However that does not mean that discussing the issue is a bad thing

However, that does not mean that discussing the issue is a bad thing. Over the weekend Philip Rustell was found dead at Reading Young Offenders’ Institution, Berkshire; James Skelly at Portland Young Offenders’ Institution, Dorset; and Craig Roach at Exeter Prison, Devon.Enver Solomon, a policy officer at the Prison Reform Trust, said: “If you have vulnerable people suffering high levels of distress and there’s a lot of public attention and media focus on a suicide, that could be a factor in forcing them to go further than they would have done otherwise.”Martin O’Neill, a spokesman for the Samaritans, said: “There is evidence that the repeated portrayal of suicide in the media can lead to copycat incidents. After several complaints from members of the public, the Press Complaints Commission is considering whether to take action over the report.Hours after Shipman’s body was discovered,prompting saturation coverage of the death on television and radio news bulletins, April Sherman, a prisoner on remand, was found hanging in her cell at Edmunds Hill prison, Suffolk.The next day, Phillip Taylor, a convicted drug dealer, apparently committed suicide at Blakenhurst Prison, Worcestershire. That sort of coverage can tilt people who are already on the edge,” he said.The death of Dr Shipman was the lead story on most newspapers and news channels.The Prison service blamed a “bidding war” between 24-hour television news channels and red-top tabloids for the most graphic and detailed accounts of Shipman’s death for encouraging inmates to contemplate suicide. A spokeswoman said: “If a suicide is covered nationally, as it was with Shipman, we expect an increase in self-harm incidents.” However, she admitted that the rate after the former GP’s death had been “almost unprecedented”.The service has been particularly annoyed by a graphic in The Sun giving instructions to Roy Whiting, the killer of the schoolgirl Sarah Payne, on how to take his life. The hig-profile nature of Dr Shipman’s death has influenced other inmates, prison sources sayA senior Prison Service source said that after Shipman’s death it had anticipated a surge in the death rate, which is running at four times last year’s levels.”All the pictures on television will have put the idea in people’s heads. The number of people satisfied with Mr Howard has risen from 21 per cent to 30 per cent since last month..

Harold Shipman’s death is being blamed by the Prison Service for a spate of inmates hanging themselves in apparent copycat suicides. But Mr Howard said: “None of them is even approaching a substitute for something like the Franks inquiry which took place after the Falklands War.”An opinion poll by Mori, published last night, puts Labour on 37 per cent, the Tories on 35 per cent and Liberal Democrats on 27 per cent, wiping out Labour’s bounce after the capture of Saddam Hussein last month. Downing Street said yesterday that the issue had now been addressed by three investigations – the Commons foreign affairs committee, Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee and Lord Hutton. Caroline Flint, a Home Office minister, denied that the Government was sending mixed signals.In his interview, Mr Howard played down growing speculation that he would abandon the policy of his predecessor Iain Duncan Smith to scrap university tuition fees after next week’s critical Commons vote on the Higher Education Bill. Asked if tuition fees were likely play some part in the Tories’ package, he replied: “No. I am very confident that we can arrive on a package for the future of university funding which does not rely on fees – at all.”The Tory leader served notice that, whatever the findings of the Hutton inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly, which will report next week, he would continue to demand an independent judicial inquiry into the intelligence supplied to the Government about Iraqi weapons.

What is hoped is that the police will be able to concentrate on hard drugs – that is a huge problem, the link with heroin and crack addiction and crime is well known and it’s important the police use all the efforts they can to bear down on it. But it does not alter the fact that possession of cannabis remains a criminal offence.”Today the Home Office will begin a £1m advertising campaign to explain the Government’s decision, which will stress that cannabis will remain illegal. The British Medical Association has warned that the new law will create confusion and lead many people to believe that cannabis is safe. Last night the BMA warned that doctors were “extremely concerned” that the reclassification ignored health risks such as heart disease, lung cancer and mental illness.Diana Organ, the Labour MP for the Forest of Dean, challenged Mr Blair in the Commons. “Do you agree that the new classification of cannabis does lead to a mixed message for young people and drugs,” she asked.The Prime Minister replied: “I agree that it is important that we have a very clear message that possession of cannabis remains a criminal offence and whatever the reclassification, the police still have the power of arrest in relation to it. Mr Blair stressed that the police would retain the power to arrest people for possession.