Many members of the Church of England and Church in Wales, both clergy and lay people, LGBT and not, are in favour of allowing gay marriage ceremonies. In time a new hierarchy will also be in favour and at that point it will be much simpler to allow "opting in" than to go through the process of amending legislation. Meanwhile the C of E will be just as well "protected" as the Roman Catholic and other churches which do not wish to hold gay marraige ceremonies. Legislating to make gay marriage illegal in the Church of England and Church in Wales simply makes homophobia legal, which wouldn't be allowed in any other institution.

Grandma B's case is the tip of an iceberg. Corrupt officials and politicians are systematically targeting vulnerable, old people and plundering their assets. North Yorkshire Police are also up to their necks in covering up for Jimmy Savile. Nobody in North Yorkshire can possibly be safe until this rampant official corruption is dealt with. For more about the story, please google: "The Abuse of Grandma B"

**UPDATE - Victory! Danny Nightingale's sentenced was quashed and he has now been released! Thank you to everyone who signed the petition.** Danny was convicted of illegally possessing a pistol which his trainees in the Iraqi army had given him as a gift in 2007. He planned to donate the pistol to his regiment but soon after had to return to the UK following the sudden deaths of two of his closest friends. His colleagues packed all his belongings, including the pistol, in boxes which remained unopened until 2010 when police searched his house while investigating a complaint made against his housemate. In 2009, Danny collapsed while on a fund-raising trek in Brazil and incurred serious memory damage. During his court martial, expert witnesses said he probably had no memory that the gun was in his possession The prosecution praised Danny's character as being exemplary. Despite this, a war hero has been imprisoned and his wife and children are now facing being evicted from their home. He has been unfairly imprisoned. Please release him immediately. You can read more here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/9669410/SAS-war-hero-jailed-after-betrayal.html

Matthew Woods was sentenced to a 12 week custodial sentence for a number of offensive remarks on Facebook. We believe that this represents a fundamental infringement of his freedom of speech as laid out in article 19 of the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." It is our opinion that the Communications Act: Section 127, has been abused in this sentencing in response to public pressure. We believe it was never intended to police offensive jokes on the internet. The precedent set by this sentence has dangerous implications and threatens to lead us down the road of internet censorship. That is why it is imperative that this is stopped now. Before it goes any further.

The safety of children is very important, but the other issues are how it effects children later in life. Sexual abuse is one of the worst things to happen to a child, and when it happens, they never forget. It can destroy their future by depriving them of a good education, and thus they cannot get a good job or have a meaningful relationship in a large number of cases. By stopping the abuse, you give children the chance to be everything they can be in adult hood. Stop the abuse, and every child will grow up far happier and healthier.

It is vitally important that the people of Scotland have access to justice as fairly as possible. This is a cost cutting exercise only and takes no account of the needs and aspirations of the people, including many of the most vulnerable, of Scotland.

John Major and other senior party members pledged to return the donations if Nadir was found guilty of fraud - this was a Conservative party commitment which they should honour.

I am one of those unfortunate people who - through no direct fault of their own - have 'lost their home'. For over 'fourteen years' (following on from buying our house/10 years) we have rented 'four' different houses. All of them - particularly the first 'three' came with a bizarre range of difficulties and problems culminating with us having to up- sticks and move on to somewhere less troubled! Our problems included immense noise problems, drug busts by the police to our immediate neighbours, racist remarks, drunkenness, barking dogs, failure of landlord to hold to the Tenancy agreement, theft, anti social behaviour: and blatant promises (by Estate Agents) of improvements that never materialised and so on. (I have detailed documentation on most of these difficulties). I often feel that renting tenants (particularly 'private' tenants) are 'used' primarily to pay the mortgage on the landlords second, third (etc) house but with 'nothing' in return beside broken promises and a very 'poor' service all round! The TV channels are currently running repetitive adverts on 'landlords insurance' but nothing is seen about the much needed 'tenants insurance'; this insurance should be included as a part of the rental agreement. I have often been made to feel like a second class citizen with little or no rights on many occasions. Surely, even if only to attempt to bridge the increasing gap (chasm) between the haves and the have-nots'- their should be made available a strict set of rules for 'landlords'. Rules which would protect tenants, provide us with a fair say on renting issues without the fear of reprisals or evictions, and to discontinue the poor practise of 'money for nothing' for bad landlords.

