super star ledgend": "This app is well good." Watch your back, Angry Birds. You're next.

• Meanwhile, back in Westminster it's the familiar spectacle of cunning political beartrap, ministerial cock-up and comical self-administered punch in the face. We refer (this time) to Francis Maude, the Cabinet office minister whose ill-judged jerry can advice last week was followed by a woman setting fire to herself in her kitchen while decanting petrol. Maude, the Diary has occasionally mused, is blessed with the appearance of an evil genius, just one of the many reasons why one should never judge by appearances. But what's this? A mole reminds us that in the Tories' darkest days in the late noughties, Maude led the "Implementation Team" charged with making the party electable again, and at a 2008 party conference meeting entitled "Preparing for Power" told delegates: "The press demands politicians be held directly responsible for everything that goes wrong" but "we are more grown up than that". In fact, he said, "some failures can be as useful in driving progress in successes." And we thought it was a gaffe! Fools. It's all part of the plan.

• Lucky old Prince Charles, for whom the fun just don't stop – on Tuesday the Sisyphean round of princely grip'n'grimace takes him to Wigton in Cumbria, as a guest of local MP Rory Stewart. Wigton, we are sure, is distinguished by many things that don't involve Melvyn Bragg, so one might consider it a little churlish of Stewart to boast of the honour the visit brings to the town "particularly when it has been working so hard to make so many improvements". It's a step up, all the same, from the Cumberland News, which after a long-running row over the closure of facilities at the Market Hall, was moved to refer to Wigton last week as "a one-toilet town". Kindly insert your own joke here about the royal wee.

• Calling all idiots prepared to spend £250,000 for dinner with David Cameron: Barack Obama is hawking himself about for just $500, "or whatever you can donate". That's because "people like you – not Washington lobbyists or special-interest [committees] – are the ones building Obama-Biden 2012 from the ground up," according to the president's re-election campaign website. He's a man of the people – as his wife told supporters. "I had the chance to go to one of these 'Dinners with Barack' just a few weeks back, and trust me, you don't want to miss out on it." Hang on a minute. He makes his wife pay $500 to have dinner with him?!? The man is an animal!

• The Titanic was made in Belfast, and sank 100 years ago this month. You may or may not be aware of this fact; if not, we gently suggest, you have not recently been in Belfast, which is sparing no energy in ensuring that no carbon-based lifeform can plead ignorance. Sharp-eyed locals have identified one or two voices of dissent, however – among them the stallholder selling T-shirts reading: "She sailed. She sank. Get over it." Brave, since it's only been 100 years. In the Northern Irish calendar, that's last Wednesday.

Twitter: @estheraddley

• Spurs forward says Arsenal are under pressure
• 'I'm confident we can finish third'

Rafael van der Vaart has suggested it is Arsenal's turn to feel the pressure after the race for Champions League qualification took another twist. The Holland attacking midfielder scored in Tottenham Hotspur's 3-1 home win over Swansea City on Sunday, which meant his team took full advantage of Arsenal's 2-1 defeat at Queens Park Rangers the previous day. Tottenham, in fourth place, are level on points with their north London rivals and behind only on goal difference.

Van der Vaart admitted that Tottenham had become affected by psychological jitters as they endured a sequence of five Premier League matches without victory. It coincided with Arsenal's resurgence and the 10-point advantage that Tottenham had held over their neighbours was wiped out in a matter of weeks. The most recent round of fixtures, though, has seen the margins alter again. Harry Redknapp, the Tottenham manager, said after his team's 0-0 draw at Chelsea the previous weekend that Arsenal could be overhauled and Van der Vaart shares the conviction.

"It was important, the match on Saturday ... away at QPR," Van der Vaart said. "QPR played really well and it helped us. I hope that Arsenal are also getting nervous. It was a really difficult game for us against Swansea because they keep the ball well and they have a great squad, so it was an important win for us.

"We were a little bit low on confidence but we showed against Swansea that we're still there and we want to be in the top three. There's still a long way to go but confidence is back. It's all to do with winning. When you don't win your games, it's also going in your head ... then you are a little bit more nervous.

"Arsenal kept on winning. They came back and I think we lost in two weeks 10 points. So it was quite hard but that's why we had to win against Swansea. Of course, I'm confident we can finish third, although I said a few weeks ago that we're going to stay in third place. We will see."

Tottenham's principal target for the season has long been a Champions League finish and coming in third to secure automatic qualification to the group phase is clearly preferable to fourth, which would necessitate a play-off. Spurs diced with elimination in a play-off against Young Boys last season before they progressed and Arsenal lived on their nerves against Udinese at the beginning of this season before also winning.

"You never know because in qualifying there are also some big teams and good teams," Van der Vaart said. "Of course it's important to finish third rather than fourth for the whole club. We want to have Champions League again because it was a great experience last season."

