Terror suspects could sue the Government for damages over the use of control orders which breached their human rights, after a ruling by the Court of Appeal yesterday.

The Home Secretary confirmed yesterday that directly elected police commissioners will take charge of police forces in England and Wales two years. Announcing what she called "the most radical reforms to policing in at least 50 years", Theresa May also announced the formation of a National Crime Agency.

To their opponents, they represent the evil eye of the nanny state, or at least devices to squeeze money out of motorists. To their supporters, they represent a key tool for ensuring safer roads. Whatever the truth, speed cameras are on the way out.

Crime in England and Wales has fallen to its lowest level in nearly 30 years according to new figures, confounding fears that the recession would lead to an increase in offending.

We had it on rather good authority that Matthew MacFadyen was miffed to find his role in Ridley Scott's Robin Hood was minimal. Fair enough: Macfadyen was awarded the part of the legend's iconic villain, the Sheriff of Nottingham. But instead of being asked to let loose his inner Alan Rickman, his involvement was restricted to a few short scenes. However, when Diary collared him at the West End opening of Ghost Stories, a petrifying new play co-written by one quarter of The League of Gentlemen, the Spooks star assured us that, far from being peeved, he was overjoyed to find he'd had a stay of execution. "I was due to die," Macfadyen explained, "and then I got the script through and I survived; it was something of a curiosity to me. I can't imagine why they didn't go through with killing me off." If Scott's planning a Sheriff-heavy sequel, he'll have to wait for Macfadyen to finish with his next star-studded remake, The Three Musketeers, in which he'll play the alcoholic Athos. "And no," he adds, "I wasn't a Dogtanian fan".

Frontline public services are going to be cut as the axe falls on Whitehall budgets, the Cabinet Office minister, Francis Maude, has admitted.

Britain's most senior counter-terrorism officer was publicly rebuked by a Government minister today after warning that planned spending cuts could not be delivered without increasing the risk of a terrorist attack.

The Home Secretary, Theresa May, yesterday moved closer to scrapping the controversial £5bn national identity card scheme, declaring it "intrusive, bullying and ineffective".

There will be no "knee-jerk" overhaul of gun laws after Derrick Bird's killing spree, according to the Prime Minister, David Cameron, who will visit Cumbria today.