The Government has described Boris Johnson's proposal for an amnesty for illegal immigrants as "naive".

Auteur : ITN
Tags : boris boris johnson politics news britain tories tory conservative conservatives labour government immigrant immigrants illegal immigrants immigration gordon brown david cameron phil woolas amnesty spain
Envoyé : 22 novembre 2008
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divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/66702?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Darling+ready+to+admit+taxes+must+risech=Politicsc3=The+Guardianc4=Economic+policy%2CAlistair+Darling%2CPoliticsc5=Credit+Crunch%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=Allegra+Strattonc7=2008_11_22c8=1122290c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=Economic+policyc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FEconomic+policy" width="1" height="1" //divpThe chancellor, Alistair Darling, is preparing to admit that tax will need to rise after the next election as borrowing projections emerged showing the public finances in a worse state than previous estimates had shown. Darling will say that "adjustments" will have to be made, though it is unclear whether these will be slated for 2010 or 2011. /ppYesterday the Treasury refused to deny reports that its officials were putting borrowing in the region of pound;120bn - much more than the pound;90bn many thought Darling would announce in his pre budget report on Monday. /ppTreasury officials are reported to have described the effect the pound;120bn would have on the economy as a "mammoth shock" as tax revenues continue to plummet and the costs of increased unemployment are borne by the state. /ppOn Monday, Darling will have to show the government has a strategy for controlling annual borrowing to soothe international markets and remove conditions that might otherwise see the Bank of England feel the need to raise interest rates. /ppLast night it emerged that the chancellor was preparing to admit the government would raise taxes in order to bring the public finances under control. It is still thought the government will announce the heavily trailed fiscal stimulus package of tax cuts and increased public spending./ppThe admission by the chancellor on Monday may also serve to claim for the government some of the intellectual territory the Conservative leader staked this week when he ended a year-old commitment to match Labour party's spending plans for the year 2010-2011. Explaining his position on Tuesday, David Cameron said he believed the British people would be suspicious of tax cuts and public spending programmes without obvious funding./ppIt is not clear what form the tax rises might take but a Treasury aide described as "rubbish" a suggestion that VAT might rise from 17.5% to 22.5%./ppThis week the prime minister's efforts in tackling the economic downturn were reflected in improved polling figures, leading to speculation that No 10 was gearing up to call an election./ppSpeaking on Jeremy Vine's Radio 2 programme yesterday, Gordon Brown refused to be drawn on his improved standing and batted away talk of a election, saying that all speculation could be "discounted"./ppDowning Street has been quick to nip the rumour in the bud, with ministerial special advisers briefed this week by senior No 10 aides that an election was not "remotely on our minds". /ppThey are keen to prevent a rerun of last summer which saw Brown's political standing damaged by his decision not to call an election after weeks of speculation./ppPressure was piled on the Treasury team drawing up Monday's plan by confirmation yesterday of poor October public sector net borrowing figures. Public sector net borrowing increased in the last month by pound;1.4bn. Borrowing was pound;3.1bn higher this year than in October 2007./ppThe figure for public sector net debt rose to pound;640.9bn or 42.9% of GDP largely down to the government's takeover of Bradford Bingley at the end of September. Net borrowing has reached pound;37bn already - nearly as much as the pound;43bn forecast by the Treasury for the whole of the year. Government spending was higher than in the same month a year ago./ppThe prime minister and chancellor have said in the last few weeks that they favour a fiscal stimulus package to help galvanise the British economy. If as expected it is announced on Monday, this could increase public sector net borrowing by pound;15bn-pound;30bn./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/economy"Economic policy/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/alistairdarling"Alistair Darling/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660288112201400459684"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660288112201400459684" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/28646?ns=guardianpageName=Environment%3A+Rich+countries+launch+great+land+grab+to+safeguard+food+supplych=Environmentc3=The+Guardianc4=Food+%28Environment%29%2CBiofuels+%28Environment%29%2CConservation+%28Environment%29%2CEndangered+habitats+%28Environment%29%2CEnvironment%2CWorld+news%2CFood+and+drink+industry+%28Business%29%2CBusiness%2CAgriculture+%28Science%29%2CKorea+%28News%29%2CSciencec5=Environment+Conservation%2CBusiness+Markets%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CClimate+Change%2CEnergy%2CEthical+Living%2CFood+and+Drinkc6=Julian+Borgerc7=2008_11_22c8=1122193c9=articlec10=GUc11=Environmentc12=Foodc13=c14=h2=GU%2FEnvironment%2FFood" width="1" height="1" //divpRich