Hopes that a large part of the legal liabilities facing British American Tobacco will soon be dismissed helped its shares achieve one of the best performances in the blue-chip index yesterday. The tobacco titan put on 17p to 1,172p as market professionals hinted that a decision on the Engle and Price class-action suits, which combined could cost the industry as much as $155bn (£85bn), are imminent and are likely to be favourable to the US tob-acco players.
BAT is exposed to these legal proceedings because of its 42 per cent shareholding in the local cigarette giant, Reynolds American. This year for the first time the 33 London councils plus eight areas just outside the capital have agreed to co-ordinate their admissions in an attempt to ensure that more families win places at the schools they want. The Government has created a fragmented system of specialist schools and academies These schools choose parents. Parents definitely don’t have the power to choose schools.”The survey shows that the issue is not restricted to the London area, which is known to have particular problems because so many schools and pupils are concentrated in a relatively small area. Parents’ leaders said the incident showed the extreme pressure facing parents over school admissions while the widespread dissatisfaction revealed in the survey showed that the “situation had spiralled out of all control”.Margaret Morrissey, spokeswoman for the National Confederation of Parent-Teacher Associations, said: “It is definitely a problem that is growing. The poll of 16,113 of this year’s graduatesranked PricewaterhouseCoopers as offering the best career opportunities..

Thousands of parents have either refused to send their children to school this term or are planning to withdraw them because they are unhappy with the place they have been given. Nearly 100,000 pupils have failed to get into their preferred secondary school this year, prompting criticism from parents that the Government’s claim to be offering more choice in education is an empty boast.
Some children have already missed a week of education after their parents refused to let them start the new term because they had been given places at schools which they regard as unacceptable, a survey by The Independent has found.The survey, which gives the most comprehensive national picture of school admissions, suggests today that more than 20,000 families have appealed against the school they were allocated to try to get a place elsewhere.It comes just days after a distraught father threw himself under a train after threatening suicide unless his local council relented and allowed his daughter to attend her chosen school.Steve Don, a 43-year-old surveyor from Brighton, had become increasingly distressed that his 11-year-old daughter had been rejected by their local comprehensive. Their numbers have swelled by 18.7 per cent to 13,401, with the biggest increases including Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.The number of overseas students from outside the European Union has gone up by 3.3 per cent, but with a notable 20 per cent decline in Chinese students.Popular subjects this year include social work – up 47.5 per cent to 6,899; education studies – up 25.4 per cent to 4,351; and tourism, transport and travel – up 25 per cent to 2,879.Meanwhile, a poll of graduates published today reveals one in five believe accountancy offers them the best career opportunities. In addition, 8,000 students have withdrawn from the scheme and a further 8,000 are still waiting to hear if a place has been confirmed.Ministers will welcome the increase in student numbers – which mean they are making progress towards their target of getting 50 per cent of youngsters into higher education by the end of the decade.But they will be anxious over whether those who have failed to find a place will try again next year – fearing a tailing off in student numbers coinciding with the first year of the new top-up fee regime.A breakdown of the figures shows the rise in European students – particularly from Eastern Europe – is far greater than UK students. Nearly 120,000 students applying for university are without a place this autumn, despite record numbers being accepted for courses. Figures show that out of 511,689 applicants this year, a total of 387,662 have had their university places confirmed as the clearing season draws to a close.
Record numbers applied this year, with student leaders and academics claiming this was because they wanted to avoid top-up fees of up to £3,000 a year – which come into force next September.As a result, the acceptance figure is 29,433 higher than last year, with the number of home students under the age of 21 going up by 8.3 per cent to 282, 514. Those getting a place through the clearing system are up by 6.7 per cent to 29,674.However, the number without a place has also risen this year to 107,652 – a 9 per cent increase on the same time last year.