It is commonly believed that Champions League football would help Tottenham to retain their star players, particularly the midfielder Luka Modric, but it is unclear whether that would be decisive in the future of Emmanuel Adebayor. The striker is on a season-long loan from Manchester City, who are paying £100,000 of his £170,000 weekly wage, and he is reluctant to accept a pay cut to improve his chances of a permanent move to Tottenham, where the weekly wage ceiling is around £70,000.

"I hope that he stays but it is always difficult," Van der Vaart said. "I think the problem is the wages but he's a great player for us. It's great for us that he came because he's a top striker. I was surprised that he came and I hope that he stays.

"I played with [Ruud] Van Nistelrooy and he was fantastic and with Ade ... normally, strikers wait for the chance and they score but he is working and even when he doesn't score he is fantastic for the team. He's so positive. We love him here. Last season I had a good understanding with [Peter] Crouch but with him it's even better."

The City manager is clearly unhappy with the flawed striker, but Roberto Mancini's handling of his team in 2012 has raised questions about his own ability

Most football fans have a soft spot for flawed geniuses. After all, YouTube was invented so that those who weren't around at the time can enjoy the sight of "Slim Jim" Baxter, socks rolled down, taunting England's World Cup winners at Wembley, or Frank Worthington, on the edge of the penalty area and with his back to goal, flipping the ball up on his instep before lifting it over his head, then turning in the same movement to dart between two defenders and volley the dropping ball into the corner of the net. Quite often you hear people lamenting the absence of such headstrong characters from today's corporatised game.

But sometimes the damage they do outweighs the pleasure they give. The arrival of Baxter, already drinking heavily, wrecked the morale of Johnny Carey's carefully assembled Nottingham Forest side a few months after the Scot's masterclass under the Twin Towers. Three decades later Kevin Keegan's mid-season acquisition of the beguiling but erratic Faustino Asprilla destabilised Newcastle United's attempt to hang on to their Premier League lead. Older Manchester City supporters remember the disastrous introduction of Rodney Marsh in 1972. And at the heart of their club's current problems may be the effect of a man whose existence reminds us that the notion of the flawed genius did not die with Gazza's retirement but lives on: Mario Balotelli, of course.

Or rather not the effect of Balotelli himself, exactly, but of the way he has been handled. It would be extremely unfair to blame the erosion of City's lead in the league on a 21-year-old who arrived in England barely a year and a half ago, knowing no one except his manager and with money falling out of his pockets.

Since Mancini gave Balotelli his Serie A debut at Internazionale, he must have known that he was buying a freakishly gifted player prone to the sort of erratic behaviour that can be amusing in short bursts and at a safe distance but is likely to try the patience of team-mates who have no escape from it. Attempting to accommodate the ungovernable antics of his £24m protege has not come easily to a natural disciplinarian, a control freak who was already, as his old boss Sven-Goran Eriksson remembers, "a coach, a bus driver and even the kit man" when he was still a player. But Mancini's own behaviour on Saturday, as Balotelli went through his latest routine at the end of another week of bizarre headlines, was hardly beyond criticism.

In the end it was a toss-up as to which of them behaved more like a petulant kid: Balotelli, who scored twice but also shirked his responsibilities and argued with his team-mates, or Mancini, who claimed later that he had considered removing the striker after five minutes and reacted to his 85th minute goal from open play – which put City on the way to snatching a draw – with a disgusted shake of his head.

Would Sir Alex Ferguson have allowed the world to witness a similar reaction, assuming that he had got himself into such a position in the first place? We saw from the way the United manager handled Wayne Rooney's transfer demand in the autumn of 2010 and the recent decision to dispose of the talented but trouble-prone teenager Ravel Morrison that he knows when to apply the principles of expediency and pragmatism. Mancini, by contrast, was behaving like a helpless romantic, sighing and shrugging as his illusions crumbled along with City's lead.

When he was thinking about signing Balotelli, he should have recognised that here is a player with no fundamental loyalty even to the game of football, never mind to a club or his team-mates. Yes, Balotelli can do the sort of magical things that lift spectators out of the mire of ordinary existence. But Mancini's willingness to tolerate his chronic indiscipline appears to have affected the rest of the squad to the point where even James Milner, as unselfish a player as you could find, now shows signs of dissent.

A lot of things are going wrong all at once for City, and although some of them – including Yaya Touré's absence at the Africa Cup of Nations and Vincent Kompany's ill-timed suspension – cannot be blamed on the manager, others are definitely his responsibility. David Silva has been played into the ground when he should have been given recovery time. Samir Nasri has not been coaxed back into the form that persuaded City to invest another £24m in him last summer. The crucial unit at the base of City's midfield has been reshuffled unnecessarily. And with Mancini casting around for someone to get him goals, Emmanuel Adebayor is scoring freely on loan at Tottenham Hotspur, while City continue to pay, what, at least half of his not inconsiderable salary.