governments and corporations are triggering alarm for the poor as they buy up the rights to millions of hectares of agricultural land in developing countries in an effort to secure their own long-term food supplies./ppThe head of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, Jacques Diouf, has warned that the controversial rise in land deals could create a form of "neo-colonialism", with poor states producing food for the rich at the expense of their own hungry people./ppRising food prices have already set off a second "scramble for Africa". This week, the South Korean firm Daewoo Logistics announced plans to buy a 99-year lease on a million hectares in Madagascar. Its aim is to grow 5m tonnes of corn a year by 2023, and produce palm oil from a further lease of 120,000 hectares (296,000 acres), relying on a largely South African workforce. Production would be mainly earmarked for South Korea, which wants to lessen dependence on imports./pp"These deals can be purely commercial ventures on one level, but sitting behind it is often a food security imperative backed by a government," said Carl Atkin, a consultant at Bidwells Agribusiness, a Cambridge firm helping to arrange some of the big international land deals./ppMadagascar's government said that an environmental impact assessment would have to be carried out before the Daewoo deal could be approved, but it welcomed the investment. The massive lease is the largest so far in an accelerating number of land deals that have been arranged since the surge in food prices late last year. /pp"In the context of arable land sales, this is unprecedented," Atkin said. "We're used to seeing 100,000-hectare sales. This is more than 10 times as much."/ppAt a food security summit in Rome, in June, there was agreement to channel more investment and development aid to African farmers to help them respond to higher prices by producing more. But governments and corporations in some cash-rich but land-poor states, mostly in the Middle East, have opted not to wait for world markets to respond and are trying to guarantee their own long-term access to food by buying up land in poorer countries./ppAccording to diplomats, the Saudi Binladin Group is planning an investment in Indonesia to grow basmati rice, while tens of thousands of hectares in Pakistan have been sold to Abu Dhabi investors. /ppArab investors, including the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development, have also bought direct stakes in Sudanese agriculture. The president of the UEA, Khalifa bin Zayed, has said his country was considering large-scale agricultural projects in Kazakhstan to ensure a stable food supply. /ppEven China, which has plenty of land but is now getting short of water as it pursues breakneck industrialisation, has begun to explore land deals in south-east Asia. Laos, meanwhile, has signed away between 2m-3m hectares, or 15% of its viable farmland. Libya has secured 250,000 hectares of Ukrainian farmland, and Egypt is believed to want similar access. Kuwait and Qatar have been chasing deals for prime tracts of Cambodia rice fields./ppEager buyers generally have been welcomed by sellers in developing world governments desperate for capital in a recession. Madagascar's land reform minister said revenue would go to infrastructure and development in flood-prone areas. /ppSudan is trying to attract investors for almost 900,000 hectares of its land, and the Ethiopian prime minister, Meles Zenawi, has been courting would-be Saudi investors. /pp"If this was a negotiation between equals, it could be a good thing. It could bring investment, stable prices and predictability to the market," said Duncan Green, Oxfam's head of research. "But the problem is, [in] this scramble for soil I don't see any place for the small farmers." /ppAlex Evans, at the Centre on International Cooperation, at New York University, said: "The small farmers are losing out already. People without solid title are likely to be turfed off the land."/ppDetails of land deals have been kept secret so it is unknown whether they have built-in safeguards for local populations./ppSteve Wiggins, a rural development expert at the Overseas Development Institute, said: "There are very few economies of scale in most agriculture above the level of family farm because managing [the] labour is extremely difficult." Investors might also have to contend with hostility. "If I was a political-risk adviser to [investors] I'd say 'you are taking a very big risk'. Land is an extremely sensitive thing. This could go horribly wrong if you don't learn the lessons of history."