IN BRIEF:Advice bureaux `negligence' claim

Employment advice offered by Citizen's Advice Bureaux is potentially negligent or below standard in almost four in 10 cases, a leaked report shows. Redundancy cases, discrimination or job security and maternity leave are areas singled out for particular criticism.

Only 20 per cent of all advice was classified as "good", according to an external audit based on an examination of 319 cases taken from 16 bureaux. Details of the report, which was commissioned by the National Association of Citizen's Advice Bureaux, are revealed in Legal Action - the monthly journal of the Legal Action Group.