Health and Safety? - So Why Are We Still Taking The Poison?

It’s said that women, by wearing lipstick, consume on average around 4lbs of the cosmetic in their lifetimes, amazing isn’t it, but is it safe?  Well apparently not!  Unbeknown to many people is the fact that lots of everyday cosmetics contain heavy metals and other toxic chemicals, an astounding fact in view of all the health and safety regulations and government/EU standards being imposed on us in our daily lives.  For instance, many types of lipstick contain lead, yes lead! That’s right some lipsticks actually contain metal, as well as other toxic ingredients; Lead has been well documented as a poison since Tudor times, when it was used in face paints, resulting in disastrous consequences for the users. So you may well wonder why lead is still being included in today’s products. Well you tell me! Manufacturers must be well aware that it is harmful and it’s not even listed on the labels of the items as an ingredient so it’s easily purchased by unsuspecting customers.  Would you purchase something that says it has lead or other toxic chemicals and metals in it? A resounding ‘No’ I would imagine! In fact Wikipedia states that ‘Lead poisoning (also known as plumbism, colica Pictonum, saturnism, Devon colic, or painter's colic) is a medical condition caused by increased levels of the heavy metal lead in the body. Lead interferes with a variety of body processes and is toxic to many organs and tissues including the heart, bones, intestines, kidneys, and reproductive and nervous systems. It interferes with the development of the nervous system and is therefore particularly toxic to children, causing potentially permanent learning and behaviour disorders. Symptoms include abdominal pain, confusion, headache, anaemia, irritability, and in severe cases seizures, coma, and death.”

It’s not only certain lipsticks that cause concerns either, in tests carried out by the Environmental Defence in Canada, other products including mascaras, eye liners, foundations, concealers, blushers, eye shadows and lip glosses were found to contain arsenic, cadmium, and lead.  They also tested for beryllium, nickel, selenium and thallium, see Environmental Defence Report and product results: http://environmentaldefence.ca/sites/default/files/report_files/HeavyMetalHazard%20FINAL.pdf

If we are lucky, the majority of us will be born pretty much perfect in respect of our health, complete with a fully functioning immune system to fight off any diseases and nasty bugs that we encounter throughout our lifetimes, but it seems that increasingly we hear more and more cases of cancer, autism, diabetes and other illnesses being diagnosed worldwide. It’s almost an epidemic of such illnesses, not so much encountered in previous eras. This brings into question that maybe harmful substances are purposely being introduced into our bodies via foods, cosmetics, toiletries, water supplies, medicines, farming practices and even the atmosphere that we breathe. So there may be many factors responsible for the general breaking down of our immune systems and the deterioration of our health in general on a global basis. Does this prove that the big corporations think more of their profits than the welfare of humans on this planet, well it's certainly looking that way.  Even Bill Gates has been recorded on film saying that with vaccines and healthcare they can REDUCE the world population! See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WQtRI7A064   Gates just loves his vaccines, in fact be safe and look into that flu shot etc that you may be offered, mercury and other ingredients you might not fancy taking may be in the vaccines being promoted. Mercury in thimerosal, a product used as a preservative in many vaccines, is thought to be a linked to Autism and other illnesses. See
http://www.safeminds.org/

Antibiotics are becoming increasingly ineffective against bugs, and no wonder, when you learn that farm animals are frequently given antibiotics to fight infections, which in turn are fed to us in milk and meat products, reducing the effectiveness of the antibiotics when we do need them most for our own fight against such bugs.  Shouldn't the 'powers that be' be addressing this?
 
