[Nicholas Witchell:] And as the treasury team meet to discuss spending, there's new talk of more defence cuts. [music] A judge at the Old Bailey has been explaining his full reasons for stopping the trial of the three retired detectives who were accused of tampering with evidence in the case of the Birmingham Six. Mr Justice Garland ruled last week that it was impossible for the former officers to receive a fair trial because of the saturation publicity that followed the release of the six, two years ago. And the perception generated that the court that freed the six, was also finding the detectives guilty. Today Mr Justice Garland stressed that he wasn't suggesting that media coverage of the case should have been restricted. He was concerned simply with the effect of what had happened in this particular case.
[Neil Bennet:] Former Detective Superintendent George who was in charge of the Birmingham pub bombings investigation, Detective Constable Terence and Detective Sergeant Colin were told last week of the judge's view they couldn't get a fair trial. He said, when the Birmingham Six were released in nineteen ninety one, it was inevitable the court of appeal's decision would appear to be a finding of perjury and conspiracy against the police. They've been accused of fabricating an interview with Richard, one of the Birmingham Six. While he made no suggestion that news coverage at the time should have been restricted, Mr Justice Garland said the volume and intensity of publicity had a snowball effect. There had also been personal prejudice against the three men who would have been on trial. The former detectives were not at the Old Bailey today, proceedings against them are over.
[David:] Well it would have been very nice if my clients had had the opportunity of a fair trial. But of course we couldn't ignore the factors which er were argued in front of the judge and which led the judge to make his ruling.
[Neil Bennet:] Isn't there though a stain still on the character of the defendants.
[David:] Erm no I don't think so. Er I think certainly not among fair minded people.
[Neil Bennet:] The judge said, the men's defence would have involved a re-examination of the events of nineteen seventy four. For the past two years, the West Midlands police have been reinvestigating the Birmingham pub bombings, the results are soon to be sent to the crown prosecution service. One of the great unanswered questions in the case, is what that investigation has uncovered. Mr Justice garland said he'd had the advantage of seeing the material gathered during this further enquiry into the pub bombings. Three of the Birmingham Six were in the public gallery to hear the judgement. They complained about smears and innuendos over the two years since their release.
[Paddy:] This this er new report is just trying to rubbish us again. That is all, nothing more and nothing less.
[Billy:] We don't know what's in that report and that's one of the reasons why we're calling for an independent enquiry. We want er whatever's in that report to be disclosed so that we're able to address the questions that come up in it. We have absolutely nothing to fear.
[Neil Bennet:] The men say they're still considering the possibility off civil action against the police and whether to take their case to the European Court. Neil Bennet B B C News.
[Moira Stewart:] This is the second time a court has ruled that press coverage of a controversial case has prevented a fair trial. The Taylor sisters who were convicted of murdering Alison were freed after the appeal court described coverage of their case as sensationalized and inaccurate. Both cases raise the question of just how the press should cover this type of crime. Today's judgement said it was essentially a political question.
[Nick:] Four months ago, Michelle and Lisa Taylor were cleared on appeal of the murder of Alison. Partly because media coverage of their original trail could have prejudiced the jury against. The press coverage was unremitting sensational and inaccurate according to the appeal court. Much of it had assumed the two women were guilty. And there had been so much coverage, a retrial would have been impossible. In the Taylor sisters case, the media was judged to have gone beyond what was acceptable, unlike coverage of the Birmingham Six. Nevertheless, one editor fears today's decision sets a dangerous precedent which could make successful prosecutions much more difficult in future.
[Max:] If there hadn't been the publicity, then the malpractice would never have come to light. So if you start saying there can't be any publicity where there's been alleged malpractice or where there's controversy er well you're going to get into in into a ludicrous situation in which the media will never be able to discuss a situation of this sort.