As the club's fans contemplate their team's last seven fixtures and the widening gap to the leaders, they may be looking at Mancini's record and wondering how much his three Serie A titles owed to the handicap of relegation and points deductions imposed on Inter's principal rivals as a result of the Calciopoli scandal. They may also be thinking about how closely the poor showing in the Champions League this season mirrored the manager's consistent underperformance in Europe with his former club. If they are, they can be pretty sure that City's owner will be sharing their unease.

richard.williams@ guardian.co.uk

Geoff Holt was prevented from boarding a train by a guard who told him that his electric wheelchair would damage the floor

The first quadriplegic sailor to cross the Atlantic solo has described his anger at being prevented from boarding a train by a guard who told him that his electric wheelchair would damage the floor.

Geoff Holt, 45, told how he was left with "a sense of genuine rage" following the incident on the platform beside an Isle of Wight train, where he said that the guard suggested that he was a liar and cut his leg when he eventually threw down a ramp for him to board.

The unnamed guard has now been suspended pending an investigation into the incident involving the Island Line's three-minute Ryde Pier to Ryde Esplanade service, according to its operators Stagecoach Group. British Transport Police also said they were investigating.

Holt, an ex-professional yachtsman who was paralysed in a swimming accident in 1984, wrote on his blog about the events of last Saturday: "I can't recall the last time that I was so angry and upset. I was physically shaking, emotion choking my voice, a sense of genuine rage.

"So why the rage? Quite simply, a guard on the train, specifically 'Guard 1003' as he reluctantly identified himself when pressed, refused to let me board the 4.45pm train – the same journey I had made nine hours earlier.

"Why? To quote guard 1003, pointing at my wheelchair, 'Those things aren't allowed on these trains, they will damage the floors'.

. I couldn't quite believe what I heard and asked him to repeat it, which he did."

"Reminding myself this was 2012, not 1912, this was public transport and this was the year the Paralympics were coming to Britain, the red mist was descending."Expanding his fictional list of reasons why I could not travel, he then said, if he got me on this train, there was no guarantees I could get off three minutes later (at) the same station I had successfully travelled from earlier that morning.

"Trying to intimidate me, he said I might have to stay on the train to Shanklin, over 12 miles away. When I said I had made the journey hours earlier, he said, and I quote: 'rubbish, you would not have been allowed to board the train'.

"Eventually, after several minutes of his posturing, huffing and puffing, Guard 1003 lifted the tiny ramp stored on the train and, quite literally, threw it on the platform, hitting my foot and leg in the process (when I got home, I found it was grazed and bleeding, I did not know this at the time because I can't feel it).

"And with that simple, easy manoeuvre, which took him only 10 seconds, I was on the train, Guard 1003 snarling at me like some prison guard. All the other passengers looked on in disbelief but, in typical British fashion did nothing."

Holt has been in a wheelchair since a swimming accident 28 years ago in the Caribbean. He completed his 2,700-mile transatlantic sail in 2010, finishing at the site of his 1984 accident.

Holt added on his blog: "He had publicly humiliated me, he had publicly degraded me and he had made me feel like a worthless piece of dirt … it was quite simply the most disgusting way to treat another human being, let alone a disabled one."

An Island Line statement, issued by Stagecoach, said: "We are absolutely horrified at the events Mr Holt has described. We welcome electric wheelchairs on our services and it is very important to us that all of our passengers feel welcome on our network.

""We are taking this matter very seriously and have already launched an investigation. A senior manager has contacted Mr Holt directly to apologise."We can also confirm that one of our employees has been suspended while our investigation is under way."

"

It was another night when Manchester United demonstrated they are not in the mood to relinquish their grip on their Premier League championship trophy and reminded us of the resolve and competitive spirit that authentic champions tend to display when the pressure is close to intolerable.

For long spells Sir Alex Ferguson's team had looked strangely bereft of ideas. They had not taken enough care of the ball and, as the game entered its closing stages, Manchester City were being encouraged to believe their own situation was not, perhaps, as irretrievable as it had looked at the weekend.

But then, how many times have United frayed the nerves of their supporters and then delivered the goals that provide a devastating reminder of their credentials? Antonio Valencia and Ashley Young both scored in the last nine minutes and it has taken the champions five-points clear of Roberto Mancini's side at the top of the table, with seven games to go.

There has been a ten-point swing in four weeks and, from here, it is difficult to believe a team with this title experience will crumple. Their next three games – QPR, Wigan and Aston Villa – are all against teams from the bottom six.

When a side is in a relegation battle it can make them obdurate opponents, as Blackburn demonstrated before slipping back into the bottom three because their goal difference is now worse than QPR's. Yet these are not generally moments when United lose their way.