In S. Korea, dog meat industry is estimated at $2 billion that results in the annual slaughter of over 2.5 million dogs, served in upwards of 20,000 restaurants nationwide. That's about 7,000 dogs slaughtered every single day. It is estimated that over 100,000 tons of dog meat is consumed annually, including 93,600 tons used to produce ‘health’ tonics called "Gae Soju" which is prepared by boiling dogs with various herbs until it become a thick liquid. Cats are also made into these tonics which is called "Goyangyee Soju". Current Situation of S. Korea's Dog Meat Industry Little has changed over the years regarding the dog meat industry in S. Korea. The selling and processing of dog meat is still technically illegal. The situation could be summed up with this paradox: it is illegal to produce and consume dog meat but it is not against the law. Debate continues on its legalization but an impasse remains at the moment between the S. Korean government and animal welfare groups, meaning that everything continues on now as it has done in the past. More Info: Korea still conflicted over its custom of dining on dogs (Part 1 of 2): http://koreajoongangdaily.joinsmsn.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2963308 Pets on plates are dog industry’s dirty little secret (Part 2 of 2): http://koreajoongangdaily.joinsmsn.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2963369&cloc=joongangdaily South Korea's dog meat clash: http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/542514.html Dogs in Hell: http://koreandogs.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/dogsinhell.pdf The Fight Against the Dog Meat Industry: http://busanhaps.com/article/feature-fight-against-dog-meat-industry Send messages to Olympic Committee: https://secure.registration.olympic.org/en/faq/ask-question [Sample message] To the International Olympic Committee: I am extremely distressed about the torture and consumption of animal companions in South Korea. Even though the government has established an Animal Protection Law, dogs are still electrocuted, hanged, and beaten to death by farmers and slaughters. Also, dogs and cats are still being tortured and boiled alive for so-called elixirs, which have no medicinal properties except in the minds of gullible customers. Until South Korea ends this appalling suffering, the country’s reputation in the international community will continue to suffer. Its citizens will face shame and embarrassment. And South Korea will continue to be regarded as “third world,” despite its glittering modernization and attempts at globalized thinking. There will be worldwide attempts to boycott “PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics unless the abuse of cats and dogs has finally come to an end. Korean Olympic Committee Homepage: http://www.sports.or.kr/eng/

Jimmy Mubenga, an Angolan national, died while being 'restrained' by G4S security guards on a deportation flight in October 2010. Eyewitnesses on the plane heard him complaining that he could not breathe, crying for help and shouting: "They're going to kill me." The Crown Prosecutions Service decided in June 2012 not to bring manslaughter charges against the guards. Lord Rathbotham (former chief inspector of prisons - now a crossbench peer) has called this decision 'perverse', and demanded that public funds be made available for an inquest to properly establish what caused the death of Jimmy - a former student leader who had fled Angola in 1994 after falling out with the ruling party. No organ of the state - including outsourced security personnel - should be allowed to kill British residents with impunity. To send a message that refugees and asylum seekers must enjoy the same rights and protection from harm as anyone else under British jurisdiction, please sign my petition to determine what truly happened on Jimmy's last flight.

The law is a discriminatory one which relies on an individual police officer's judgement and, as such, is open to abuse. The police officer is open to criticism for misuse of the order and under 16 year old's are vulnerable to overzealous application and miss-accusations. The discriminatory nature of the order encourages the hatred and fear of young people and allows some to feel justified in discriminatory attitudes toward them. It encourages those who have suffered at the hands of badly behaved youths to believe that they are all like that and to become more afraid. It will only serve to alienate young people and make them feel that the police are there simply to control them but not to protect them. Already young people in Bangor are avoiding going out to the cinema and to after school clubs for fear of being caught in the curfew or of being beaten up by the marauding gangs that this order implies are on the loose in the city center. Bangor is a lovely historic place with much to offer young and old alike. It suffers from very little anti-social behavior apart from a very few people in limited areas and the usual after pub and club problems present in all cities. It is suffering in the downturn from an empty high street (the longest in the country) but there was no rioting in Bangor last year, the out of town JJB sports, PC World etc were not ransacked as was seen in other towns and cities across the UK, so why Bangor? There was no consultation with the public or even their elected representatives on the City Council. This is despite the ACPO guidance that there should be consultation with the effected community and a Rowntree report, which concludes that these laws have only been effective where consultation and involvement had taken place. This law is badly worded, heavy handed, discriminatory and draconian and it should be stopped now!

The Channel Island of Sark has just 600 inhabitants. They lead a peaceful and historic way of life that has remained largely unchanged for hundreds of years. The islanders get around on bikes or by horse and cart - there are no cars or tarmac roads on the island. It is a unique and beautiful place, a rare piece of tranquillity in a chaotic modern world. But now the billionaire owners of The Telegraph newspaper, the Barclay brothers, are threatening that way of life. Twenty years ago, they bought the tiny neighbouring island of Brecqhou and built a huge mock gothic castle that looms over Sark. Ever since, they have been buying up every hotel, small business and piece of land they can get their hands on. The islands status as a tax haven means the brothers have to pay no tax on their fortune back to the UK. The Sarkees have been doing everything they can to resist their power over the island. In 2008, the Barclays tried to flood the island's first democratically elected government with their allies. When the islanders emphatically rejected them in favour of their own representatives, the brothers retaliated by firing everyone who worked in any of the businesses they had bought out - that amounted to a sixth of Sark's population losing their jobs. It doesn't end there. Those who speak out against the brothers' stranglehold on the island are publicly dragged through the dirt in the Sark Newsletter - a weekly propaganda piece written by the Barclays' lieutenant, Kevin Delaney. The islanders recently told the Guardian and BBC that they live in fear in a "culture of bullying and intimidation." The Barclay brothers company Sark Estate Management (SEM) has turned much of their good quality agricultural land over to vineyards, land that was traditionally used by the islanders for centuries for growing crops and grazing livestock. In November 2012 a peaceful protest at the Sark Mill vineyards against the spread of vines resulted in 120 Sark residents signing a petition asking the Barclays to reconsider their vineyard project but this was ignored. SEM continue to spray the vineyards with chemicals and residents fear for the health of Sark's pristine ecosystem and their fresh water supplies which come from under the ground. Sark is a dependency of the Crown but, so far, our government has left the islanders to fend for themselves. The Department of Justice has admitted that it has an "ultimate responsibility to ensure good governance" of Sark. They are aware of what's going on - former Justice Minister Lord McNally has already been to visit the island. It's time Lord Faulks, the new Justice Minister and Chris Grayling, the Secretary of State for Justice, lived up to that responsibility. You can find out more about the situation in Sark in this recent Panorama show: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01px74c/Panorama_The_Tax_Haven_Twins/ Or this earlier Today programme piece: http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9709000/9709518.stm