/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/food"Food/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/biofuels"Biofuels/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/conservation/"Conservation/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/endangeredhabitats"Endangered habitats/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/fooddrinks"Food drink industry/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/agriculture"Agriculture/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/korea"North and South Korea/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Environmentcountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660228112201400459684"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Environmentcountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660228112201400459684" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/74369?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Rise+of+BNP+is+politicians%27+fault+-+Blearsch=Politicsc3=The+Guardianc4=BNP+and+the+far+right%2CHazel+Blears%2CLabour%2CConservatives%2CLiberal+Democrats%2CPolitics%2CUK+newsc5=Unclassified%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=James+Meikle%2CIan+Cobainc7=2008_11_22c8=1122229c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=BNP+and+the+far+rightc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FBNP+and+the+far+right" width="1" height="1" //divpThe British National party has made advances because mainstream political parties, including Labour, have abandoned sections of the white working class, ignoring people's needs while taking their votes for granted, a government minister admits today./ppWriting in the Guardian, the communities and local government secretary, Hazel Blears, warns that politicians must work hard at grassroots level to win back the trust and confidence of people alienated from mainstream political life./ppWith the BNP's areas of strongest support revealed this week by the posting of the party's secret membership list on the internet, Blears also calls upon her Labour colleagues to take their opposition to the far right to the streets in those places. "We must continue to campaign vigorously against the BNP: demonstrate, picket, leaflet and argue," she says./ppIn a strongly worded piece, Blears argues that demonstrating against the BNP is not enough, however. "Shouting 'Nazi' is not the answer," she writes. /ppThe government, Blears insists, must devise a long-term strategy to bring different communities together, working with councils and different community groups; some Labour backbenchers have blamed the party's drive to capture middle class votes for the rise of the BNP in some areas that were previously Labour strongholds./ppBlears writes: "We must recognise that where the BNP wins votes, it is often a result of local political failure." She adds: "Estates that have been ignored for decades; voters taken for granted; local services that have failed; white working-class voters who feel politicians live on a different planet. In such a political vacuum, the BNP steps in with offers of grass-cutting, a listening ear and easy answers to complex problems."/ppBlears acknowledges that the BNP, under Nick Griffin, has a "cunning strategy", and that it has "started a process of detoxification". Using websites, blogs, newsletters and petitions, it has reached thousands and "played on people's apprehensions". It has peddled, she says, "pernicious but plausible lies"./ppShe points out that support for the far right remains small, but says a revival of mainstream politics is paramount in those areas where the BNP is now known to be at its strongest. Her comments echo what some Labour backbenchers and rank-and-file party members have been saying about the BNP's strategy for several years./ppThere have been warnings that BNP activists have targeted neighbourhoods where few people vote in local or general elections, and introduced themselves on doorsteps as representatives of "a party that's like Labour in your parents' days". /ppBlears is one of the most senior Labour figures to voice such concerns, and in such forthright terms. Her wake-up call came as the fallout from the posting of the membership list continued to be felt by the BNP. Police forces across the country were continuing to scour the lists for the names of serving officers - who are banned from joining the party. But the General Medical Council said it would not be taking action against any medical practitioners found to be members of the party./ppIn West Yorkshire, police investigating the petrol bombing of a car outside the home of a man whose name appears on the list were trying to establish whether it was the result of a vigilante attack. The petrol bomb exploded on Thursday night in Liversedge. The Peugeot 206, which belonged to a neighbour of the man named on the BNP list, was destroyed./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/bnp-far-right"BNP and the far right/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/hazelblears"Hazel Blears/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/labour"Labour/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/conservatives"Conservatives/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/liberaldemocrats"Liberal Democrats/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660218112201400459684"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660218112201400459684" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

