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Britain's special forces have been dealt a devastating blow that has seen the number of elite Special Air Service (SAS) personnel on active duty slashed.

The move was condemned last night by leading SAS figures as "madness" which will result in the loss of some of the country's most experienced and senior special forces personnel.

The dozens of soldiers axed – who were informed last week – include some of the SAS's best men, whose efforts have been crucial in a series of successful missions to kill or capture senior Taliban commanders in Afghanistan.

This follows a decision by Whitehall officials to end a practice called "continuance", which allows special forces soldiers to serve up to the age of 45 – five years longer than their regular Army counterparts. As a result almost 40 men – the equivalent of half of one of the regiment's four squadrons – were informed last week that they will be forced to retire.

The move has provoked fury within the SAS. One regimental insider, speaking to The Independent on Sunday last night, slammed the decision as "madness" and said: "This is the work of bean counters who know nothing about military operations. It has hugely damaged morale within the regiment."

It is understood that the cut was decided several months ago, by the former government, and is not part of the current defence review, which in itself could result in further cutbacks. "I'd be astonished if Liam Fox [the Secretary of State for Defence] is even aware of this, given what he has said about not reducing the effectiveness of the Army or resorting to salami slicing of budgets. This isn't about getting rid of dead wood, it's quite the opposite – these are the very people who really know how it works. How it is that senior NCOs who are counter-insurgency experts cannot be regarded as essential is beyond most military people," the insider added.

Former SAS officer Colonel Clive Fairweather condemned the move as a "clever dick idea" and said: "I'd hang on to the special forces, to every bit of experience they've got, even if they are grey-haired, old dogs – it's what's in their heads that's important. I would really fight hard to keep those guys."

He added: "People have this idea of the SAS being macho and terribly physically fit but it's much more about what's in their heads and their experience... The SAS isn't actually about 'Who Dares Wins', it's about who trains and who prepares wins."

Special forces are vital in the war against the Taliban, said Colonel Richard Kemp, former commander of British forces in Afghanistan. "In Afghanistan they have done enormous damage to the leadership of the Taliban. In the current operations that we're engaged in, special forces are absolutely critical, they're extremely important and if this measure looks like weakening the capability of the SAS then it should be resisted."

And expertise built up over a lifetime cannot be quickly replaced, Col Fairweather warned. Wider cuts to the Army would result in increased pressure on special forces, he claimed. "If you reduce the size of the armed forces, as we're about to do so, you can't sustain very large special forces because the talent pool to recruit from is diminished."

Col Fairweather likened Liam Fox to the maniac Dr Strangelove played by Peter Sellers. "I don't think Fox likes the Army very much. I think Fox thinks he's cleverer than the Army, but he's not.

"He worries me; he's a maverick that could get it quite badly wrong. Strangelove is the name I have for him in my mind. He looks like him, and he carries on like him."

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The government is to introduce a wholesale change to Britain's overseas aid budget by demanding that projects in the developing world must make the "maximum possible contribution" to British national security, according to a leaked Whitehall paper.

Labour, which established the Department for International Development to ensure overseas projects are funded on the basis of a country's needs, warned tonight that Britain's aid budget was being "securitised".

The coalition came under fire after a leaked DfID document showed that the new national security council, which oversees all aspects of foreign policy, is requiring that national security considerations are placed at the heart of aid projects.

The document, which offers guidance to staff of the department overseas who draw up bids for aid, says: "The national security council has said the ODA [Overseas Development Administration] budget should make the maximum possible contribution to national security consistent with ODA rules. Although the NSC will not in most cases direct DfID spend in country, we need to be able to make the case for how our work contributes to national security."

Labour said the document marked a return to the days when the old Overseas Development Administration was a division within the Foreign Office. Gareth Thomas, the shadow international development minister, said: "This document is deeply worrying, as it confirms the fears of many in the international development and humanitarian community that the government plans to securitise the aid budget, and weaken its focus in prioritising resources on the poorest people and countries.

"The revelation that part of the aid budget will now be directly controlled by the national security council suggests that other ministers will now be calling the shots on the aid budget instead of the development secretary."

David Cameron decided after the election that all aspects of foreign policy would be overseen by a national security council, to be chaired by the Foreign Office permanent secretary, Sir Peter Ricketts. The change was seen as a victory for William Hague, the foreign secretary, and a defeat for Liam Fox, the defence secretary, because the strategic defence review will be run by the national security council.

