World news bloging

11.04.2009., subota

Cities Turn to Fees to Fill Budget Gaps

After her sport utility vehicle sideswiped a van in early February, Shirley Kimel was amazed at how quickly a handful of police officers and firefighters in Winter Haven, Fla., showed up. But a real shock came a week later, when a letter arrived from the city billing her $316 for the cost of responding to the accident.

“I remember thinking, ‘What the heck is this?’ ” says Ms. Kimel, 67, an office manager at a furniture store. “
always thought this sort of thing was covered by my taxes.”

It used to be. But last July, Winter Haven became one of a few dozen cities in the country to start charging “accident response fees.” The idea is to shift the expense of tending to and cleaning up crashes directly to at-fault drivers. Either they, or their insurers, are expected to pay.

Such cash-per-crash ordinances tend to infuriate motorists, and they often generate bad press, but a lot of cities are finding them hard to resist. With the economy flailing and budgets strained, state and local governments are being creative about ways to raise money. And the go-to idea is to invent a fee — or simply raise one.

Ohio’s governor has proposed a budget with more than 150 new or increased fees, including a fivefold increase in the cost to renew a livestock license, as well as larger sums to register a car, order a birth certificate or dump trash in a landfill. Other fees take aim at landlords, cigarette sellers and hospitals, to name a few.

Wisconsin’s governor, James E. Doyle, has proposed a charge on slaughterhouses that would be levied on the basis of each animal slaughtered. He also wants to more than triple the application charge for an elk-hunting license to $10, an idea that has raised eyebrows because the elk population in the state is currently too small to allow an actual hunting season.

Washington’s mayor, Adrian M. Fenty, has proposed a “streetlight user fee” of $4.25 a month, to be added to electric bills, that would cover the cost of operating and maintaining the city’s streetlights. New York City recently expanded its anti-idling law to include anyone parked near a school who leaves the engine running for more than a minute. Doing that will cost you $100.

“The most dangerous places on Staten Island are the schools at drop-off and dismissal time, when parents are parked three deep in the road,” says James S. Oddo, a City Council member from Staten Island who voted for the measure. “There is a mentality here that Johnny can’t walk 100 feet, he has to be dropped off right at the front of the school — and frankly that’s why Johnny is as pudgy as he is.”

Nothing, it seems, is off the table. In Pima County, Ariz., the County Board of Supervisors increased an assortment of fees, including the cost of AIDS testing. Florida has proposed raising medical visit co-payments for inmates in state prisons. Parking fees at the Honolulu Zoo could rise by 500 percent if a proposal there goes through.

Politicians tend to regard fees as more palatable than taxes, and more focused too. If a state needs to finance an infrastructure to oversee fishing, why shouldn’t fishermen foot the bill? But groups like the nonpartisan Tax Foundation in Washington worry that governments are now using fees to shore up budget shortfalls rather than cover specific costs incurred by specific users.

“When it comes to paying for bananas, you’ve got the market as a mechanism to make sure you’re paying a fair price,” says Josh Barro, a staff economist at the Tax Foundation. “But when it comes to getting your driver’s license renewed, the government has a monopoly, and you have no idea what it costs the state or what it’s doing with the money.”

In some cases, towns say they are merely enforcing rules that have long been on the books. For the first time in years, for instance, officials at Londonderry, N.H., have mailed notices to dog owners reminding them to renew their annual dog licenses, which cost $6.50 apiece, or face a $25 fine. Town leaders think the get-tough approach could raise an additional $20,000, but Meg Seymour, the town clerk, is dreading local reaction. When the town last sent out fine notices, in 2002, the calls to her office were vicious.

- 16:45 - Komentari (0) - Isprintaj - #

Tamil students to end Sri Lanka conflict hunger strike in deal brokered with police and MPs

Two Tamil activists who had vowed to starve themselves to death outside parliament unless Britain intervened politically in the Sri Lankan conflict were on the verge of ending their hunger strike last night as part of a deal brokered with MPs.

The students, from Mitcham in south London, have been on hunger strike since Monday in Parliament Square which has been illegally occupied all week by around 500 Tamil supporters in the largest protests since demonstrations there were banned in 2005.

Simon Hughes, a Liberal Democrat MP who has been involved in negotiations between the Tamils and police, said last night that one of the men had agreed to suspend his hunger strike in order to travel to the UN in New York with Labour MP Des Browne, the government's special envoy for Sri Lanka.