It seems that almost every item you pick up in supermarkets nowadays has ingredients on the label that read more like a cocktail of chemicals produced in a laboratory rather than a bakery or factory type kitchen.  It’s time we fought back and stopped purchasing goods with these preservatives, taste enhancers and sweeteners! It’s basic naturally grown products that we want to see (no, not genetically modified grains!)  The shelf life of many products has reached ridiculous longevity; some of it being a couple of months or more, and it must be down to the added laboratory made ‘nasties’ included.  Cheese used to go mouldy after a little while in the fridge, but not now; how old is this stuff by the time it’s sold to us?  Even fruit keeps for longer periods, but most of it isn’t all that nice, peaches used to be firm to the touch when you bought them, but you had to eat them fairly quickly as they ripened after a day or two, being lovely and soft and juicy, but now most of them seem to look good on the outside, but stay hard on the inside, then suddenly they go rotten without the ripe juicy bit in between. They also seem pretty tasteless too.  Of course it depends where you buy them, but generally supermarket fruit does seem to have this problem in a lot of cases.

Indeed there is a great deal of evidence that sweeteners such as Aspartame (it goes under other brand names too like Nutra-sweet), actually cause a great deal of harm to our bodies.  These sweeteners have been so widely used it’s a job to find a low calorie item without an artificial sweetener; they even include them in the non-low calorie ranges in a lot of cases too.  They don’t get it do they, we just want natural ingredients, we aren’t mugs, we are fully aware of the evidence that is now available by reputable professional people who have pointed out the dangers of such products. You can do your own research about Aspartame on the internet, it’s not easy viewing and there is enough evidence to make you wary about continuing to use or buy products with sweeteners included.

We want safe packaging too, without it leaking toxins into our food and drinks.  Manufacturers can produce plastic bottles etc, without the risky chemical BPA (Bisphenol A), which gives out a harmful hormone like substance when it’s used in bottles and clingfilm, but it’s hard to find which products don’t include it, see ‘On the Trail of Water Bottle Toxins’ http://www.leas.ca/on-the-trail-of-water-bottle-toxins.html   Not forgetting they put a lot of plastic inside tin cans too, some of which contains BPA, so your tin of soup could also be quite dodgy!

We are told that Sodium Fluoride was introduced into our drinking water to keep our teeth healthy!  Well I’d rather it be my decision what I take and how I look after my teeth, as Sodium Fluoride has been found to have harmful side affects, especially for children, whose IQ it is said to diminish. It’s also said that Fluoride in drinking water causes sterility and the substance is used in drugs such as Prozac to dull the senses.  Sodium Fluoride is an active ingredient in pesticides and rodenticides too, (See the Fluoride Action Network http://www.fluoridealert.org/health/index.aspx  And as far as health for teeth, well it doesn’t have a good record for that either; it’s said to cause damage to tooth-forming cells and can lead to dental fluorosis which stains teeth anyway, causing damage to tooth enamel (http://www.fluoridealert.org/dental-fluorosis.aspx ).  No wonder the Queen has a Borehole in her garden for spring water!  So why should we, the public, be forced to drink this and other chemicals added to our water supply?

As well as being unhappy about the toxins included in our every day lives in cosmetics, food, drinks, packaging, medicines and other items, it’s also very sad to note that cruelty to animals still goes on in the testing of so many products.  Indeed, I was shocked to hear that laboratory animals such as rats and mice are not protected as far as cruelty laws, which means many of them suffer dreadfully without the public realising it.  The organisation Peta is very handy to browse, you can actually do a search on a product and they will tell you if it has been tested on animals before you buy it. See http://www.peta.org/living/beauty-and-personal-care/companies/default.aspx

Also Peta gives a list of items with animal products included, some of them which you would never suspect, see http://www.peta.org/living/vegetarian-living/animal-ingredient-guide.aspx  With this they also provide alternative products to help you choose your purchases.