Andrew Mitchell, the international development secretary, is relaxed about the NSC's role. Mitchell told the Guardian in January that he wanted to "wire [DfID] in a little bit better into the Whitehall constellation".

The leaked document indicates that national security considerations are likely to be crucial in two sensitive countries that are beneficiaries of increasing amounts of British aid – Afghanistan and Pakistan. It talks of how projects in "fragile states" should focus on peace building and state building.

The document says: "We need to explain how DfID's work in fragile states contributes to national security through 'upstream' prevention that helps to stop potential threats to the UK developing (including work to improve health and education, provide water, build roads, improve governance and security)."

Labour says it agrees that aid should be spent in Afghanistan and Pakistan on improving education to help discourage support for al-Qaida and the Taliban, and that it is right to spend aid on building up structures such as the civil service and the police. But the party fears that aid money may be diverted to help build up the Afghan army.

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Lawrence Leaman, Norwich

This intriguing show by young artist Lawrence Leaman might initially leave you feeling wrong-footed by its subjects and styles. Little plain clay sculptures of humdrum items like a sheaf of corn are displayed on a short unassuming plinth, while clay Venetian blinds hang from the ceiling; paintings and drawings depict anything from shoe insoles to pebbles and hands. Wherever the images were sourced from to produce a catalogue of pared-down digital line drawings is unclear. Leaman seems interested in the off-kilter dance between intention and interpretation, leaving his audience guessing so as to keep meaning on the move.

Outpost Gallery, Thu to 21 Sep

Skye Sherwin
Feral Trade Cafe, Manchester

To what extent Feral Trade Cafe constitutes an art event is open to question. But it does take place in a gallery and is an otherwise unclassifiable project. It was founded in Bristol in 2003 by "artist and trader" Kate Rich as "a survival strategy for operating in an art world of diminishing returns". The artist's friends and peers contribute food from their global travels. Visitors might come across tortillas from Mexico or Bangladeshi tea. Rich is obviously an ironic opportunist, exploiting the traffic of the international art world as a trade route outside the global marketplace. Her artwork Café is joined here by Summer House, a space for a constantly mutating artist collective.

Castlefield Gallery, to 10 Oct

Robert Clark
Zed Nelson, Penarth

Photographer Zed Nelson's latest series Love Me is a heated take on the pursuit of beauty, building a convincing picture of oppression and identity made of material amassed over five years of travelling. It spirals outward from familiar images of beauty gone mad – American children dressed up as Mini-Mes in beauty pageants – to explore how a western ideal has been exported from the US across the globe. Thus we also find Russian women who work at a nuclear plant competing for the title of Miss Atom; female inmates at a South American prison putting on a beauty contest; and women and teenage girls in Tehran lining up for nose jobs. The beauty industry seems bleakly all-powerful, demeaning and narrow-minded, crossing continents and the gender divide.

Ffotogallery, Sat to 9 Oct

Skye Sherwin

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A mystery caller knocked on a woman's door - and left a four-foot snake on her doorstep.

The South American male boa, dubbed Kojak by officers, was abandoned at the house in Cricklewood, north London, in the early hours today.

The resident told police a young woman knocked on her door and asked for Andrew before walking off and leaving a pillow case behind.

When the confused householder saw the case was moving, she looked inside, found the snake coiled up at the bottom and called police.

A Metropolitan Police spokeswoman said the snake is "friendly", in good condition, and appears to have been handled before.

It was housed in an office at Colindale police station for several hours before being taken to London Zoo.

The spokeswoman added: "If you are the owner of the boa and wish to be re-united with your pet, or have information about where he has come from please call police on 0300 123 1212.

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It is the Road to Bognor, a title which some might find off-putting, but which those of us who have spent half a century travelling to the coast from the London area know is the best-kept secret in southern England. It is, a few notable kinks apart, exceptionally straight (running, as it does, in places over Roman Stane Street). It has villages that are real communities, not tourist traps.

It has several sensational views. And it is almost ridiculously uncrowded.Good though it is to travel the A29 southwards, it is the run north that most rewards, and so that is the way we will go.