The Government is facing a Labour rebellion over plans that could lead to British National Party members holding positions of power over policing.

Mushrooms. They do funny things to you, honest. I ate a punnet of slightly manky ones from the reduced aisle at Asda once and I’ve never been quite the same since. It’s uncommon to combine mushrooms and*computer games, the reason being that all game developers are beardy and unclean and don’t need any more fungus than they already grow themselves.
There are, however (as is often the case) the odd exceptions. The daddy of the mushroom games is, of course, Centipede. A game which not only featured our little hallucinogenic bundles of basidiomycota,but spiders, scorpions, fleas and, allegedly, a centipede or two.

Few who partook in the trackball-rolling coin-guzzling button-bashing arcade game experience will be able to rid themselves of the thrill of wiping out the last segment of ‘pede on it’s final sweep of the bottom of the screen.
The Atari VCS owners among us will hardly be able to resist looking back on this particular title with fond memories of wasted afternoons waggling their stiff joysticks in a darkened room.
And now there is Prospero’s Millenipede.
Alright, I’ll admit, there’s not exactly a shortage of decent Centipede remakes out there but this is the first in these here parts for a while.
This is actually an update to a game first released way back in April 2007 (when we were kids and the internet was new and shiny…. Alright, a year and a half ago) and boasts improved graphics and audio, new weapons, onling high scores and SO much more.
This is clearly a labour of love for Prospero who has promised naked ladies and fast cars*in the next version (not true) and deserves at least a small portion of anyone’s time. Because it’s fab and colourful and fast and frantic and free (of course!)*and REALLY REALLY Centipedeish!
Alright, I’m convinced, show me the dollarcash….

Certainly sir, walk right this way to the download
And pop into our special Amsterdam style coffee house for a mushroom or two afterwards to share your opinion….


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Auteur : 1maidhk
Tags : maid maids housekeeper domestic help jobs cleaning us helper usa agency agencies employment worker workers job work companies foreign helpers labour hong kong filipino salary 1maidhk.com world champ
Envoyé : 21 novembre 2008
Note :0.0
Votes :0

You may or may not have noticed that I’m actually supposed to be posting here. I’m kinda the Halley’s Comet of the CSBG crew. I turn up very rarely, there’s a brief flurry of excitement and then I vanish for an interminable period of time.

Anyway, one of the reasons for this is that, well, most comics these days just don’t light a fire under me. The blog is called ‘Comics Should Be Good’ after all, and, well, I’m finding that most of what flits under my nose these days is kind of mediocre.

Not bad, per se, just not ‘good’.

Which leads us to Jamie Smart and ‘Space Raoul’.

Jamie Smart is a plucky British cartoonist most known for ‘Bear’ a neat little comic which came out in the wake of Jhonen Vasquez’ ‘Johnny the Homicidal Maniac’ when publishers were scrambling for the next thing which they could trademark and then proceed to smear all over clothing, stickers and lunchboxes and flog off to pimply, middle class goth kids at Hot Topic for a vastly inflated price.

Amongst the wave of forgettable detritus, there was something about ‘Bear’ which made me think it wasn’t the usual load of cobbled-together crap trying in vain to replicate the ‘kowaii’ (cute but scary) work of Japanese artists like Junko Mizuno.

For one thing, it was actually funny, while pretty much everything else could, at best, manage a sort of tired, self referential wink (”Oh, look, it’s a cute teddy bear… but it’s evil… how potently ironic… oh, I may swoon…”), and on the other hand, it was competently executed.

Which brings us back to ‘Space Raoul’.

Space Raoul is a plucky, bold and ever-so-British space hero who travels the galaxy with his trusty pal, Quibble, battling Space Ne’er-do-wells, encountering strange space races and weird space phenomena, and eating cake (possibly some sort of Space cake, but more likely some good, stout-hearted British cake he’s packed especially for the journey). He’s a short, pinkish-red doggy-looking thing with a bubble helmet, a star on his chest and a pipe.

And he’s utterly delightful.

In fact, so euphorically delightful that it took all my efforts to write this review and not just write SPACE RAOUL over and over again in big letters, enthusiastically pounding and flailing my hands, arms, elbows and face into the keyboard.

So yes, the upshot is that, after doing a bunch of ‘Space Raoul’ pieces for a bunch of people, the kindly folks at Slave Labour Graphics have compiled them into a handy-dandy single-volume thing. At first, it seems rather slight, but one thing with Smart is that he crams the story into every spare corner of his page, and there’s quite a bit to read here.

There’s some neat subtexts about imperialism, Britishness, the hubris of the middle-class and so forth, but mostly it’s jolly all-ages space fun which entertains and amuses without talking down to its audience.

If I had one quibble (besides our hero’s trusty co-pilot), it’s that, in replicating stuff that originally appeared in British Tabloid-sized comics into a digest-sized tpb, some of the script does tend towards the teeny. But aside from that, it’s all jolly and pip-pip and what ho.

Do feel free to ‘get amongst it’.

It’s the civilised thing to do.