City, in contrast, have won only one of their last four league fixtures. They looked desperately short during a grumpy, dishevelled performance against Sunderland on Saturday, and United's supporters revelled in a form of malicious pleasure. "City's cracking up," they sang.

It had been a strange night because, for long spells, it was rare to see United have so much possession and so little penetration. Wayne Rooney never looks particularly happy when he is shunted to the left, while Javier Hernández flickered only occasionally. Valencia was a constant menace on the right but it had needed a string of exemplary saves from David de Gea, their renascent goalkeeper, to keep out a Blackburn side that gained in confidence and were the more dangerous side at times in the second half.

Then, on 81 minutes, Valencia advanced from the wing, cut inside and the Blackburn left-back, Martin Olsson, backed off. Valencia is increasingly emerging as United's key player in this title race and the extraordinary diagonal shot from his right boot was a stunning combination of power and precision. It flew past Paul Robinson in the Blackburn goal and it was almost insulting when a television reporter asked him afterwards if he had meant it.

Mancini had accepted at the weekend that if United won here and then beat QPR at Old Trafford on Saturday the title race would be "finished." In the immediate aftermath of the 3-3 draw with Sunderland he had also predicted United would manage only a draw, even offering a bet to anyone who disagreed. Perhaps the City manager was aware they had won only two of their previous 12 visits to Ewood Park. Or maybe it was an attempt something that could be lumped in the mind-games bracket. Either way, he didn't sound terribly convincing at the time.

Valencia's goal broke Blackburn just as they were daring to believe they might actually be capable of following up December's 3-2 victory at Old Trafford with the most improbable double of the season. Five minutes later, Valencia squared the ball into the path of Ashley Young, a 79th-minute replacement for Paul Scholes. Young took a touch to control the pass, spun and turned a precise shot inside the left post.

As has been the case so often this season, there was still the sense of a United team at least one or two notches below their best. In terms of possession, however, they probably deserved the win. A pattern was quickly established whereby long spells of the game were spent in the Rovers half. It was just that they did not always play with the wit to get behind the home defence.

There were moments of vulnerability, too. The first half was a peculiar one because Blackburn were camped inside their own half for much of it but still contributed the three most illuminating pieces of drama. These were the moments when De Gea excelled. Since returning to the team, the Spaniard has been exceptional and there were three spectacular saves in succession.

Junior Hoilett was denied with a stretching, one-handed dive and Grant Hanley's header was turned away from just under the crossbar. The finest of the lot, however, was in between when Marcus Olsson speared a left-foot shot towards the top corner and De Gea turned it away with a twisting, full-length dive. It was probably the outstanding performance of a helterskelter first season in England and he deserved the loud, sustained serenading from the boisterous away following.

This was United's seventh win in a row and their tenth in 11 games since losing back-to-back matches against Blackburn and Newcastle. Late on, Ferguson also heard his name being sung and his reaction told its own story.

The request was for a wave; what they got instead was a fist-pumping, arms-above-the-head victory salute.

Education minister asks qualifications watchdog, Ofqual, to let universities 'drive the system'

Education secretary Michael Gove has asked the top universities to set A-level exams, amid fears that tens of thousands of teenagers are woefully under-prepared when they start their degrees.

Gove has instructed the exam boards and ministers to "take a step back" from dictating the content of A-levels and hand over the power to academics. At present, the Department for Education sets out the structure and core knowledge A-level students need to know, and exam boards devise the questions and coursework. Gove has written to the qualifications watchdog, Ofqual, asking for universities to be allowed to "drive the system".

The 24 most academically competitive universities in the UK, known as the Russell Group, will be allowed to set questions and the content of the syllabus. Schools will be advised to put their pupils in for only those A-levels that have been approved by the universities.

When A-levels were introduced in the early 1950s, they were set by universities and seen as rigorous preparation for degree courses.

Gove's move is likely to lead to fewer students achieving top grades, the abolition of modules and retakes – other than in exceptional circumstances – and longer essay questions in exams.

The coalition wants the new A-levels to be taught from as soon as 2014. Students would sit the exams two years later. Initially, the changes would affect English, maths and science A-levels in England, but would soon be rolled out to all subjects and across the UK.

Gove said Ofqual must ensure university ownership of the exams was "real and committed, not a tick-box exercise".

"I am increasingly concerned that current A-levels, though they have much to commend them, fall short of commanding the level of confidence we would want to see," his letter to Ofqual states.

"I do not envisage the Department for Education having a role in the development of A-level qualifications. It is more important that universities are satisfied that A-levels enable young people to start their degrees having gained the right knowledge and skills than that ministers are able to influence content or methods of assessment."

Meanwhile, a poll of lecturers has found that many think A-level exams no longer prepare students for university. Just over half of the 633 academics polled by Cambridge University's exam board, Cambridge Assessment, said students did not possess the writing or critical thinking skills needed for their degree courses. Three-fifths said their universities offered catchup classes for first-year undergraduates.