Supporters feared that the pair, who only began sipping liquids again late on Thursday night, were close to renal failure. Prarameswaran Subramaniam, 28, was said last night to have agreed to begin taking liquids regularly while Sivatharsan Sivakumaraval, 21, had agreed to suspend his hunger strike to travel to New York.

Other protesters, who are mainly Tamil students and young people, are to travel to meet political representatives in Washington DC, to Brussels to meet representatives of the EU's presidency and to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London.

Hughes said separate negotiations with police would pave the way for the protests to move to a legal, semi-permanent footing. "The police were very keen that this became legitimate," said the MP who added that the protest will essentially move from the grass area on the square on to the pavement.

"It's about getting into a situation where there are then regular requests for a protest which the police can then back, a bit like the old protests outside the South African embassy. People here want urgent political action but they realise that cannot happen if political leaders around the world cannot be mobilised."

Talks have also been taking place with a view to forming an interfaith group of representatives from the Hindu, Christian and Buddhist communities who might then start talks with the Sri Lankan government.

The protesters have been calling on the British government to take action to help protect Tamils in their homeland, where the Sri Lankan government has rejected calls for a ceasefire. Up to 150,000 people are trapped in the war zone in the north of the country, according to the UN. The demands of the two hunger strikers included a ceasefire and that food and medical aid be allowed to reach civilians.

Dr Jayendran Namasivayam, a radiologist at Whipps Cross Hospital in Leytonstone who has been helping to look after the two, said: "What they say is that our people are dying every second and every minute of every day and that our point has to be made to Gordon Brown."

- 16:43 - Komentari (0) - Isprintaj - #

PM has voluntarily abdicated authority: Advani

Reiterating his charge that Manmohan Singh is a weak prime minister, BJP's prime ministerial candidate LK Advani said Manmohan Singh had voluntarily abdicated authority. (PTI Photo)

the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) prime ministerial BJP's prime ministerial candidate LK Advani said Manmohan

In an interview to TV channel, Advani said: "You have a situation in which the prime minister holds office but has no authority, while the person who wields the authority has no accountability", hinting at Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

"This is not a democracy," said Advani, adding that Manmohan Singh had "voluntarily abdicated authority".

He also said Manmohan Singh's weakness as prime minister was "patently" visible and "very clear".

"I have known cases where the prime minister has proposed some course of action but he is not able to implement it unless he gets clearance from the Congress party president," Advani said.

The BJP leader said: "I described him as a weak prime minister in the context of the fact that I have seen prime ministers earlier who had the support of only four MPs in the house and yet they were never at a disadvantage."

"I have seen Chandrashekar, I have seen HD Deve Gowda," Advani added.

His comments come a day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, during an interaction with women journalists in New Delhi, said he did not wish to have a television debate with Advani as he did not want to accord Advani the privilege of being "an alternative prime minister".

- 16:40 - Komentari (0) - Isprintaj - #

11 die after drinking bootleg liquor: Turkey

Turkish authorities say 11 people have died after drinking bootleg liquor since March. They included three German students.

A statement on Saturday from the Ministry of Agriculture, in charge of controlling alcohol sales, says authorities have been inspecting distributors since the first death on March 21 from ingesting liquor containing methyl alcohol.

The German students, aged between 17 and 21, consumed the poisonous liquor in the Mediterranean resort town of Kemer while on a class trip to Turkey. One of them died in Turkey while two others suffered irreversible brain damage and died later while being treated in Germany.

It is the second such tragedy in four years in Turkey. In 2005, three Turks were sentenced to eight years in prison for distributing bootleg liquor after more than 20 people died.

- 16:38 - Komentari (0) - Isprintaj - #

Pathologist in Ian Tomlinson G20 death case was reprimanded over conduct

The initial post mortem examination of the man who died at the G20 protests after being attacked by a police officer, which found he had died of a heart attack, was conducted by a forensic pathologist once reprimanded about his professional conduct by the General Medical Council.

Ian Tomlinson, a 47-year-old newspaper seller, died on April 1 after being assaulted at least once by officers policing the G20 demonstrations. He had been trying to walk home from work when he was confronted by police, hit with a baton and thrown to the ground.

Two days later Home Office pathologist Dr Freddy Patel concluded Tomlinson had died of a heart attack. He has previously been reprimanded by the GMC, after he released medical details about a man who died controversially in police custody.

In a second case, which raised questions about Dr Patel's findings, police dropped a criminal investigation after the pathologist gave it as his opinion that the victim, a woman, had died of natural causes. A man who lived in the flat where the body was found went on to murder two other women and mutilate their bodies.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) launched a criminal inquiry into Tomlinson's death after footage obtained by the Guardian showed he had been attacked from behind. Tomlinson had had his hands in his pockets and was walking away from police lines.