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/21685?ns=guardianpageName=Comment+is+free%3A+Gaunty%2C+you+were+rightch=Comment+is+freec3=The+Guardianc4=BNP+and+the+far+right%2CPoliticsc5=Unclassified%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=Mark+Lawsonc7=2008_11_21c8=1121545c9=articlec10=GUc11=Comment+is+freec12=blogc13=c14=Comment+is+freeh2=GU%2FComment+is+free%2Fblog%2FComment+is+free" width="1" height="1" //divpIt seems fairly unlikely that Jon Gaunt reads the Guardian. And, if he does, I would worry about the effect on the rightwing shock jock's blood pressure of the words he will read now. His sacking from TalkSport this week was a wrong and deeply worrying act, and it makes me think Gaunt may have been right in one of the favourite riffs of his Sun column and radio show: that Britain has gone barmy and is becoming a dictatorship of liberal opinion./ppThe systolic readings of Gaunty, as he likes to be called, may be even more at risk from the revelation that a commentator connected with this paper and the BBC - despised HQs of the PC revolution - is also troubled by this week's public exposure of the membership list of the British National party./ppDon't misunderstand this: I wouldn't want to be stuck in a lift with any of them, and have never agreed with anything said by presenter or party. But one of the most delicate judgments in any society is where the line of acceptable behaviour should be drawn, and both of these cases suggest that the boundary is now being marked in the ink of self-righteous idealism./ppThe brutal removal of Gaunt has been overshadowed by the fuss over other broadcasting absences - Jonathan Ross's push, John Sergeant's jump - but is far more significant. A broadcaster known to be outspoken on a station that trades in outrageousness lost his rag, no more or less than he has done a thousand times before, with a local councillor, whom he called a "Nazi" during a discussion about children in care./ppGaunt says that he meant to say "health Nazi" but the distinction is irrelevant. If there were ever libel proceedings the insult would be justified as "vulgar abuse". A career could only be ended over such an innocuous exchange in a culture that had seriously lost its nerve over freedom of expression./ppBut perhaps we have. Many of the people outed this week as BNP members probably are Nazis, metaphorically or actually, but the revelation of their names and addresses exposes the mess of our policies on tolerance. It is legal to belong to the party, or to vote for them, but membership is proscribed for some professions (soldiers, police and prison officers) yet not for others (doctors, nurses, teachers). Educational unions have called for the restrictions to be widened but, if this were to happen, logic suggests that the BNP should be banned, which would be controversial (and anti-democratic) but at least more coherent./ppAlthough the outcry over Ross and Brand is largely responsible for Gaunt losing his job, it is a distraction in this debate: no definition of free expression should include the right to invade people's privacy for entertainment. But the Gaunt and BNP incidents raise the fundamental question of the limits of free speech./ppThe point is that sacking shock jocks and demonising political parties are cosmetic measures. Banning attitudes removes them from view, but not from existence. Any politician who has campaigned in inner cities will tell you that both Labour and Tories have long had voters who are, frankly, racist. The one advantage of the rise of the BNP was that it became easier to measure, in elections, the numerical level of extremist opinion. But, now that the security of the membership list has been breached, such rumblings will be harder to calculate./ppToday, with the latest stage of the BBC inquiry into Granddaughtergate, we will discover if the risk has increased that Rossy will suffer a Gaunty. The mood for removal from Radio 2 (but continuation on TV) seems to be growing, and it would surprise me if he still has his current wireless slot in six months./ppMany would be pleased by this outcome, as they would also cheer the dismissal of Gaunt and the fact that we now know where BNP supporters live. But, taken together, these events suggest an emergency, but cack-handed, sanitisation of attitudes - an emergency carpet-sweeping exercise with a broom that hits some bits while missing others. A broadcaster loses his job for saying "Nazi", while those who hold extremist views on immigration are allowed to teach children but not go to war./ppThese ideological contradictions would make a good Gaunty phone-in, had he not become a victim of the silly view that a society that looks and sounds nicer has actually become nicer./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/bnp-far-right"BNP and the far right/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Commentisfreecountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727878112100421654622"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Commentisfreecountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727878112100421654622" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/54665?