Queen issues formal decree to guarantee princess title if Duchess of Cambridge has a girl

The Queen has issued a formal decree to grant the title of prince or princess to all of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge's children.

Using Letters Patent, a method by which the sovereign can give orders without the involvement of Parliament, the Queen decided that from now on "all the children of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales" should be given the title of Royal Highness "with the titular dignity of Prince or Princess prefixed to their Christian names".

Until now, only the eldest son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales was entitled to the honour, following a decree made by George V in 1917, meaning that if the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have a daughter later this year she would have been known as "Lady".

But the Queen's formal ruling, officially made on December 31 but only now made public, means that not only the eldest child but all children of the Duke and Duchess will be princes and princesses.

A formal announcement in the London Gazette reads: "The Queen has been pleased by Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the Realm dated 31 December 2012 to declare that all the children of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales should have and enjoy the style, title and attribute of Royal Highness with the titular dignity of Prince or Princess prefixed to their Christian names or with such other titles of honour."

The Government has already begun the process of altering the laws of succession to ensure that the Duke and Duchess's first child will become monarch, removing the ancient rule of male primogeniture which gave precedence to boys.

However, the Queen's decree, in specifying that the royal titles are only given to the children of the Prince of Wales's eldest son, means that if the Duke and Duchess have a daughter, she will not be entitled to give her own children the title of prince or princess.

The Duchess celebrated her 31st birthday today by spending time privately with her husband, who had time off from his job as an RAF Search and Rescue pilot.

The Duke is understood to have travelled to the South East from his base in Wales to spend time with his wife in London.

Sir Jimmy Savile was a 'predatory sex offender', police say

Police called Sir Jimmy Savile a “predatory sex offender” as it emerged that he is now suspected of abusing up to 25 young girls in allegations dating as far back as 1959.

In the first official estimate of the scale of his crimes, Scotland Yard said its team was pursuing 120 separate lines of inquiry against the late BBC presenter.

So far eight criminal allegations have been formally recorded against him, two of rape and six of indecent assault, involving girls aged between 13 and 16.

Police said Savile had a “predilection” for young girls and that his offending was on a “national scale” and went on for four decades.

Officers are in contact with Stoke Mandeville and Leeds General Infirmary hospitals, where he did charity work and volunteered, about the possibility that he abused patients there as well as in his BBC dressing room. He is also said to have preyed on girls from Duncroft Approved School in Surrey and the Haut de la Garenne children’s home in Jersey.

The corporation’s own investigations unit is co-operating with the Metropolitan Police while 10 officers will take statements from the “brave” women who have come forward to say Savile took advantage of them. The investigation, called Operation Yewtree, could involve between 20 and 25 victims.

With support from the NSPCC, which has fielded some 40 calls in the week since ITV disclosed the first accounts from Savile's victims, the Met will compile a report within a few months on what can be concluded and what lessons should be learned.

Commander Peter Spindler, the Met’s head of specialist crime investigations, told the BBC: “At this stage it is quite clear from what women are telling us that Savile was a predatory sex offender.”

The new evidence prompted renewed claims that senior figures at the BBC must have heard the rumours about one of its star performers, and should have taken action years ago.

Rob Wilson, the Conservative MP for Reading East, said: “The scale of the allegations against Sir Jimmy Savile is staggering. I have spoken to a number people who worked within the BBC in the 1980s and they tell me that Savile’s behaviour was common knowledge within the corporation. If this was the case, did any senior manager look into the rumours? If they did not, why not? My big concern is that the BBC had a misogynist culture, where younger women in particular were not treated as equals and incidents of sexual harassment and groping were not uncommon.

“The BBC has been dragging its feet ever since this story broke and it is causing it enormous reputational damage. The BBC needs to begin an independent inquiry into the culture and management of the organisation so that license payers can have faith that noting uncomfortable for the corporation will be covered up or swept under the carpet.”

Panorama, BBC 1’s flagship investigations programme, is expected to make a programme about the Savile scandal, after BBC 2’s Newsnightshelved its exposé last year.

The Met said it will also pursue investigations against others who helped procure girls for Savile or joined in his abuse.

Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Commissioner, said his force would be “asking questions” of those still living.

Freddie Starr, the veteran comedian who has been accused of groping a girl in Savile’s dressing room in 1974, appeared on television to deny the claims and insist he would welcome a police investigation.

He told ITV News: “To be accused like this is devastating. I’ve got to fight back.

“I will take this evidence down to the police station and show them. I want a police investigation. I want them to interview me.”

As the backlash against Savile continued to grow, his family decided to take down his elaborate headstone “out of respect for public opinion”.

The triple headstone, only unveiled last month, will be removed from his grave in Scarborough. A clifftop path named after him has been dismantled while a memorial plaque has been vandalised.

Earlier the Prime Minister had hinted that Savile could become the first person to be stripped of their knighthood posthumously.

David Cameron told ITV1’s Daybreak: “We have something called a Forfeiture Committee. It is not chaired or sat on by me but it is responsible for looking at honours and the removal of honours, and obviously they have to do their job too.”

The Cabinet Office insisted that honours cease to exist when a person dies, although there is a campaign to change the law so that they could be revoked after death.

