BACK CHAT.

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• Lonely hearts may be missing out on an unusual way to improve their love lives. According to a poll commissioned by Community Service Volunteers, a regular spot of volunteering can do wonders for your sex life. According to the survey, 9 per cent of men and 8 per cent of women believe voluntary work has boosted their love lives.

• Charity Mencap held an 80th birthday bash for its president, Lord Rix, at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London last month, where it is exhibiting a new collection of photographs by or about people with a learning difficulty. What a shame that more people with learning difficulties weren't able to join the great and the good to share in the celebrations.

• A myopic mutt might not be the ideal mate for a blind person but research carried out in New Zealand reveals that one in 10 guide dogs are very short-sighted and would need specs if they were human. The findings of the study were presented at the International Myopia Conference in Cambridge.

• Ever get the feeling that MPs miss the point? Labour MP Paul Flynn (right) has accused homelessness charities of creating a new definition of homelessness to serve their own interests. In an early day motion tabled last month he hailed the Rough Sleepers Unit as a "brilliant success" and slammed charity Crisis for the "hugely expensive gimmick" of sending 600 boxes made of card to MPs. What Flynn failed to grasp was that the "gimmick" highlighted the plight of the 380,000 hidden homeless living in B&Bs and sleeping on friends' floors rather than sleeping rough.

• And, finally, some good news for asylum seekers. Reliance Monitoring Group, which has been responsible for releasing at least six prisoners in error, has been named one of three companies awarded the contract for tagging asylum seekers in England and Wales. The pilot scheme is due to start in the autumn.

If you have a contribution for Backchat, please e-mail it to sally.gillen@rbi.co.uk

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