The Army will then carry out its own assessment of proposed candidates

The Army will then carry out its own assessment of proposed candidates.
Offenders will only be considered if they have been sentenced to two years or less, and those convicted of sex, drug or race crimes will be disqualified.Details of the scheme have emerged despite concern among senior officers that it should be kept low-key. The Army is thought to be keen to avoid a repetition of the criticisms that accompanied last year’s plans to recruit homeless youngsters living in Leeds. THE ARMY is preparing to bolster its ranks by scouring jails for criminals who might be recruited on their release. In a pilot scheme due to begin in the new year recruitment officers will visit institutions for young offenders in Dover, Kent and Wetherby, West Yorkshire.

Derry – solo – says it was a prearranged part of a rolling programme of restoration,” she wrote.The diaries also disclose a Cabinet split over Lords reform. Jack Straw, the Home Secretary, and other ministers wanted an appointed upper chamber. But Lord Richard was authorised by Tony Blair to negotiate with Lord Cranborne, the Tory peer, for a House that was two-thirds elected and one-third nominated, after the end of the hereditary peerage.Yet when Lord Irvine appeared in front of the Commons select committee on public administration he said there had been no discussions about Lords reform.. According to extracts of the diary published in the Sunday Times, it said that the Lord Chancellor had made it clear that he regarded the refurbishment of his residence as an absolute priority.Lady Jones recorded that a reply to a Lords question about the Lord Chancellor’s wallpaper had been drafted by Black Rod, General Sir Edward Jones, and other senior officials But Lord Irvine rejected the form of words “Black Rod and co know Derry started [the refurbishment].

A “killer memo” proved that three days after Labour won the general election, Lord Irvine of Lairg demanded the refurbishment of his apartment with Pugin wallpaper, furniture and fittings, though he later denied responsibility for initiating the face-lift.
Among the shopping list of improvements he wanted, Lord Irvine called for a regular supply of flowers and the clock from the Prime Minister’s office in the Commons.Extracts from a diary by Lady Jones, the wife of Lord Richard, the former Labour Leader of the Lords, who was sacked by Tony Blair so that he could promote Baroness Jay, allege Lord Irvine bullied officials in the Lords into “covering for him”.The internal Lords memorandum, dated 4 May 1997, was headed “Refurbishment of the Lord Chancellor’s Residence”. THE LORD Chancellor has been accused of making misleading statements over Lords reform and the expensive refurbishment of his grace-and-favour apartment in disclosures by the wife of a former Cabinet minister. Mr Karpichkov’s case reflects the difficulties the Home Office faces in uncovering the truth of the many East European asylum cases in the years since the Berlin Wall came down.. But whether he has defrauded a Latvian bank or incurred the wrath of his country’s officials is harder to determine.Latvia has an extradition agreement with Britain, but it does have problems with mafia corruption at a high level. There is no doubt that much of his story is true, and a great deal of it is supported by Latvian and Russian newspaper articles. He believes they only want to extradite him to stop him publishing information abroad on corruption in Latvia.Establishing the truth of Mr Karpichkov’s claims is difficult.

They appear to live in poverty, dependent on hand-outs.”The Latvian authorities only asked for extradition after I gave interviews to the Latvian press on the phone,” said Mr Karpichkov. Later they flew to Russia, and after meeting problems there they sought asylum in Britain.Mr Karpichkov said he explained his predicament to the Home Office as part of his asylum claim, which was being processed normally until his arrest The family were found housing by a local authority. But he escaped from his sixth-floor apartment by climbing down a rope made from knotted-together clothes, and fled with his family to Cyprus. Although he was not seen as a central figure, Mr Karpichkov was accused of involvement with theft He denies the allegations.

He met the attorney-general of Latvia, Janis Skarstins, in 1996 and was offered a deal under which he would have been treated as a special witness in return for handing over evidence.Although Mr Karpichkov handed over documents and tapes, the deal fell through and he was placed under house arrest. At this point, he said, they betrayed him and told the Latvian police about his work. He said this led to his arrest by the Latvian police and later by the Russian police. He said he was tortured and beaten.When Olympia Bank failed in 1995, questions were asked about where large sums of money had gone. But Mr Karpichkov was actually gathering information on money laundering through Latvia’s biggest commercial banks, including Bank Olympia. The bank handled a number of International Monetary Fund credits worth millions of dollars intended for the country’s industrial and agricultural development. Mr Karpichkov said that in this period he gathered an “explosive” dossier, with tape recordings, about “the close connections between highest level officials of the Latvian state with leaders of organised crime”.Mr Karpichkov said he passed some of this information to his bosses in Russia’s secret services.