The poll, part of an 18-month study into how A-levels can better prepare students for university, found that academics wanted to limit the number of times students can retake their exams. In one case, a mature student was allowed to retake an A-level maths module 29 times.

The lecturers, who taught English, history, geography, psychology and business studies degrees, called for A-level exams to include more open-ended questions and encourage more independent study.

Andrew Hall, chief executive of the Assessment and Qualifications Alliance exam board, has said A-levels need to be reliable "but the pendulum has swung too far that way, so there's a danger that they are too predictable".

Biopic to chart rise of maverick comedian who became famous for characters such as Sid Snot and Cupid Stunt

He was one of broadcasting's most-loved entertainers – a maverick comedian who delighted radio and television audiences with his comic characters and a quick, sometimes controversial wit that more than once saw him lose his job.

Now Kenny Everett is to be celebrated on BBC4, with a 90-minute biopic that focuses on his relationship with his wife, singer Lee Middleton – they married in 1966 and separated in 1979 – and charts his rise from rebellious young DJ to rebellious household name.

The Best Possible Taste takes its name from the catchphrase of Everett's American chatshow host, Cupid Stunt, one of the performer's most famous comic creations alongside Sid Snot. Both characters feature in BBC4's film about Everett, who died in 1995 of an Aids-related illness.

Everett is played by newcomer Oliver Lansley, while former Coronation Street actor Katherine Kelly plays Middleton. The script is by Tim Whitnall, best known for writing the stage play Morecambe, about comedian Eric.

"Kenny Everett was a genuine original: wild and unfocused maybe, but also deliciously anarchic and always entertaining," said Richard Klein, the controller of BBC4.

"In many ways Kenny was a very modern celebrity, wearing his heart on his sleeve while coping with a complex life. Re-evaluating this talented and exuberant personality, enabling audiences to reconsider Kenny's undoubted impact and legacy, makes this a very BBC4 drama."

Everett's infamous appearance at a 1983 Young Conservatives' conference, where he shouted "Let's bomb Russia" and "Let's kick Michael Foot's stick away", will feature alongside tales from his radio career on pirate, commercial and BBC stations. The comedian also had hugely popular television shows on first ITV and then BBC.

Prime minister seeks to renew Margaret Thatcher's legacy by unveiling discount of up to £75,000 on homes for council tenants

David Cameron will seek to rejuvenate one of Margaret Thatcher's main legacies when he declares that two million social tenants could buy their properties with a discount of up to £75,000.

The prime minister, who believes that discounts became "virtually meaningless" over the past decade after they failed to keep pace with property prices, will pledge to give tenants a chance to secure a "vital rung on the property ladder".

Cameron's remarks will be made at the formal launch of what is being dubbed the reinvigorated right-to-buy scheme, designed to breathe new life into one of Thatcher's most significant achievements.

The government says two million social homes have been bought by their occupants since the scheme's introduction in 1980. But numbers have tailed off to fewer than 4,000 sales last year.

Cameron will say: "I want many more people to achieve the dream of home ownership. In the 80s, right to buy helped millions of people living in council housing to achieve their aspiration of owning their own home.

"It gave something back to families who worked hard, paid their rent and played by the rules. It allowed them to do up their home, change their front door, improve their garden – without getting permission from the council. It gave people a sense of pride and ownership not just in their home, but in their street and neighbourhood, helping to build strong families and stable mixed communities.

"But, over time, the discounts were cut; they didn't keep pace with rises in property prices and this vital rung on the property ladder was all but removed. This government is now putting it back by dramatically increasing the discount rates so that we support the dreams of those council tenants who to want to own the roof over their head."

The £75,000 discount represents a quadrupling of the discount cap in London and a trebling in most parts of Britain. The average right-to-buy discount fell from 50% of the value of a property in 1998-99 to 24% in 2008-09. In London, it fell from 53% to 10%.

Government to crack down on unlicensed food vendors and caterers seeking to cut corners to cash in on Olympic visitors

They may be the purveyors of the traditional – if notoriously greasy – staples enjoyed by millions of British sport fans, but the ubiquitous burger van could be hard to find at the London Olympics.

The government's food watchdog is cracking down on unlicensed vans selling burgers, hot dogs and fish and chips to the millions of visitors to the 2012 Games in an attempt to protect them from food poisoning and from being ripped off by rogue operators.

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) has released £1.5m to pay for an extra 14,700 food hygiene inspections from April to September, covering restaurants, pubs, stalls and vans across the country during the Olympics and Paralympics.

Inspectors face a raft of challenges from people trying to cash in on the Games, including an expected spike in bootleg alcohol, businesses stockpiling food due to delivery routes being cut and people serving food from their front gardens.

