There is just one post devoted to the prevention of female genital mutilation (FGM) in Whitehall, and the government has abolished it. Campaigners said the loss of the FGM co-ordinator will undermine efforts to eradicate the practice.

Some 24,000 girls among FGM-practising minority ethnic communities in Britain are estimated to be at risk of the procedure, in which part or all of their genitalia is cut off and stitched up without anaesthetic.

The Home Office insist the work of the FGM coordinator will not end. Rather, it will continue to be carried forward by individual departments where we believe it will be better integrated.

You can read the full story here. I hope that this important role is not diluted into the work of many people and therefore the important subject forgotten about.

And The Times reported last week that almost 100,000 acres of England’s public forests will be sold regardless of the outcome of the independent review of the future of Forestry Commission land, the Government indicated yesterday.

Caroline Spelman, the environment secretary, told MPs on the Commons Environment Select Committee that sales of 15 per cent of the 638,000 acres of public forests would go ahead within the next four years to raise £100 million.

Have I missed something here? I had thought the environment secretary agreed not to sell off our forests…? I recall just a month or so ago that the government was forced into an embarrassing u-turn over its decision.

But this u-turn on the u-turn, as it were, seems to have taken place with relative ease. You can read the full story here.