[Nick:] Today's judgement could have an impact on other forthcoming cases. Asil Nadir has been reluctant to return to Britain, partly because he says, media coverage of his case makes a fair trial unlikely. The promoters of a planned musical about Robert Maxwell were told by lawyers acting for his son Kevin, that their production and other media coverage could prejudice future proceedings. And lawyers for the two Libyans suspected of the Lockerbie bombing say a Jury in Scotland might be influenced by what they call prejudicial pretrial publicity.
[Anthony:] One can think of a number of cases which are coming before the courts where there's been a lot of publicity and I'm sure that the legal teams involved in those cases will be studying this judgement er and will be considering whether or not those principles can't be applied to their cases. I think once you've let loose a case like this, it will be very hard to contain it.
[Nick:] Earlier this year, a jury acquitted three ex-policemen of fabricating evidence against the Guildford Four. Another widely publicized case. On that occasion the judge didn't feel the weight of media coverage had prejudiced the fairness of the trial. Nick Hyam B B C News.
[Nicholas Witchell:] I'm joined from the Old Bailey now by our legal corre by our legal affairs correspondent, Joshua Rosenburg. Joshua, did Mr Justice Garland explain why it wouldn't be possible to instruct a jury to ignore the publicity and concentrate on the specific charges.
[speaker010:] Well I think he made it clear that no jury could forget what everybody knew er which is of course er the the facts that emerged at the time er that the Birmingham Six were acquitted. And he said it was difficult for the jury to isolate the narrow questions that they were going to have to decide, which is whether these officers had er fabricated notes of an interview with one of the Birmingham Six, from all the information that they had. And he also pointed out that the three detectives were going to claim in their defence that the Birmingham Six were guilty all along. Now they were perfectly entitled to claim this but this was going to confuse the jury and the jury would also be confuse by the fact there was going to be no mention of the fact which everybody was aware of that the men claim that they were beaten up while they were in custody.
[Nicholas Witchell:] He spoke of the enormous amount of new material he had seen The judge did th that is. But doesn't appear to have said what part if any that played in his decision. Do you find that surprising?
[speaker010:] Well he didn't reveal any of this new material and none of it was revealed in open court. Er it's a matter of speculation as to whether it did play any part. I I cannot see that it can have because it wasn't actually put to him but he did mention twice in his judgement that he was aware of this new material and as Neil Bennet said, we'll have to wait and see what that is.
[Nicholas Witchell:] Joshua Rosenburg, thank you very much.
[Moira Stewart:] This year's Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded jointly to the South African President F W de Klerk and the A N C leader Nelson Mandela. The Nobel committee said it was given for their work towards a peaceful ending of apartheid and for laying the foundation for a democratic South Africa. Mr de Klerk said he was overwhelmed by the award. And Mr Mandela said it would make him strive even harder for peace.
[Nicholas Witchell:] The change in South African politics began with the release of Nelson Mandela. He'd served twenty seven years in Jail for advocating the violent overthrow of Apartheid. But now putting personal bitterness aside, he threw his enormous influence on the side of peace.
[Neil Bennet:] Take your guns, your knives and your and throw them into the sea.
[Nicholas Witchell:] His fellow prizewinner is the man who released him. president F W de Klerk had also gambled by overthrowing the entrenched attitudes of his white countrymen. The right wing labelled him a traitor. But the President held a referendum and won convincing support from South Africa's whites.
[David:] Today we have closed the book on apartheid and that chapter.
[Nicholas Witchell:] Today in Johannesburg news of the Nobel Prize was celebrated both outside add inside the African National Congress Headquarters.... In accepting it, Mr Mandela congratulated President de Klerk a demonstration of the mood of reconciliation which won both of them the prize.
[Neil Bennet:] I dedicatee this award to all the courageous people of my country, black and white, who have suffered and endured so much and pledge that in whatever time remains to me, I will spare no effort to bring peace and freedom and justice for all to South Africa.
[Nicholas Witchell:] President de Klerk reaffirmed his belief that negotiations would settle South Africa's future. But said the country was at a crossroads.