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Find+%26pound%3B1bn+to+help+10p+tax+rate+victims%2C+Darling+toldch=Politicsc3=The+Guardianc4=Tax+and+spending%2CAlistair+Darling%2CEconomics+%28Business%29%2CCredit+crunch+%28Business%29%2CEconomic+policy%2CLabour%2CBusiness%2CMoney%2CPolitics%2CPre-budget+reportc5=Personal+Finance%2CCredit+Crunch%2CBusiness+Markets%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=Patrick+Wintourc7=2008_11_21c8=1121605c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=Tax+and+spendingc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FTax+and+spending" width="1" height="1" //divpThe leaders of Labour's 10p tax rebels yesterday served warning on the chancellor, Alistair Darling, that he has to find at least pound;1bn in Monday's pre-budget report to help the 6 million people who have still not been compensated for the disastrous decision to abolish the lower tax rate earlier this year./ppFrank Field and Greg Pope, the leaders of the tax rebellion earlier this year, have written to Darling, urging action. Field told the Guardian: "The Labour backbenches will not abandon the poor who have still not been compensated. It is a Rubicon they will not cross, and at a time the government has found pound;50bn to bail out the bankers, the Treasury can surely find pound;1bn to ease the resentment of our core voters." /ppThe chancellor is expected to announce a series of business and personal tax cuts in Monday's pre-budget report, aimed at the poorest because they are most likely to spend any extra cash./ppThe intervention of Field and Pope will add to the pressure on the Treasury which was last night seeking to dampen speculation of a massive tax giveaway next week after the latest official figures showed a backdrop of rapidly deteriorating public finances./ppIn the wake of the first October deficit in 14 years, officials dismissed suggestions that the chancellor could unveil a pound;30bn package - worth 2% of GDP - designed to lift the economy out of recession. /ppThe quarterly payment of corporation tax means October is normally a surplus month for the public finances, but the slowdown in the economy, the collapse of the housing market, financial turmoil and tax concessions since the budget combined to leave the state in the red by pound;1.4bn last month. /ppCity analysts said the budget deficit could rise to pound;70bn this year and top pound;100bn in 2009-10 even before the extra borrowing for Monday's fiscal package was taken into account./ppIn their letter Field and Pope write: "We are anxious that the government's promise to do all in its power to compensate fully the losers from the abolition of the 10p rate is not only met, but kept clearly separate from other tax reductions the government may announce next Monday."/ppFollowing an unprecedented backbench rebellion, and amid signs that Brown's leadership was at risk, the Treasury hastily assembled a pound;2.7bn compensation package in May. Darling increased personal allowances for all basic rate taxpayers. Although only 1.1 million householders have lost out overall, this masks the fact that 6 million individuals have been losers. /ppField and Pope write: "Overwhelmingly these taxpayers are on low earnings. The Institute of Fiscal Studies estimates that the greatest loss of around pound;112 a year are for taxpayers earning pound;7,755."/ppThey accept that the complexity of the tax system means it will be impossible for the Treasury to help every group that has lost, but argue it does seem likely that most of these losers are on low earnings and fall below a threshold of pound;13,355 a year./pp"We do hope you can give us an assurance that Monday's statement will include a measure that will recompense as many of these individuals as is practically possible. Only in this way would it be possible to draw a clear line under this wholly sorry saga." /ppField claims the net cost of his proposal will be pound;1bn./ppIn other developments the employment minister, Tony McNulty, said the pre-budget report would propose a new employment programme, adding it was "a no-brainer" to revisit the closure programme for Jobcentre Plus officers. Since 2002, the government has closed nearly 500 job centres, including 40 in the last year, and cut staff by 16,000. /ppMinisters are also under intense pressure to use the pre-budget report to rethink its housebuilding programme after figures were released yesterday showing only an estimated 22,200 housing starts in England in the September quarter, down 33% on the previous quarter./ppThis decline in housebuilding levels makes the government's target of building 240,000 homes a year by 2016 look hopelessly unrealistic./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/taxandspending"Tax and spending/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/alistairdarling"Alistair Darling/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/economics"Economics/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/creditcrunch"Credit crunch/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/economy"Economic policy/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/labour"Labour/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/pre-budget-report"Pre-budget report 2008/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727712112100421654622"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727712112100421654622" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/588?