The drive will be led by hundreds of environmental health officials, overseen by 10 senior officers, providing advice and extra training to restaurants and caterers who fail additional hygiene and safety inspections.

Tough enforcement action will follow where public health is put at risk. Unlicensed street vendors near Olympic venues will have their vehicles seized.

Sarah Appleby, head of enforcement and local authority delivery at the agency, said: "London 2012 is about celebrating everything that the UK has to offer and food is an important part of this.

"We have so much fantastic food to showcase to Games visitors, and we want food business owners to ensure that everything they sell is the best it can be. It will be an exceptionally busy time for a lot of these businesses, and the FSA is providing extra support and advice to make sure they are well prepared to meet the challenge."

The move is likely to trigger fresh criticism of the stranglehold on Games food and drink held by sponsors McDonald's (its largest UK restaurant is in the Olympic Park), Cadbury and Coca-Cola. The latter alone will serve 23m soft drinks due to its near-monopoly at Olympics venues.

Airport-style security at the Olympic Park will prevent visitors from bringing their own food, though they will be able to refill bottles from water fountains.

In what is being dubbed the largest peacetime catering operation in the UK, Olympics organiser Locog is preparing to provide 14m meals – for 9 million visitors and 24,000 athletes and team officials – from the time the first athletes arrive at the end of June to the official shutdownafter the Paralympics in September, across 40 different locations.

Pickets, including actor Ricky Tomlinson, to argue that Conservative government interfered with judicial process

A group of trade union pickets who were jailed nearly 40 years ago in a famous case are seeking to have their convictions overturned on the grounds that the then Conservative government interfered with the judicial process.

The pickets will argue that they were the victims of a government plot to make an example of trade union activists who took part in successful picketing.

The men who received the longest sentences, Ricky Tomlinson and Des Warren, became known as the Shrewsbury Two and were the focus of a long-running campaign against the government's policy on union law in general, and flying pickets in particular.

Tomlinson, jailed for two years for conspiracy to intimidate, has since become a successful actor, starring in many films and on television in Brookside and The Royle Family. Warren, jailed for three years, died of Parkinson's disease in 2004.

Now some of those convicted and their supporters will on Tuesday present an application to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) in Birmingham in an attempt to have their convictions overturned.

"We were innocent then and we're innocent now," said Tomlinson. "I promised Dessie that I would continue the fight to clear the names of all convicted pickets."

The convictions, at Shrewsbury crown court in 1973, came in the wake of the first ever national building workers' strike in 1972. It lasted for twelve weeks and helped to secure a significant pay rise for building workers. Five months later, in a series of arrests 24 unions members who had served on the picket lines were eventually convicted of offences ranging from conspiracy to unlawful assembly and affray. Six of them were jailed.

The trial became a major political event. At its conclusion, the judge told Warren: "you are no martyr … You thought you could flout the law. You were wrong." Warren replied: "The only conspiracy was between the government, the employers and the police." The Shrewsbury Two then became a cause célèbre in a long-running campaign to have them freed.

The application to the CCRC by the solicitors, Bindmans, is based on four years of work by researcher Eileen Turnbull. It will claim that the Conservative government interfered with the judicial process by encouraging the prosecutions to deter effective picketing, then a standard process in industrial disputes. Turnbull said that she used the National Archives at Kew to uncover details of the decision-making process in the prosecution.

"There is a lot of material and we are very optimistic that we will finally be able to overturn what we believe is a miscarriage of justice," she said. The legal submission claims that the trials were an "abuse of process" and the convictions should be quashed by the court of appeal. The CCRC has the power to refer such cases to the court of appeal.

At the time of the dispute, there were strong connections between leaders of the construction industry and the Conservative party. The strike was regarded by the Conservative government as a crucial challenge to their authority and was seen as part of the build-up to the later confrontation between the government and unions which culminated in the miners' strike in 1984.

"There was a conspiracy but it was not amongst building workers," said Terry Renshaw, a convicted picket. "It was between the building industry bosses and the Tory government. The picketing on the day that the alleged incidents took place was peaceful – in fact, when we got on the coach to go home the police complimented us on our behaviour. It is important that we continue the fight to clear our names and correct this injustice."

Labour says inequality, which result in poor being left a year behind richer pupils, is one of biggest barriers to social mobility

Poor pupils in weak schools face a "double disadvantage", which is the equivalent of being left a year behind more affluent contemporaries in better schools, the shadow education secretary, Stephen Twigg, will say on Tuesday.

In a speech to the ATL annual conference in Manchester, Twigg will say that the coalition is doing little to tackle the "national scandal" by focusing its new free schools in more affluent areas.

Twigg will cite research by the Royal Society of Arts which warned of a "double disadvantage" in which the poorest children are concentrated in the least successful schools while affluent pupils tend to attend better schools.