[David:] We still face tremendous challenges there are stumbling blocks which must be overcome. We have all sorts of remaining problems but by and large, if we look back over the past three four years, tremendous progress has been made.
[Nicholas Witchell:] Death and violence are the accompaniments to negotiation as South Africa struggles forward to elections next year. And critics of the men inside both black and white communities have criticized them for causing bloodshed. But the Nobel Prize committee said the prize was not a declaration of sainthood. Instead looking at the changes which had been achieved, they judged that Mr Mandela and President de Klerk had laid the foundations for a new democratic South Africa and done so through personal integrity and great political courage. Brian Hanrahan B B C News. The supreme court in South Africa has passed death sentences on two right wing extremists convicted of murdering the South African Communist Party leader Chris Harney. Yanoush Valus, a Polish immigrant and Clive Derby-Lewis a pro apartheid politician were found guilty yesterday. The judge said the two knew the killing would cause chaos, anarchy and widespread bloodshed.
[Paddy:] Ecstasy in downtown Johannesburg at the very moment crowds outside the supreme court heard that Yanoush Valus and Clive Derby-Lewis, two men driven by cold political fanaticism to assassinate Chris Harney, had themselves been sentenced to death. Harney's death was a political assassination, it triggered nationwide riots followed by the biggest murder investigation South Africa has seen. Harney's widow, when she emerged, insisted that others must have been involved in a conspiracy.
[Billy:] Their sentence doesn't bring my husband back. Their sentence doesn't bring the father of my three daughters back. now we are left with getting the plotters. The plotters of my husband's assassination should be brought to court. Then we'll have true peace.
[Paddy:] In court earlier, the prosecuting attorney general said Valus, a Polish immigrant, driven by contempt for communism, and Derby- Lewis, right wing conservative party activist, had committed a cold blooded, premeditated and abhorrent crime. Society, he insisted, demanded their destruction. The judge agreed. Before handing down the death sentence, he asked if the two men had anything to say. Valus and Derby-Lewis showing no remorse replied, nothing. They were driven away to death row in Pretoria's central prison. For the past three years, President de Klerk has maintained a moratorium on hanging with the A N C's approval. This afternoon Nelson Mandela gave his verdict.
[Neil Bennet:] The death sentence is the best sentence a court of law could have imposed under the present circumstances.
[Paddy:] Nelson Mandela faces a serious dilemma, after appeals it will be his government that must decide whether or not to commute sentence. If he abides by A N C policy and spares the lives of Valus and Derby-Lewis, then thousands of young radicals in the townships will be enraged. If the two men hang, then South Africa faces the very real risk of a severe right wing backlash. John Harrison B B C News, Johannesburg.
[Moira Stewart:] Here, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has expressed concern about the safety of underwater births. The college has asked the Department of Health to investigate the practice after a baby died during delivery in a pool in Sweden. This afternoon, doctors at a Bristol hospital disclosed that a baby there had died after the mother used a pool during the first stage of labour. But the Royal College of Midwives said, it wouldn't use the technique if it didn't believe it was safe. Twenty years ago, one British birth in ten thousand was underwater, today in some areas of the country, it's one in twenty. The death of a baby boy this week in Sweden has raised fears there about the dangers of birth underwater.
[Nick:] He did not breathe spontaneously and died in a pulmonary W with lungs filled with water and we can't exclude that the reason for that was just the water bath.
[Moira Stewart:] The Stockholm hospital concerned has now closed the bath used for underwater deliveries. Doctors at a Bristol hospital said today, they'd called for more research following two cases there in which mothers had used water baths in the early stages of labour. Though in neither case was delivery underwater. One child dies, another is brain damaged.
[Max:] This could merely be clustering, it could be merely chance. Er but since this is a relatively new area of technology, we felt it our responsibility to report this.
[Moira Stewart:] The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists say too little data exists on the dangers of underwater birth.