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+As+the+voters+trickle+back%2C+readers+stay+away+in+drovesch=Politicsc3=The+Guardianc4=Gordon+Brown%2CPolitics+%28Books+genre%29%2CLabour%2CBooks%2CCulture+section%2CPoliticsc5=Not+commercially+usefulc6=Helen+Piddc7=2008_11_21c8=1121557c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=Gordon+Brownc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FGordon+Brown" width="1" height="1" //divpThese are high times for Gordon Brown. He has been praised for saving the global financial system, and received a welcome respite from his electoral troubles at the Glenrothes byelection./ppBut not everything is rosy for the prime minister. His latest book, Wartime Courage: Stories of Extraordinary Courage by Ordinary People in World War Two, has sold just 193 copies in the fortnight it has been on sale./ppIn the same two weeks, Jordan - Pushed to the Limit, the latest instalment of the glamour model's autobiography, sold 4,446 copies, despite having been on sale for 10 months. Wartime Courage currently ranks at 10,646 in the Amazon UK sales chart./ppTo rub salt into his wounds, the reviews have been rotten. The Independent bemoaned Brown's "robotic neutrality", "engine-drone monotone" and "mealy-mouthed avoidance of 'controversial' issues". Writing in the Spectator, the author James Delingpole went further, describing Wartime Courage as a "leaden, clunken-fisted cuttings job". Brown has an "automaton-like inability either to empathise with his subject ... or to work out which details needed emphasising and which could be safely excluded"./ppBrown's subjects - which include the Chariots of Fire legend Eric Liddell and Violette Szabo, who worked undercover for the Special Operations Executive during the second world war - were intrinsically thrilling, said Delingpole. Which "makes it all the less excusable that Brown has made them seem so dull"./ppAnd that's not all. "His opening and closing essays are waffly, trite and, in so far as they attempt to make political capital from the achievements of people who have nothing whatsoever to do with him or his grisly ideology, offensive," complained Delingpole, who admitted that as a "starving author" he resented "the allocation by the publishing industry of time, money, space and attention to people who can barely write and anyway have well remunerated day jobs"./ppNot everyone hated it, however. The Jewish Chronicle's reviewer was a lone fan, saying all of the stories in the book were "well told" and made "compelling reading". "Finding time to write this book does the prime minister credit."/ppThe book was due to be published in April, but did not hit the shops until November. A spokeswoman for Bloomsbury, the prime minister's publisher, denied it had been held back because of his low popularity ratings in the spring./pp"The reason it was delayed was because he hadn't finished writing it - he didn't have a ghostwriter," said Bloomsbury's publicity director, Katie Bond./ppNeill Denny, editor-in-chief of the publishing trade magazine the Bookseller, said that while he was surprised Brown's book had sold so badly, it was not the most tempting proposition./ppDenny said: "It would be different if he had written his memoirs. That could be political dynamite. We've had half the story of the Blair years, but Brown's point of view could be fascinating."/ppBut he added: "It is not disastrously bad. Hardback books do not sell in huge quantities any more. When the Booker longlist came out last year, of the 13 books, half had sold less than 1,000 copies."/ppGordon Brown's first book on the subject of bravery, Courage: Eight Stories, which was published by Bloomsbury last year, has sold 4,469 copies in the UK, according to Nielsen BookScan. /ppThe Conservatives may be falling back in the polls, but they are easily winning the book war: William Hague's biography of William Pitt the Younger has sold more than 78,000 copies since 2004./ph2PM's weighty tome/h2pstrongTirpitz and Godfrey Place/strong/ppOn 11 September six X-craft set out for the thousand-mile journey. Each midget submarine had two crews: one for the passage out - on which they were towed by six larger submarines - and one operational crew to carry out the final attack. Two of the midget submarines broke adrift, one being eventually recovered, the other sinking with all hands. On 19 September the four remaining vessels approached the target area, still under tow. Towing problems delayed HM Submarine Stubborn and her charge X-7 when a floating mine - part of the outer defences of Altafjord - became caught on the tow-line and was then impaled on the bows of the midget submarine. [Godfrey] Place, the commander of X-7, went out on its forward casing and cleared the mine away with his foot./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/gordon-brown"Gordon Brown/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/politics"Politics/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/labour"Labour/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727768112100421654622"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727768112100421654622" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