Separate research by the Sutton Trust says that over a school year pupils from the poorest backgrounds gain 18 months' worth of learning with strong teachers. This compares with six months' worth of learning with weaker teachers.

Twigg will say: "In other words, being a poor pupil in a poor classroom is the equivalent of being left a year behind. This is a national scandal.

"I know there are inequalities in our health system, but if poorer patients were left to linger on waiting lists for an extra year there would be a huge outcry. But too often in education, we accept inequality – condemning certain children to mediocrity because we assume that they cannot achieve success. This is one of the biggest barriers to social mobility today."

The shadow education secretary will say that a future Labour government will address this "double disadvantage" as a priority. This contrasts with the current government which pursues what Twigg calls "pet projects".

"While Labour's academies focused on some of the poorest communities, by contrast, the Free Schools and Academies being set up under the Tory-led government are often in areas with already outstanding schools, and higher levels of wealth," he will say.

Twigg will add that, as a first step, the government should rethink its plans for regional pay. "If we are to address this double disadvantage, we have to encourage more teachers to teach in tough schools in poor neighbourhoods. The exact opposite of what will happen under the government's regional pay plans. If regional pay means pay cuts for teachers in the poorest parts of England how does that help tackle disadvantage? I urge the government to think again."

UK still seems to be on course for recovery after manufacturing data shows sector grew for fourth consecutive month in March

The UK's slow recovery remains on course after manufacturing data released on Monday showed the sector grew for a fourth consecutive month in March and a survey of nearly 8,000 businesses shows increasing optimism across the UK.

Manufacturers said orders improved on the previous month, adding to the impression that the economy has narrowly avoided a double dip recession in the first three months of the year.

According to the Market/Cips purchasing managers' index (PMI), the British manufacturing sector expanded at its fastest pace in 10 months, as factories worked through a backlog of existing orders and stockpiled goods in warehouses.

The headline index jumped to 52.1 in March, beating forecasts of a reading of 50.7. The poll also revised February's reading from 51.2 up to 51.5. Any figure over 50 represents growth, while less than 50 shows a contraction in activity.

A separate report from the British Chambers of Commerce, released on Monday, points to "a welcome but modest improvement in the economic situation" with small increases in domestic and export orders – though they remain below pre-recession levels. More manufacturers and service firms are also expecting to recruit staff.

The BCC Quarterly Economic Survey – in which 7,981 independent businesses participated – predicts 0.3% growth in the first three months of this year. However, the BCC also suggests that full year growth will be 0.6%, less than the 0.8% expected by the Office for Budget Responsibility, because "unresolved problems in the eurozone may trigger new upheavals later this year".

John Longworth, the director-general of the BCC, said he was encouraged that business confidence was improving, but growth remained too slow. He called on the government to come up with more policies to foster growth.

The BCC survey represents a turnround from the end of last year, when it was predicting stagflation – a grim combination of zero growth and inflation.

The reports are likely to cheer the Treasury after a fortnight that started with the granny tax debacle during the chancellor's budget and ended with George Osborne parrying questions from MPs on his reasons for applying VAT to pasties.

Markets reacted positively to the manufacturing figures, with the FTSE 100 climbing 106 points or 1.84%. Other European markets followed suit, though more in reaction to a rise in the US's main manufacturing index and a more positive than expected survey of Chinese manufacturers. The S&P index climbed nearly 1% to 1420.99 - a four year high. The Dow was up 76 at 13288 by mid-afternoon.

Andrew Goodwin, senior economic adviser to the Ernst & Young ITEM Club, said the strength of orders suggested the recovery will take hold. "Another encouraging set of results, which makes it almost certain that the economy will have returned to growth in the first quarter. Official data for the manufacturing sector was already pointing to a reasonably good first quarter and Monday's figures provide further evidence that this will be the case.

"Based upon the official data available so far and recent business surveys, we expect manufacturing output to have grown by 0.8% on the quarter. It looks as if GDP will have grown by around 0.3% in the first quarter, fully reversing the decline in the fourth quarter of 2011."

In the United States, stockmarkets started the second quarter with a bang, with the S&P 500 climbing to a fresh four-year high as manufacturing data from the US helped support the outlook for economic growth. The Dow Jones industrial average added 52.45 points, or 0.40%, to 13,264.49 at the close. The S&P 500 rose 10.43 points to 1,418.90.

The US manufacturing PMI for March rose to 53.4, up from 52.4 last month – better than economists had forecast. The data means America's factory sector has been in expansion for 32 months in a row. In comparison, the eurozone PMI has now shrunk for the last eight months.

"The market is telling you it believes the US economy has turned around, it has made that corner, it is clearly moving higher - especially compared to Europe and parts of Asia," said Ken Polcari, managing director of Icap Equities in New York.

Recent signals from the UK economy have helped the government, which is under pressure to show that businesses are doing well despite its controversial public spending cuts and tax rises. The Market/Cips data raised some concerns about inflation after figures showed the prices manufacturers are paying for materials have shot up.