[Anthony:] Our main concern is here is a method that might be a problem it's theoretically and physiologically could be a problem, about which we do not know the extent.
[Moira Stewart:] Many mothers sing the praises of underwater delivery. After two traditional births, Jayne Beaumont had her nine week old daughter Jessica underwater.
[speaker010:] It was peaceful, it was erm quick, it was easy, if you can call childbirth easy. Erm and she had a wonderful peaceful entrance into the world.
[Moira Stewart:] At one British hospital where underwater delivery was pioneered, almost three hundred and fifty births have taken place over five years without problems in the special pool. There's enthusiasm for this method of delivery.
[Nicholas Witchell:] We wouldn't be offering it if we didn't feel it was a safe option for women. But of course nothing is a hundred percent safe in in obstetrics or the medical profession. But I can't irritate enough, we wouldn't be offering it if we didn't feel it was a safe option.
[Moira Stewart:] The Department of Health says it will be studying doctors' concerns about underwater birth. Mike Smart B B C News.
[Nicholas Witchell:] The time is six sixteen. And still to come, a peace vigil in Belfast, speakers urge terrorists on both sides to leave the community alone. And from the Princess of Wales, a plea for those caring for loved ones, who've suffered brain damage. [music]
[Moira Stewart:] An armed man in his early thirties was shot dead by police in North London today. Scotland Yard say the man hijacked a refuse vehicle at gunpoint after running away from the scene of a robbery. Several shots were fired at the officer who were not injured. The police complaints authority will supervise and investigation into the incident.
[Neil Bennet:] In a North London timber yard, the body of the armed robber was still being examined by a police forensic team late this afternoon. The police had shot the man in the head after he had fired on Police a number of times as they chased him. They police say their action was in self defence and justified.
[David:] They looked like they acted quite properly erm and er unfortunately someone's been shot dead.
[Neil Bennet:] After the lunchtime bank robbery, in nearby Highgate, the man had run off initially firing at police officers chasing him on foot. The man then hijacked this council refuse truck threatening the three workers outside it.
[Paddy:] When he er he comes round the front he says, Give us the keys. We says, No. Then he sort of went like this, pulled out a big gun, pointed it at us says, Give us the keys, again. So I said, here I'll give it you.
[Neil Bennet:] As a number of police cars chased the refuse truck, the man again fired on Police officers.
[Billy:] He hit that big vehicle and then he hit me add a few other cars behind me. And then you know there was a lot of police cars chasing.
[Neil Bennet:] A double parked lorry blocked the armed man's path. The police say he then fled from the refuse truck, running into the timber yard. The police say he fired again, an armed officer then shot him. The police complaints authority will now supervise an investigation into the exact circumstances of the shooting. Clarence Mitchell, B B C News, North London.
[Nicholas Witchell:] The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Kenneth Clarke is meeting senior colleagues to discuss taxation and spending options for next months budget. It's emerged that further cuts in defence spending are being considered including reducing the number of senior officers and ministry of defence civil servants. But the chairman of the Defence Select Committee has warned it would be unrealistic to make any further reductions.
[Moira Stewart:] Of all the ministers present for today's crucial session of future spending and tax plans, Michael Partial, the chief secretary to the Treasury is said to be most eager to see further cuts in the military. Treasury officials say they want to save one billion pounds on defence, the opening demand in a vicious Whitehall battle. One treasury suggestion is to cut senior personnel because one estimate shows that junior ranks have taken the brunt of the cuts so far. The M O D says that idea wouldn't save much with all the handshakes and pensions and there is support for that view.
[Nick:] Even if you did did cut one or two admirals, you're not going to make much of a dent in a fifty billion pound public expenditure deficit. And so I think that it's easier to to make criticisms of small matters in detail, but it is not easier to make a serious defence cut. And if we were to cut further in any significant way, then we would undermine our capacity to look after the defence interests of our country.
