unprotected

"Child recruitment has been possible because of the existence of unprotected, abandoned and marginalised children, and legal loopholes in the Colombian justice system," Mr Mantilla said.

Predictably, the unprotected home met the fate that thousands of structures did during the windy and dry Jan. 7 disaster.

"Increasing health funding at anything like the historical average rate would mean imposing real-terms cuts on other 'unprotected' departments," the think tank said.

“If groundwater remains unprotected in large swaths of the southwestern U.S. and continues to disappear, it will dramatically limit food production,” Famiglietti said.

But there is also a growing realisation that further tax rises are all but inevitable if deeper cuts to unprotected departments – those outside of the NHS, defence, and schools - are to be avoided.