Parents of Shafilea Ahmed sentenced to 25-years after being found guilty of her 'honour' killing

A Pakistani couple murdered their westernised daughter because they were more concerned about shame in their community than about their children, a judge said.

The parents of Shafilea Ahmed, Iftikhar and Farzana Ahmed Photo: PA

Iftikar and Farzana Ahmed, strict Muslims who are first cousins from the same village in Pakistan, were jailed for life after being found guilty of the 2003 honour killing of their “determined” and “ambitious” daughter Shafilea. They were told they would serve at least 25 years.

They suffocated the 17 year-old in front of their four other children at their home in Warrington, Cheshire after she rejected a forced marriage in Pakistan.

The couple escaped justice for almost nine years, accusing officers of victimisation and stereotyping for suspecting them after her body was found months later in a river in Cumbria.

Duke and Duchess of Cambridge's honeymoon pictures published

An Australian magazine has published photographs of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge strolling on a beach during their honeymoon in the Seychelles.

The Duchess and Duke of Cambridge on the day after their wedding April 30, 2011 Photo: John Stillwell/PA

The sixteen photographs, which appear in the latest issue of Woman's Day magazine, include images showing the Prince in floral swimming shorts and his wife in a black bikini.

The location of the 10-day honeymoon, North Island in the Seychelles, was known to several British media outlets but they had promised not to publish photographs.

It is not clear how Women's Day, a monthly tabloid magazine, acquired the photographs of the royal honeymoon, which appeared to be taken with a long lens.

The magazine featured a cover photo of the couple holding hands on a beach and included 15 more images inside.

The headline – "Our Island Paradise" – prompted criticism that the magazine appeared to be suggesting the couple had endorsed publication of the images.

The magazine's executive editor did not return The Daily Telegraph's calls.

The royal couple had insisted on privacy for the honeymoon.

A spokesman for the Duke and Duchess said: "It's a very private moment and we would ask people to respect that privacy, as we did at the time."

Australian tabloid magazines have previously published controversial photographs of the royals, clearing the way for the British media to publish.

Most famously, New Idea magazine, then owned by Rupert Murdoch, scooped the world in 1993 with publication of the so-called Camillagate transcripts – the intimate phone conversations between Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles, with whom he was then having an affair.

The same magazine broke a British media blackout in 2008 to reveal that Prince Harry was fighting with the British Army in Afghanistan – a story that prompted army chiefs to send him home.

M6 toll: Motorway closed after anti-terror police stop coach

Part of the M6 motorway was closed this morning after police stopped a coach following warnings of a potential terror related incident on board.

It is understood police received a call from a passenger on board the coach who was concerned about the activities of another passenger. 

Police shut a large stretch of the M6 Toll Road near Lichfield in Staffordshire in what they described as a “major police led incident”.

It is understood police received a call from a passenger on board the coach who was concerned about the activities of another passenger.

One source claimed the passenger had become worried after spotting a smoking liquid on board the bus.

Staffordshire police were called at 8.20am and closed the motorway in both directions between junctions T3 and T4.

It is understood the south bound coach, which belonged to the Megabus company, had already pulled over to the hard shoulder when police arrived at the scene.

A spokeswoman for Megabus, which is operated by Stagecoach, said: "We are assisting police with their inquiries into an allegation made against a passenger who was travelling on board one of our services."

The coach was travelling from Preston to London.

The incident, which occurred at the height of rush hour, brought chaos to the road network in the area.

It is believed armed police were at the scene but Scotland Yard were not thought to be involved.

A spokeswoman for Staffordshire Police said: “There is currently an ongoing incident on the M6 Toll at Weeford, near Lichfield.

“Both lanes of the toll road have been closed while police deal with the incident.”

The incident came as six people were held in London over a possible terror plot involving Islamist extremists targeting the UK.

The two operations were understood to be unconnected however and police sources claimed the terror plot was not connected to the upcoming Olympic Games.

Police in London swooped in a series of dawn raids at addresses in the capital detaining five men and a woman on suspicion of the commission, perparation or instigation of acts of terrorism.

During the raids a 24-year-old man was Tasered but did not require hospital treatment, a spokesman for Scotland Yard said.

Those detained included a 29-year-old man, who was arrested in the street in west London, a 21-year-old man and a 30-year-old woman were held at separate residential premises in west London, and two other men, aged 18 and 26, who were arrested with the 24-year-old in east London.

Some of those held are understood to be British nationals.

The spokeman said: "Searches under the Terrorism Act 2000 are being carried out at eight residential premises in east, west and north London and one business premises in east London. Public safety remains our overriding concern."

UK terror convict testifies in US about Bin Laden meeting

Saajid Badat refused to appear in person as he is still wanted in the US

Continue reading the main story

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A British man jailed for plotting to blow up a plane has admitted meeting Osama Bin Laden, in a taped testimony for a US terror trial in New York.

Saajid Badat, 33, told the trial of Adis Medunjanin - accused of plotting to attack the city's subways - that he met Bin Laden in Afghanistan in 1999.

It is the first time a terrorist convicted in the UK has testified at a terror trial abroad.