The age of criminal responsibility in England is one the lowest in Europe, and the statistics show that we are in danger of criminalising too many children and young people. The age of criminal responsibility needs to be reviewed in light of the standards set by the UN Convention and these international comparisons. Young children are simply not capable of the sophisticated mental reasoning required to be held fully responsible for criminal actions, and we need to take a far more "welfare based" approach in dealing with young people who commit serious crimes. Furthermore, there is concern among neuroscientists in this field that the age of criminal responsibility in the UK is unreasonably low given the emerging understanding of how slowly the brains of children mature, and the evidence of individual differences suggests that an arbitrary cut-off age may not be justifiable.

by putting Andy Coulson in place as communications director against advice and in light of Coulson's being found guilty of phone hacking that caused untold misery to people, David Cameron has shown he cannot be trusted to run the country and cannot command the confidence of parliament or the people of the UK. he must go.

British society and its legal proceedings should be secular and not alienate. I recently attended a swearing of probate and was handed a bible before being asked to repeat the words of the lawyer. When I asked the lawyer that I wanted to swear an affirmation, I was made to feel awkward. The lawyer claimed this was the first time such a request had been made. It is clear that many of us merely accept a christian oath as the accepted format, and by doing so perpetuate a procedure that no longer represents our society.

Democracy is dead if this is prove

This is important because the government withdrew legal aid at a time when it contracted out its duties to ATOS to assess whether or not claimants, of sickness benefits, were fit for work. Job Centres and the Department of Works & Pensions have strict guidelines to follow when assessing claimants, however, by contracting out to ATOS they avoided these strict guidelines to reach the government's targets to reduce the number of people on sickness benefits. Thousands of people, who were misdiagnosed by ATOS, won their appeals. No fines have been levied on ATOS, or compensation paid by them, for financial loss or the pain and suffering caused to the individuals, despite the proven negligence at the tribunals.

The public's safety is key, especially those with young families and the elderly. By Kirsty Anne Taylor with the help of my friends and a big thank you to Harry Acid for your support. https://www.facebook.com/Kirstyanne1989

Millions of tonnes of food, particularly fresh food, that is perfectly good for human consumption are destroyed every year by supermarkets because it is in some way "blemished". Meanwhile those living in poverty, housed or on the streets, are going hungry or even malnourished here in the UK. This is utterly immoral and must cease NOW.

The cuts mean that in the cases of divorce and separation the spouse denied legal aid will be the one who cannot afford to go out to work because they are looking after young children. The spouse who can afford legal representation is the more likely to win the custody battle. In very many cases he or she is really not the best parent to look after the child/ren and the heartache for both the children and the better placed parent will be grossly unfair. This matter should most definitely NOT be a case whereby the parent who has the money to spend on the case is the victor. Lives will be severely blighted. Many in particular only see their children as a key to the door of the family home and do not have the children's interests at heart. The withdrawing of legal aid in these cases is grossly inhumane and really must not go ahead.

This is important to me, because there's a lack of awareness that men can get raped or sexually assaulted despite the recent male rape attack in Bristol. According to UK charity Mankind 1 in 29 have reported being sexually assaulted and 1 in 20 have been affected by sexual violence. There's a huge denial that male rape exists, rooted in mistaken ideas that 'real' men can fight off an attacker, women cannot rape men, and male rape only happens in prison. These mistaken beliefs make it hard for male survivors to come forward, because they are left with feelings of shame, confusion and self blame for what happened. That's why we need the council and police to publicly recognise male rape to make it easier for male rape survivors to get the help they need and to report the crime.

There is no economic argument for the closure of Magilligan. The Prison Service of Northern Ireland argues that the prison has outlived its economic usefulness but the additional cost incurred by building a new facility on the Magheraberry site destroys this argument. Closure of the prison would have a catastrophic impact on the local economy. This part of the North West has already been ravaged by the economic recession and the loss of a further 440 jobs would be devastating.The spending power of those employed in the prison would be lost to the local economy and in addition, the goods and services that the prison buys from local suppliers will stop causing further pressure upon already struggling businesses and potentially causing even more job losses. This area simply cannot afford to lose the prison.