Here are some links you may find useful:

http://shine.yahoo.com/green/lead-lipstick-10-worst-brands-better-alternatives-204800618.html How much lead in lipsticks and alternative brands

http://safecosmetics.org/ Campaign for Safe cosmetics

http://safecosmetics.org/section.php?id=33 What is in your product?

http://aspartame.mercola.com/ Aspartame

It's a strange and not so nice world at the moment, where making a profit seems to vastly outweigh the safety and welfare of decent hard working people and those who need to be cared for in society.  We are being inundated with so many rules and regulations to restrict our lives via the EU, supposedly for health and safety reasons, that you would think they would turn their attentions to actually ensuring that our lives are being made better and our health looked after by sorting these toxins out that are still being added to our products.  Maybe they have something in common with Bill Gates, who seemingly wants to reduce the population (that means all of us by the way, not just some poor people in the third world!). Who knows! but we can all do our bit by reading food labels and asking what is in these products before we buy them. If we stop buying the dodgy products, the manufacturers will have to mend their ways, or see their profits tumble!  Be Safe!

Janet Clarke

NEWS SNIPPETS 30TH APRIL 2012

RT News - BBC World Service and US State Department: new partners, new bias? (Will we hear on Press Freedom day on 3rd May that the BBC is to be funded by the US against the BBC's own sponsorship policies? - UKIP Editor)

Daily Mail - One in three households squeezed on travel costs as soaring prices mean families spend 10% of income on transport
Soaring petrol prices and rail fares have plunged 8.2million households into ‘transport poverty’, figures reveal.
This means they spend more than 10 per cent of their income on transport costs such as fuel, fares and vehicle maintenance.
Campaigners say it has left many vulnerable people so short of cash they have to choose between ‘meals and wheels’, with more than a third of all households having to cut back on other spending to afford travel. See Article

Daily Mail - Crisis, what economic crisis? Anger after £10m private jet deal to fly Eurocrat chiefs to engagements
EU chiefs were yesterday accused of living the ‘high life’ at taxpayers’ expense after signing a £10million deal for the use of private jets to fly them around the world.
Baroness Ashton, the EU’s foreign policy chief, is among the eurocrats who will enjoy use of the jets for their globetrotting.
From tomorrow, the Labour peer will be able to use a choice of aircraft – including the Falcon 7X jet and Boeing 737 – when she travels abroad for EU business.
Jose Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, and Herman van Rompuy, president of the European Council, are among other dignitaries who will benefit from the agreement with Belgian firm Abelag.
The news of the deal – estimated to be worth as much as £10.3million over the next four years – comes after Britain reacted with fury to the EU’s demands to increase its budget by seven per cent.
The Commission’s proposal would increase the Brussels budget by 6.8 per cent to nearly £114billion. Britain’s share, at around 12.5 per cent, would be £16.6billion – a rise of more than £1billion.
Lady Ashton has demanded an extra £23million to run the EU’s foreign service – despite her promise that it would be ‘budget neutral’ when she was appointed as its foreign minister in 2009.
Her 5.7 per cent increase takes the annual bill for EU diplomats and embassies to £422million, at a cost to British taxpayers of £52million in EU contributions.
Speaking of the private-jet deal, Martin Callanan, a senior Tory MEP, said: ‘Coming just days after Commission leaders put forward a preposterous set of budget proposals, claiming they were doing all they could to save money, this confirms they really have no shame. See Article

Daily Mail - The worst is yet to come for the euro, warns Number 10 as it raises fears single currency could collapse
David Cameron raised the spectre of the collapse of the euro and years more economic turmoil yesterday as he confronted his deepest political crisis since entering Downing Street.
The Prime Minister warned the debt crisis across the Continent was not even halfway through, blaming the EU's woes for Britain's double dip recession.
With support for the Conservatives at its lowest ebb since 2004, just days before crucial London mayoral and local council elections, Mr Cameron promised to 'strain every sinew' to prompt economic growth
But he warned that the eurozone's failure to contend with its problems risks dragging the UK down for years to come.
His remarks will infuriate EU leaders, who face crunch elections in France and Greece. In both countries, voters are likely to return governments which will unpick a treaty on 'fiscal union' which Mr Cameron refused to sign up to.
'I don't think we are anywhere near halfway through it because what's happening in the eurozone is a massive tension between the single currency that countries are finding very difficult to adapt to,' Mr Cameron told the BBC's Andrew Marr programme. See Article