His sentence was cut in exchange for his testimony and he has been freed.

On Monday, British prosecutors revealed that Badat's UK 13-year sentence had been reduced by two years. Jailed in 2005, he has been described an al-Qaeda supergrass.

Badat, from Gloucester - who would otherwise have been released in July two-thirds of the way through his term - was freed in March 2010, the Parole Board said.

He refused to appear in person, as he remains under indictment in Boston on charges of conspiracy with would-be British shoe-bomber Richard Reid.

"If I go to the United States, I'll be arrested," Badat said on the videotape played in a federal court in Brooklyn, New York.

Mr Medunjanin, 27, a naturalised US citizen, is accused of travelling to Pakistan with two friends in 2008 and receiving terror training from Bin Laden's network. The other two men have pleaded guilty and testified against him.

Badat had no involvement with the three, but prosecutors wanted to use his testimony to corroborate what Mr Medunjanin's friends have said about al-Qaeda's training methods.

US prosecutors and defence lawyers interviewed Badat in late March, before the trial began.

Badat said he had "direct interaction" with Bin Laden more than once in Afghanistan, and that Badat had agreed to blow up a plane using explosives hidden in his shoes.

But while Reid went ahead with the plot, Badat backed out, and was later arrested and convicted of conspiracy.

The bulk of Badat's evidence will be heard when the trial resumes on Monday.

Border Agency still failing on basics, say MPs

The UK Border Agency is still failing in its "basic functions" in spite of efforts to overhaul it, MPs have said.

The home affairs committee said UKBA had provided "inconsistent" information about immigration and asylum cases dating back to 2006 and this backlog would take four more years to clear.

It also said it was "deeply concerned" about the number of foreign prisoners living in the UK awaiting deportation.

Immigration minister Damian Green said "past mistakes" were being dealt with.

The UK Border Agency - responsible for securing the UK border at air, rail and sea ports and migration controls - was set up in 2008 following the then Labour Home Secretary John Reid's 2006 declaration that the Home Office's immigration directorate was "not fit for purpose".

Borders row

The organisation is now being split into two in the wake of a row last year over revelations that hundreds of thousands of people were let into the country without complete checks. The row led to the resignation of the head of the UK Border Force, Brodie Clark.

The UK Border Force, the section of the agency that manages entry to the UK, is to become a separate law-enforcement body reporting directly to the Home Office while the UKBA will be solely responsible for immigration policy work.

Continue reading the main story

“Start Quote

UKBA appears unable to focus on its key task of tracking and removing illegal immigrants, overstayers or bogus students from the country”

Keith VazHome affairs committee chairman

In its latest report on the workings of the UKBA, covering the period between August and November 2011, the cross-party committee suggested the agency was still not getting a grip on the backlog of approximately 450,000 asylum and immigration cases which emerged in 2006.

Last year UKBA officials said a preliminary decision had since been made in all these cases. Of about 365,000 cases where the individuals could be traced, it said 18,000 remained unresolved.

But the committee said new evidence it had seen in recent months suggested the UKBA was dealing with 1,500 more "live cases" than previously indicated and it was unclear where some of these had originated from. It called on the agency to "clean up and clarify" the figures.

"The agency must rid itself of its bunker mentality and focus on ensuring that Parliament and the public understands its work," the MPs said. "Confusion over figures only risks suspicion that the agency is attempting to mislead Parliament and the public over its performance and effectiveness."

There are currently 118,000 cases where individuals cannot be located. MPs said, at the current rate of progress, this would take four years to clear and this was "unacceptable".

In its last report, in November, the MPs said the cases had effectively been "dumped" in an archive and the agency had given up on them.

'Better decisions'

The committee said it was also taking too long to consider whether foreign nationals could be deported at the end of their prison sentences. It said it would be seeking an explanation from officials for why the number of deportations fell in the past year and the exact nature of "obstacles" standing in the way of deportation cited in one in four cases.

While the MPs said they welcomed the reduction in the number of prisoners released without being referred to the UKBA for possible deportation, the committee said there were 3,940 former foreign inmates living in the community - 2,670 of whom were still awaiting deportation after two years.

Labour MP Keith Vaz, who chairs the committee, said more needed to be done to tackle the use of false identities and absence of basic documentation hindering the process.

"The reputation of the Home Office and, by extension, the UK government is being tarnished by the inability of the UK Border Agency to fulfil its basic functions," he said.

"The foreign national prisoner issue and the asylum backlog were scandals which first broke in 2006, six years ago. UKBA appears unable to focus on its key task of tracking and removing illegal immigrants, overstayers or bogus students from the country."

He added: "Following the border controls saga, we now have two agencies instead of one. We are hopeful that UKBA will now concentrate fully on the issues that are causing so much concern to the public and Parliament."

Mr Green said the UKBA was publishing more information about its performance than ever before, making it more accountable.

"At the same time as clearing up the mistakes of the past, we are taking the action necessary to ensure the same errors will not be allowed happen in the future," he said.

"We are starting the deportation process earlier and removing foreign criminals more quickly than ever. We are now making better asylum decisions, ensuring cases are properly tracked, improving intelligence and speeding up removals."