We start on the front at Bognor, a resort whose unfortunate first syllable and George V's deathbed curse has made a sort of seaside Neasden, its name alone causing sniggering merriment. As a result, it is under-visited, and long may this continue say those of us with boltholes nearby, who use its sandy beaches and enjoy its conservation areas. They were, after all, good enough for James Joyce, Queen Victoria, Lewis Carroll, Noël Coward, and Dante Gabriel Rosetti - visitors or residents all.

The first eight miles or so - across the coastal plain, and through ribbonly developed Westergate - are but a preliminary to get you and your vehicle in the mood.

Then, swinging left at the village's curious lion-surmounted war memorial, you pass the homely Fontwell race course, joust momentarily with the A27 traffic, before turning off left on to the A29 again, leaving the heavy breathing lorries and dodgems drivers of the big road far behind.

Now starts the most pleasant drive in all south-eastern England. First are the outlying parts of Slindon, a village with a better claim to be the birthplace of cricket than Hambledon. Up a rise and down again and there is Fairmile Botton, nature reserve to the north, scrubbier downland to the south. As a child, I knew the last part of this section as "The Enchanted Wood" because of the arching trees which made the road an open-air nave. It still has charm, but busybodying forestry has thinned its magic a little.

No matter, because at the top, just beyond the excellent Whiteways Café, is a view no Hollywood art director would dare make up: the Arun valley far below, with the South Downs rearing its chalky biceps again on the far side, and, to the north, the Weald with distant, misty hills beyond. You descend Bury Hill like a downhill skier, the road S-bending from side to side, each turn offering you the Arun floodplain spread out like a well-laid tea table.

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The row over the Government's "progressive" credentials and the fairness of the emergency Budget is blown open today with new research from the respected Institute for Fiscal Studies.

The IFS's study of the effects of the June Budget, drawing on evidence published by the Department for Work and Pensions, suggests that the Prime Minister's and the Chancellor's claims that the Budget would not increase child poverty are wrong. Research commissioned from the IFS by the End Child Poverty campaign shows that the group that George Osborne's Budget will hit hardest are the poorest families with children, who face a loss of just over 5 per cent of their income by 2014. Families with children lose more than pensioners or other household types in all except the top-three income groups.

The Treasury has argued that an increase in the child tax credit will help protect the most vulnerable and prevent child poverty rising, but in its analyses it did not include the effects of wider benefit changes, such as restrictions on housing benefit. The IFS's work has attempted to do that, and has revealed a less favourable picture.
James Browne, senior research economist with the IFS and co-author of the report, said: "It seems likely that, once changes to other benefits are taken into account, child poverty will go up."

The IFS report is especially embarrassing for Nick Clegg, who is "holding the fort" in the Prime Minister's absence, and who has insisted on the Coalition being a "progressive" force.

The Treasury Select Committee last month asked the Chancellor to provide a wider analysis of the redistributive effects of the Budget, but this has not been forthcoming as yet.

In his Budget statement, the Chancellor declared that "the policies in this Budget, taken together, will not increase measured child poverty over the next two years" and that "overall, everyone will pay something, but the people at the bottom of the income scale will pay proportionately less than the people at the top. It is a progressive Budget."

David Cameron added: "We are absolutely committed to meeting the child poverty targets. This Budget, despite all its difficulties, does not add a single family to child poverty."

The Coalition has adopted the outgoing Labour government's goal of eliminating child poverty by 2020.

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Kim Kardashian shows off her killer body in the September issue of Allure  -- and tells the magazine she hopes to have kids in the next few years.

In the article accompanying the sexy photo shoot, the 29-year-old says "In five years I would hope to be settled down, have a baby  or two. I always thought, for sure, when I'm 30, I'll have four kids like my mom."

She also says she's always wanted to do reality TV, telling the mag "In elementary school, 'The Real World' came on, and I was like, That's it! I know I want to be on a reality show. And I was like, OK, when I'm old enough, I will make an audition tape."