Obviously this didn’t come to fruition and we continued with our trademark application of the logo, which we now have.”Peter has been using the logo in his series for seven years and on merchandise for well over three years and as far as we’re concerned we don’t think that there is a ’situation’ between Chorley FM and Phil McIntyre Entertainment.”. She said: “In 2004 we decided to trademark a ‘Chorley FM’ logo that Peter had been using in his shows since 1998; at the same time we tried to register the company name Chorley FM Ltd but discovered that a company had already been incorporated under that name in November 2001 [three years after Peter had begun using the logo].”As their accounts had been dormant for two years we approached Chorley FM Ltd to inquire if they would be prepared to change their name so we could have that company name to tie in with our trademark and offered to pay associated costs. There was some talk of him moving in to the borough, but if he’s seen to be ripping off the local station, he’s not going to be very welcome.”A spokeswoman for Phil McIntyre Entertainment said it was a “misconception” that they were trying to buy the radio station. The service will launch in early 2006.In a complicated twist, Kay’s co-writer on Phoenix Nights, Dave Spikey, is Chorley FM’s patron. Chris Mellor, cultural manager at Chorley Borough Council, said Phil McIntyre Entertainment had approached the community group a year ago and offered to buy the company and the name for just £80 – the cost of setting up an alternative company to house the radio station. The group declined the offer.Mr Mellor added that they had invited Kay to take part in some of their community broadcasts, but said he had declined.

A request this week for a meeting with Phil McIntyre Entertainment had also been turned down, he said.Mr Mellor said: “They have just ignored what’s going on locally and they have been looking to exploit it commercially Peter Kay has got a pretty poor name locally. Aimed at 15- to 25-year-olds and in particular at the Lancashire town’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered community, Chorley FM has transmitted on a temporary basis for the past six years.The media regulator Ofcom last week granted the station a permanent licence to broadcast for the next five years. A spat has now broken out between the not-for-profit community radio station, Chorley FM, and the television production company that makes Kay’s sitcoms.
The name Chorley FM was made famous in The Services, which preceded That Peter Kay Thing and Phoenix Nights, Kay’s sitcom set in a northern social club. The imaginary radio station, whose innuendo-filled catch phrases included “Coming in your ears”, also featured in spin-off series.The genuine Chorley FM, which won a local radio licence from Ofcom last week, is not amused and claims Phil McIntyre Entertainment, the production company that made the shows, tried to buy the station at a knock-down price.The council-backed station is also unhappy that Phil McIntyre Entertainment has trademarked the Chorley FM logo.The station has been inundated with requests for car stickers from Kay fans who do not realise there is a difference between the community service and its fictional counterpart. A fictional local radio station dreamt up by the comedian Peter Kay has been a huge hit with fans who have clamoured to get their hands on car stickers and T-shirts bearing the legend Chorley FM. But the creator of Phoenix Nights had not bargained on the existence of a real radio station of the same name. “Me? I’ll be wearing a T-shirt and a pair of jeans.” www.barbour , 0191-427 4210.

The only hitch appears to be a rather endearing inability to stick to the marketing script. What will he wear, I ask, when he takes his wealthy American shooting party on to the moors? The Lightweight Cheviot, perhaps? The Dunmoor Shooting Fleece?Percy stretches back in his chair. “I take a hell of a lot of shit from my mates, but I’ve got used to it. If I’d produced something that was crap, I would have been torn to shreds.” Instead, he’s received plaudits from the shooting industry and, so far, very respectable sales.In Lord James, Barbour have found blue blood, expertise and the “right” lifestyle. It’s got to be reasonably conservative, because that’s where the market lies.”Not that Lord James is short of ambitions for the Northumberland range: he has a women’s collection planned for September 2006 (take note, Madonna) and wants to expand into fishing, tweeds and even something for “the younger market”.Barbour are happy as long as Lord James continues to be the “face” of the brand, although he dislikes personal promotion: “I would have preferred to be an anonymous designer, but they wanted me as a front man.”And it’s as a marketing concept, above all, that he’s is most valuable: posed in the company’s catalogues and ads leaning against the bonnet of a Land-Rover parked on a grouse moor, gun slung over one arm, golden retrievers at his feet, he’s an authentic poster-boy for a fading country lifestyle of the English upper classes.”It’s quite embarrassing, actually,” he says.