Samuel Tombs at Capital Economics said cost pressures cast some doubt over recovery. "Given that a pickup in price pressures appeared to contribute to the manufacturing slowdown in the second half of last year, it seems as if the industrial recovery is still built on shaky foundations."

The ITEM Club added: "The only fly in the ointment is on the costs and prices side. At the moment the rise in raw materials costs is being reflected in a squeeze on margins. However, the longer that input prices continue to rise, the greater the chance that it will feed through to consumer prices. This in turn would reinforce the pressure on household finances and place a significant question mark over the prospects for a sustained recovery this year."

In 2010 the PMI almost hit 60, driven by rising exports. The UK was on course for a recovery led by manufacturing. But during 2011, as fears grew over the euro, the sector started to contract, opening up a war of words between the chancellor and Labour over the economic prospects.

Manufacturing recovery has done little so far to bring down unemployment. The figures for March showed factory employment was largely unchanged. David Noble, chief executive at the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply, said: "Headcounts are being kept to a minimum in part to offset the chronic rising cost of raw materials."

Poll finds many teachers believe portion sizes have been reduced and choice of healthy options is more limited

School lunch portions are now so small that many children in England are hungry during afternoon lessons, teachers have warned.

Canteens are cutting costs by reducing portion sizes, the annual conference of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) heard. Some run out of food before all children have been served.

At the same time, teachers said, the number of children eligible for free school meals was on the increase because of rising unemployment. Pupils are entitled to a free lunch if their parents' joint income is less than £16,000 a year. For many of these children their only daily hot meal is eaten at school.

An ATL poll of 503 school staff found that more than a third had noticed a rise in the number of children eligible for free school meals. Just over three-fifths (62%) said the cost of school meals had risen by up to £95 a year per child. But many warned that portion sizes had been reduced and the choice of healthy options had become more limited.

School food experts said this could have a damaging effect on children's concentration and behaviour.

One teacher, who did not want to be named, said children at her primary school were served "very small portions and very limited choice. Children who come with packed lunches eat a lot more at lunchtime."

Another said the portions at her school were very poor. "There seems to be no regular inspection of the food, the kitchens or portion sizes," she said. A secondary school teacher said schools offered chips, pasta and rice rather than vegetables and salad because that was what cooks could prepare in bulk quantities.

Many schools outsource the running of their canteens to private firms. Mary Bousted, general secretary of ATL, said: "Private market forces risk taking over what we are feeding the nation's children. The size of a portion will, to some extent, affect the size of the profits of an outsourced firm … it is absolutely the case that children are going hungry."

The Jamie Oliver Foundation, a charity that helps the public to make better-informed choices about food, said a nutritious lunch increased children's concentration, improved their behaviour and made it more likely that they would achieve top grades.

Nursing budgets could be cut by up to 50% in London hospitals under possible cost-saving measures

NHS London, the body that overseas the health service in the capital, has identified potential savings of hundreds of millions of pounds through cuts to hospital nursing budgets.

Documents obtained by Nursing Times magazine show NHS London suggesting hospitals could slice deeply into frontline staff budgets to align "staffing levels with clinical need".

The documents suggest cuts including £7m at North Middlesex University Hospital Trust and £54m at Imperial College Healthcare Trust, savings of less than a third of their nursing budgets.

Newham University Hospital Trust and the Whittington Hospital Trust could make more than £20m in cuts, representing a 50% reduction, the documents claim. The finances of 18 hospital trusts were analysed.

Unions warned that the level of cuts proposed "takes you into core safety territory". The Royal College of Nursing said reducing nursing numbers would see an increase in the number of patient "trips and falls" and lead to problems with medication not being administered.

Howard Catton, head of policy at the RCN, said: "There's good evidence that mortality rates go up as there is a failure to spot patients in trouble and rescue them."

He pointed out that last month a study by the National Nursing Research Unit at King's College London and the University of Southampton showed that the levels of burnout and job dissatisfaction among English nurses were among the worst in Europe.

NHS hospital trusts are having to make significant savings in the runup to April 2014, the date by which they must become financially independent foundation trusts. This has led to many hospitals looking to save cash in the short-term.

The NHS London report claimed there was no clear evidence that increasing the number of nurses would improve the quality of nursing care.

It stated: "Other factors, such as ways of working, may be more important than resourcing levels and, whilst some individual clinical areas will undoubtedly require more resource (including increasing the numbers working in those areas), efficiency improvements will enable others to deliver improved quality with fewer staff."

NHS London said in a statement that the report used "three different sets of figures to calculate potential savings for each trust and all represent theoretical productivity improvements, not a plan to implement changes. The set of figures used in the model are based on a trust performing optimally at every possible area including nursing. No trust has been asked to achieve these reductions."