[Moira Stewart:] With troops deployed in Bosnia for a year already, and no one knows for how much longer, the defence secretary Malcolm Rifkind is openly arguing against more cuts unless commitments like this are cut as well. The opposition and the military agree with him.
[Max:] The government are putting the defence of Britain at risk by this Treasury led approach. We're asking our troops to do more and more with less and less. What's needed is a full defence review so we can actually shape our forces to match the threats which are facing us.
[Anthony:] If you're going to keep up the same pattern of commitments the answer is that the army is already stretched as it clan be and so are the other two services and this is putting a terrific strain on the individual servicemen and their families. And I don't think any money can reasonably taken away.
[Moira Stewart:] The defence ministry may be helped in its battle with the treasury when the commons defence committee publishes two highly critical reports on Monday at the start of the annual defence debate. There's also support from the foreign office which wants to see Britain contribute to U N operations and from industry which is desperate to secure orders for new weapons. None of this though guarantees the armed forces will be spared from further cuts. David Schuckman, B B C News, at the Ministry of Defence. More than a thousand people held a peace rally in Belfast today in protest at last Tuesday's murder of a Catholic father of five. Protestants at the rally said they were disgusted by the shooting and by other loyalist attacks on Catholics. In a separate development, the president of Sinn Fein, Gerry Adams called for the demilitarization of the province and repeated that the I R A was not prepared to arrange a unilateral cease fire.
[speaker010:] There have been many peace rallies many times before in Northern Ireland, the significance of today's not the numbers, a thousand or so, but who they were. Workers from Shorts, Harland and Wolf and other companies, predominantly protestants demonstrating at the murder of a Catholic. They were told, now was the time to find the courage to stand up to terrorists,
[Nicholas Witchell:] It's quite poignant that ninety percent of the people here were protestant. Starting out for a Catholic worker. And that to me i is a very positive point.
[Neil Bennet:] I think over the last few months, there's been so much killing that maybe for me, that was the the watershed.
[speaker010:] At the same time, the Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams said again in a B B C interview there would be no unilateral cease-fire by the I R A. And what was needed was total demilitarization. But he emphasized the Hume-Adams talks were the only window of opportunity around. Comments which will be the focus of the Ulster Unionist conference when it starts tomorrow. A conference which has aroused enormous interest after the party suggested this week they would talk to Sinn Fein if the I R A ended its campaign of violence permanently. A position which has angered many unionists at grass roots level. But as the politicians continue to argue and the gunmen continue their own agenda, the people are as desperate as ever for some formula which will end the killing. Matthew B B C News, Belfast.
[Nicholas Witchell:] The United States is asking the U N security council to authorize a stop and search operation against ships heading for Haiti. An American official said Washington wanted to enforce the international oil and arms embargo against the country. The move follows yesterday's assassination of the justice minister in Haiti's transitional government.
[David:] Bill Clinton's advisors gathered at the White House to face yet another foreign policy challenge, proposing the use of U S naval power to enforce sanctions against Haiti and at the United Nations, U S diplomats were pressing for what would be a virtual blockade of the island. Haiti's military rulers have thumbed their noses at the U S. The murders of pro-Aristide politicians, a deliberate attempt to sabotage the return to democracy.
[Paddy:] We need the military to bee decided and willing to stop violence. Not to look for sophisticated legal arguments while people are being shot and killed in the streets.
[David:] With Canadian peace keepers now pulling out of Haiti, Aristide supporters are asking the U S for protection.
[Billy:] A strengthening of the er marine contingent at the embassy as a security matter er to potentially provide for other Haitians, for Haitians who who may who are in danger.
[David:] The Haitian military have shown no willingness to compromise and Washington now wants U N authorization to use military power to enforce sanctions against them. That would mean U S warships ringing the island and the escalation of a confrontation that the White House now seems determined to win. Martin Sixsmith, B B C News, Washington.