Absolutely adorable! What more can I say? :D



Quote: A two-headed kitten born in Midvale yesterday has left local vets baffled.

The kitten's mother was taken to the Swan Veterinary Clinic after suffering complications while in labour.

Community Newspapers photographer Matthew Poon happened to be at the vets for an unrelated visit and snapped the amazing images of the kitten.

There were three kittens born in the litter, but just one was left with such a unique deformity.

The kitten eats out of just one mouth because of a cleft palate, but both mouths meow simultaneously.

Louisa Burgess, a veterinary nurse who helped deliver the kitten, told InMyCommunity.com.au that she had never seen such an unusual animal in her 12-year career.

”I have seen cats with two tails and extra legs, but not this,” she said.

Ms Burgess said the cat appeared healthy, but it would be closely monitored over the next few days.

”It has a full tummy and it survived the night so that is a good sign,” she said. ”It seems content, it meows and purrs.

”This is the result of a congenital deformity. Something has gone wrong in the early embryonic development.” Article Link

More Pictures

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/68502?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Former+Labour%2C+Tory+and+Lib+Dem+members+on+BNP+listch=Politicsc3=guardian.co.ukc4=BNP+and+the+far+right%2CLabour%2CLiberal+Democrats%2CRace+issues+%28News%29%2CPolice+%28politics%29%2CPolitics%2CWorld+newsc5=Unclassified%2CPolicy+Society%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=James+Meikle%2CHelen+Carterc7=2008_11_20c8=1121587c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=BNP+and+the+far+rightc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FBNP+and+the+far+right" width="1" height="1" //divpThe leaked British National party list contains the names of individuals who are former members of all the mainstream political parties in England, it emerged today./ppA former constituency chairman for the Conservatives, a former Labour prospective parliamentary candidate, and a church minister who had been at various times a Green, a Conservative and a Liberal Democrat, all went public on why they had switched parties in the wake of the leaking of a BNP members' list./ppLionel Buck said he was chairman of Ashfield Conservative association in Nottinghamshire for about four years, joining the BNP two years ago. He told the Guardian: "The way the country is at the moment, there is no major party, whether it be Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democrat, looking after the indigenous population."/ppAndrew Emerson said he had been due to fight Chichester in Sussex for the Labour party in 1997 before illness ruled him out, but joined the BNP in 2005, when he had been the party's candidate for Broxbourne, Hertfordshire. /ppHe had since tried to get elected to Chichester council, in his last attempt last month gaining 12.3% of the vote in the ward. The main reason for changing parties was "my unhappiness with the [Labour] party's open-door immigration policy, making no attempt whatever to control immigration ... and to properly control our borders"./ppJohn Stanton, who heads the Rock Dene Christian Fellowship in his home town in Rochford, Essex, with a congregation of 22, had also been a Green, a member of Ukip, a Lib Dem councillor in the 1990s and a member of the Conservatives in the 1970s. /ppHe told the Press Association that "the flood of immigration" was a problem, as was Islam and the European Union. /ppHe said he had been with the BNP for eight months./ppA worried Labour MP, whose constituency is about 98% white and appears to have the most BNP members, told the Guardian it was sometimes difficult to address concerns of communities "stirred up by malicious and false information"./ppColin Challen, MP for Morley and Rothwell in Yorkshire, where there are 90 members according to the list, said it was "very disappointing that local people, even to that extent, have been persuaded to believe the racist claptrap and hate politics of the BNP"./ppBut research indicated, he said, that "sadly it is very often the case that areas which have a very small ethnic minority population and large working class population have developed pockets of support for the British National party". /ppIt was a "matter of shame" that a seat on Leeds city council that fell within his constituency was held by a BNP member. The main political parties had to understand the concerns of communities and work to address them, even in the face of inflammatory information. /ppThe Labour party said it would expel anyone found to be a member of the BNP; the Lib Dems "deplored" its beliefs and tactics; and the Conservatives said all mainstream parties "have an obligation to address the voter alienation and disillusionment that fuels support for extremism". /ppNine people on the BNP membership list are said to be former Conservatives, but the party said it only knew of six, and they had been associated with party some years ago./ppMeanwhile, a police officer whose name appeared on the BNP list was tonight suspended from duty by Merseyside police, a spokesman for the force said. /ppPC Stephen Bettley, who worked as a driver for the chief constable, Bernard Hogan-Howe, in 2006, returned early from a holiday abroad tonight to help the force with an investigation into his alleged involvement. /ppPolice are banned from becoming members of the far-right party because it conflicts with obligations under race relations laws./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/bnp-far-right"BNP and the far right/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/labour"Labour/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/liberaldemocrats"Liberal Democrats/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/race"Race issues/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/police"Police/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227216410558112021361951300"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227216410558112021361951300" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a