Last night a second post mortem examination, intitiated by Tomlinson's family and the IPCC, was being carried out by Dr Nat Cary.

A source with detailed knowledge of the IPCC investigation expressed surprise that the initial post mortem was referred to Dr Patel rather than the Forensic Pathology Services, a body of nine independent forensic pathologists, including Dr Cary, which usually deals with suspicious deaths in London and the home counties.

The selection of Dr Patel could have been a jurisdictional issue relating to City of London authorities, the source said.

"Who chose the first pathologist and how?" said David Howarth MP, the Liberal Democrats' justice spokesman. "When the first post mortem came out saying natural causes so soon after his death, I thought that was too quick." He added: "At the very least, there now needs to be a full and independent public inquiry into the Tomlinson case, and the actions of the public authorities in the days after his death. Who knew what - and when?"

The IPCC took over the criminal investigation into the death of Ian Tomlinson on Wednesday, after the Guardian published footage showing he had been hit with a baton and thrown to the ground by an officer in an apparently unprovoked assault. The Guardian included the video in a dossier of evidence handed to the IPCC that also contained statements from witnesses who alleged Tomlinson was assaulted by police at least once before he died.

Dr Patel is on a Home Office register of accredited forensic pathologists, which is managed on behalf of all police forces by the National Policing Improvement Agency. Questions have twice been asked about his handling of suspicious death cases. In 1999 Dr Patel was disciplined by the GMC after he discussed the medical history of Roger Sylvester, a 30-year-old black man who died in police custody, outside an inquest hearing.

He told reporters: "I am aware from the medical records held at Whittington hospital that Mr Sylvester was a user of crack cocaine." Sylvester's family were devastated by the suggestion and contested that he been a user.

Asked about the GMC reprimand last night by telephone, Dr Patel said: "That is right. It happened a long time ago."

In a separate case in January 2002, Dr Patel found that Sally White, 38, died of a natural causes resulting from heart disease. Her body was found locked in a bedroom in the Camden flat of Anthony Hardy, a 52-year-old psychiatrically-disturbed alcoholic.

White's death was treated as suspicious until Dr Patel detailed the cause of her death as a heart attack. Hardy went on to kill two women, Elizabeth Valad, 29, and Brigette MacClennan, 34, and place their body parts in bin bags.

Last night, Dr Patel said: "As far as I know, my findings [in the Sally White case] stand as they were, and I wasn't criticised." He declined to comment on whether he was the correct person to conduct the first post mortem examination into Tomlinson's death, referring questions to the coroner. The City of London coroner in the case, Paul Matthews, was yesterday not contactable.

- 16:36 - Komentari (1) - Isprintaj - #

Teachers' union votes to boycott Sats

Teachers today backed moves to boycott next year's Sats in a major escalation of their campaign to force the government to drop the tests.

The National Union of Teachers (NUT), the biggest school union, will now ballot members to take industrial action and refuse to administer the Sats in England in 2010, defying government warnings that to do so would be unlawful.

It sets the NUT, and possibly the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT), which is due to vote on an identical motion next month, on a collision course with ministers who have accused them of acting irresponsibly. The boycott would halt next year's national tests in primary schools and the league tables they feed into.

The NUT president, Martin Reed, told the union's conference in Cardiff today: "The government will have to understand one obvious fact: because of our boycott carried out with the NAHT there will be no national curriculum testing forced on our schools; not in 2010 nor in any year after that."

The unions say that the Sats and the league tables are damaging to children's education, having the effect of narrowing learning in primary schools as teachers are forced to focus on literacy, numeracy and science to improve their results. Their campaign has been fuelled by the scrapping of tests for 14-year-olds which were removed after the collapse of the marking system by the private American firm ETS last year.

The union's leaders say that by planning the boycott for next year they have allowed plenty of time for ministers to make arrangements to replace the tests.

The schools secretary, Ed Balls, has said the current system of tests is not set in stone, but he insists that some form of end of primary test is crucial to track children's learning, monitor progress across the system and hold schools that are under-performing to account.

Balls's department, the Department for Children, Schools and Families, yesterday said its legal advice was that a boycott would be unlawful because headteachers have a statutory duty to carry out the tests. The National Governors Association has also warned that headteachers face disciplinary action if they boycott the Sats.

However, the only time the law has been challenged was during the last boycott, in 1993, when the NASUWT teaching union defeated a legal bid by Wandsworth council to halt the action.