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It is always so tempting. There's a till free, there are only a few items in your basket. How difficult can it be? The decision is made and you're there, face to face with the supermarket's self-service check-out till.
But for many people, this simple decision often turns out to be a source of such frustration that it ruins the rest of their day, leaving a lasting sense of resentment and ineptitude.
Supermarkets championed the introduction of self-service tills as a means of reducing queuing but, with a twist of irony, research now shows that for some customers they have had the opposite effect and actually increase waiting times.
What's more, supermarket staff who bear the brunt of customer exasperation at the failings of the new checkout technology have reported a new phenomenon: self-service till rage.
This unexpected anger in the bagging area is usually prompted by frustrations at the behaviour of the machine, even if the glitches are really down to the customer's cack-handedness. The eggs won't scan, the machine can't identify the turnip on the till, and the bar codes on every item in the basket are hiding in the most obscure part of the packaging.
Swiping items across the scanner in quick succession seems unacceptable to the machine and a member of staff has to be summoned to verify you're old enough to buy alcohol. Perhaps most annoying of all is the robotic call of "Unexpected item in bagging area", which rivals "Your call is important to us, please hold" as a blood pressure-inducing curse of the automated age.
A survey carried out by the shop workers' union Usdaw has, for the first time, identified self-service till rage as a cause of abuse. John Hannett, the general secretary, said that as yet, it accounts for only 3 per cent of cases but that it is an alarming source.
"Our concern is that the use of self-service checkouts has become a flash point that can lead to abuse and violence against shop workers," he is reported as saying. "Frustrated shoppers experiencing problems using self-service checkouts can often take out their anger and frustration on the nearest shop worker, and this is unfair and unacceptable.
"We will be very concerned if the situation worsens as the use of self-service checkouts becomes more widespread. On the whole, shoppers much prefer to be served by real people."
Self-service tills were introduced in 2002 and they are now found in most supermarkets. By next year, there are forecast to be 15,000 in use in Britain. The units take up less space than the traditional manned conveyor-belt type, so more can be installed, but supermarkets insist that their introduction is not merely a simple means of reducing staff levels.

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The second floor of the Helmut Newton Foundation is devoted to changing exhibitions—right now, photographs by Alice Springs. (I wrote about the first floor, and Helmut himself, last week.) Most of the show is made up of her black-and-white portraits and the fashion campaigns she shot in the seventies and eighties. My favorite pictures are her portraits of the great fashion designers. She knew their world and they posed for her without holding back. No doubt it was her wit and charm that seduced them. Beyond these, I fell in love with her portrait of Antoine Blondin and was charmed by a picture she took for the magazine Depeche Mode, in Paris, 1971. It can be seen as a poster all over Berlin announcing the exhibit (see above). I did miss one of my favorite pictures from her very amusing “Baby with Parent(s)” series: Brigitte Nielsen, ex-wife of Sylvester Stallone, hoists her sleeping baby, paying no attention whatsoever to the child.

On the third floor is the recently reconstructed Kaisersaal (Emperor’s Hall). It completes Helmut’s dream: a photography museum in Berlin. On view right now are hidden treasures of architectural photography from the collections of Berlin’s State Museums of Art (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin). It is a must see for anyone interested in architecture or architectural photography.

No worries if you don’t get to Berlin this summer but still want to see Alice Spring’s photography. Taschen has published her monograph, which includes that Brigitte Nielsen portrait. (P.S. Alice Springs is also known as June Newton.)

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Telecoms group BT today said it is considering increasing its number of apprenticeship places after an unprecedented demand for the scheme.

The company had nearly 24,000 applications for the 221 apprenticeship places available this year - more than 100 applications per place.

More young people applied for the positions on the programme - which offers an annual salary of £11,000 to £14,000 - than the total applications to Oxford University, which attracted 17,000 applications for its 3,000 undergraduate places.

Today, the firm said it is considering taking advantage of this demand for the scheme, especially in light of its plans to introduce faster, fibre broadband across the UK.

Alex Wilson, BT's human resources director, said: "BT has had unprecedented interest in its apprenticeship scheme.

"Given this interest, and BT's plans to spend £2.5 billion on rolling out fibre broadband, the company is now considering whether to expand the scheme.

"We'll need engineers to help us deliver superfast broadband and so we hope to tap into the interest that is being shown by young people across the UK."

Successful applicants go on to specialise in information technology, telecoms or customer service, and will gain qualifications including BTEC or foundation degrees.

The National Apprenticeship Service (NAS) has recorded a steady increase in the number of applications being made through its online facility, nearly doubling from 22,550 in April to 41,940 in July.

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