[Moira Stewart:] Britain's second biggest brewer, Courage, is to axe seven hundred jobs after an extensive review of its operations. The jobs will be shed over the next eighteen months and will affect management, administration and production workers across thirty five sites. The brewery says that compulsory redundancies can't be ruled out. The days when brewers rode recessions with ease have long gone. If they ever existed. Courage with its string of Bulk brews from John Smiths to Fosters now talks of a formidable challenge as it reorganizes in the face of a four percent drop in total British beer sales a year.
[Nick:] people are drinking less. Erm and they're drinking less because of the recession. They're drinking less because of changes in lifestyle. Erm and a an awareness er thankfully of drink driving laws.
[Moira Stewart:] Since the war there's been the slow death of the British beer drinker. People in the business say we've changed our habits. Men tend to drink in rounds less now. Peer group pressure is easing on that. And there's been the wine bar, the symbol of the eighties. Nineteen seventy eight was the peak bitter and lager year in Britain. Forty million barrels were produced. Today, under assault from wine, that's fallen to thirty four million, two hundred and twenty pints a beer each now, nearly three hundred a decade ago. And less heavy industry means less heavy drinking.
[Max:] Traditionally, after a day in the steelworks, the coal mines, people used to quench their thirst to replace the liquids they've lost. Perhaps six, seven pints of beer then. Tho those sort of drinkers I think have erm almost disappeared in in large areas and subsequently, beer consumption has fallen. [music]
[Moira Stewart:] And cider grows as beer falls. Advertised in an Americanized style for younger people. And beer, caught between the factors and the one third increase in teetotalism over the past decade. All pressing the brewers and their employees. Steven Evans, B B C News. The Princess of Wales has been speaking about the problems faced by people caring for loved ones who have suffered brain damage. Addressing a conference in London she said that all too often, families were left isolated drained and exhausted as they helped to rebuild a shattered life.
[Anthony:] Two years after a road accident, Chris Dorrington is learning to walk again. He's receiving intensive physiotherapy at the Wolfeson Medical rehabilitation Centre in South West London. Which has an international reputation for treating patients with head injuries. But the centre is far from overstretched. A third of its beds have been empty for several years. Despite a waiting list of patients. The centre's director who organized today's conference attended by the Princess of Wales, says health authorities give too low a priority to rehabilitating head injured patients. He says delays clan jeopardize chances of recovery.
[speaker010:] It's catastrophic, the earlier the patients treatment begins, the better. There are physical problems, psychological problems, all sorts of problems. The needs of the patients aren't me met. Let alone the needs of the family and the carers.
[Anthony:] Dr Jenkins also criticizes the lack of aftercare for people like Sean Stanley. He's a former patient of the Wolfeson, and is cared for by his wife, a nurse who he met at the centre. Sean is blind and physically disabled, he pays for two private physiotherapy sessions a week, otherwise his condition could regress.
[Nicholas Witchell:] Once you're er out of a hospital, that's that. this or that anybody without the private means to pay for it, has to do without physiotherapy.
[Anthony:] The Princess of Wales who's patron of the national head injuries association Headway, told the conference that adequate resources for rehabilitation were essential.
[Neil Bennet:] We need to know for certain that if a person were to suffer in this way, the care will be there for them. Not just at the beginning but throughout what may prove to be a long and difficult journey of recovery.
[Anthony:] The clear message from the conference was that without adequate facilities, many head injured patients will fail to improve and could even get worse. Fergus Walsh, B B C News.
[Nicholas Witchell:] And the main news again, an Old Bailey judge has explained why he's stopped the prosecution of the three detectives accused in the Birmingham Six case. He said publicity surrounding the officers had snowballed so that the public perceived them as guilty. And Nelson Mandela and President F W de Klerk have won the Nobel Prize for peace. The next national news is the Nine O'clock news. But from Moira Stewart and from me, good evening and have a peaceful weekend. [recording ends]