The high court ruled in that case that the teachers were within their rights to take the action because the tests increased their workload and so they could refuse to take on the extra work.

A Department for Children, Schools and Families spokesman said yesterday: "The motion proposed by the NUT leadership calling for a boycott of next year's statutory tests is irresponsible, it is unlawful and it is out of touch with what parents and teachers want. They should think again.

- 16:34 - Komentari (0) - Isprintaj - #

Terror bomb plot intelligence came from MI6 operatives in Pakistan

Key intelligence that led to security officials fearing a terrorist cell was to launch a large-scale bomb attack on British soil came from MI6 operations targeting Pakistan, the Guardian has learned.

Sources with knowledge of the investigation say the intelligence gathered first from abroad and then in Britain before Wednesday's raids, left counterterrorism officials believing there was too high a risk of an "imminent" attempt to bomb targets in Britain and cause mass casualties.

However, subsequent, intensive searches of at least 10 addresses linked to the suspected al-Qaida plot in northern Britain have so far failed to turn up any clear evidence of a terrorist conspiracy, despite the huge resources devoted.

Forty-eight hours after the arrests, sources close to the inquiry say no evidence has been found of bombs, bomb-making parts, precursor chemicals to make explosives, a bomb factory, weapons or ammunition.

The jigsaw of intelligence studied before the Wednesday raids left all agencies – from the police, to security services to Whitehall officials – convinced they had to arrest the 12 people detained. Today warrants were granted for the continued detention for a further seven days of 11 of the men, while an 18-year-old man was released into the custody of the UK Borders Agency.

A Greater Manchester Police spokeswoman said: "The North West Counter Terrorism Unit was last night given warrants for the further detention of 11 men arrested." Police now have a further seven days to detain the men, who range in age from 22 to 41 and are in custody in various locations across the country.

The 18-year-old has been released without charge in relation to the anti-terror operation and is now in the custody of the UK Borders Agency, which regulates immigration and can investigate the status of those entering the country.

Police are continuing to search 10 addresses in Liverpool and the Cheetham Hill area of Greater Manchester.

Examination of computers recovered from raids in Manchester, Liverpool and Clitheroe has only just begun. In past cases, data recovered from computers has been a source of incriminating evidence. Other forensic tests are also at an early stage.

One senior source said "nothing of huge significance" had been found, and accepted it was possible that no evidence could emerge before the 28-day limit to hold terrorism suspect expires.

But the source added: "There is lots of material that when put together may take us somewhere. It will be a long and drawn out investigation.

"If we don't charge it will look bad, but we had to take action. Was there any alternative; no there wasn't."

A central mystery remains how counterterrorism officials could believe such a serious plot existed when they were unsure of seemingly basic elements of the alleged conspiracy, such as the targets.

The Guardian has spoken to several informed sources with knowledge of the case, who paint a picture of fragments of intelligence coming in and fuelling a mounting concern that Britain was facing one of it's worst terrorist atrocities. They spoke on condition of anonymity.

Two to three weeks ago, intelligence from operations carried out in Pakistan by MI6, Britain's foreign intelligence agency, provided names of suspected members of an al-Qaida trained network in Britain.

That intelligence as well as the interception of calls and emails led UK security officials and police to fear a large terrorist attack was being planned in Britain.

The monitoring of calls and emails also led officials to believe a link existed between suspected al-Qaida commanders in Pakistan and the people in the UK.

An informed source said the plot was "al-Qaida driven". "There was concern [al-Qaida] was directing operations ... recruiting people to travel to this country, direct their operations and tell them what to do."

A large surveillance operation was put into place.

Some of those arrested were seen taking photographs near a Manchester nightclub, the Birdcage, and the Trafford shopping centre. The suspects were also seen taking photographs near other places in and around Manchester which are usually crowded.

The source said the suspect's behaviour was consistent with the way terrorists carry out reconnaissance ahead of an attack. But it was also consistent with a group of students in a new area taking photographs of themselves to show friends and family.

"There is no way we would use these [counterterrorism] powers for a bunch of people going around Manchester taking photographs," said the source.

Photographs of the nightclub and shopping centre have been recovered in the raids, but three separate sources continue to insist this can not be taken as evidence of targets.

A Whitehall source said: "They were not observed doing much suspicious."

Compared to other countersurveillance operations carried out before arrest, the suspects were not seen buying materials that could be used to make explosives or other equipment known to have uses in making improvised explosive devices.

- 16:30 - Komentari (0) - Isprintaj - #

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