Daily Express - ANGER OVER NHS HEALTH TOURISTS
LAX rules allowing foreigners to sign up easily for free British health care have been branded “outrageous”.
Campaigners warn the National Health Service will become “the world health service” without an urgent clampdown.
The backlash came after the Government admitted there was no formal requirement for foreigners to produce paperwork when registering with a family doctor, with up to 1.6million immigrants a year potentially abusing the system.
Health Minister Simon Burns told Parliament in a written answer that many GPs request proof of identity and address but must not do so in a “discriminatory way”.
He said the decision whether to register foreign patients with six-month visitors visas is left to individual GPs.
But Sir Andrew Green, MigrationWatch UK chairman, said: “This means someone getting off a plane with a valid visitors visa is in effect able to access the GP services of the NHS without having paid a penny into the system. See Article

Daily Express - SHED ECONOMY BOOMS
BRITAIN’S booming “shed economy” has rocketed by 25 per cent in two years to reach £8billion.
Up to 100,000 businesses are based in people’s homes – in garden sheds or spare rooms – and their average turnover has risen by a quarter since 2010.
A survey for supermarket giant Asda found that sales of sheds, low-cost office technology and stationery are booming, with shed sales nearly quadrupling in a year, laptop sales up 86 per cent and printer sales up 45 per cent.
Alex Crowe, Asda’s homeworking specialist said: “Many households are taking a go-it-alone approach to business and are reaping the rewards. 
“The low cost of starting up a business means that many households are pursuing the entre­preneurial dream.” See Article

The Telegraph - Heathrow at 'breaking' point as Border Force struggles to cope, leaked memos warn
The Home Office has tried to ban Heathrow from informing the public about the full extent of delays at the airport, suggest leaked emails obtained by The Daily Telegraph.
Heathrow approached “breaking” point last week, with passengers left so frustrated by delays that they resorted to storming past officials without showing their documents and slow handclapping staff in immigration halls.
Several times last week delays were reported in Terminal Five of up to two hours.
On Saturday BAA, the owner of Heathrow, tried to defuse tensions with a leaflet apologising to passengers for the “very long delays” and saying people entering the country “deserved a warmer welcome”.
The leaflet suggested that passengers should complain to the Home Office. See Article

The Telegraph - France election: Nicolas Sarkozy forced to deny he received 50 million euros from Muammar Gaddafi
Nicolas Sarkozy was forced to deny allegations he had received 50 million euros from the late Muammar Gaddafi as France's presidential rivals accused each other of dirty tricks a week before election day.  
With the contest approaching its climax, Mr Sarkozy effectively accused his left wing rivals of orchestrating what he described as a “despicable forgery”.
Amid mutual smear claims, Mr Sarkozy and François Hollande held giant rallies in Paris and Toulouse on Sunday ahead of a crunch two-and-a-half-hour televised debate on Wednesday. More than 20 million French are expected to tune in for the lone duel ahead of the May 6 runoff that Mr Hollande is polled to win by up to 10 percentage points.
On Saturday, the investigative news website Mediapart published what it said was a copy of a Libyan regime document proving that Mr Sarkozy and Col Gaddafi – onetime allies – had an illegal financial arrangement to help propel Mr Sarkozy to power in 2007. See Article

The Telegraph - NAB to cut 1,400 jobs at Yorkshire and Clydesdale banks
National Australia Bank, owner of the Clydesdale and Yorkshire banks in Britain, is to cut 1,400 jobs at the loss-making arm by 2015. 
Australia's fourth biggest bank announced the restructuring alongside a 15.6pc fall in first-half net profits fell to A$2.05bn (£1.32bn) in the six months to March 31.
The results follow £456m of writedowns and restructuring charges at its UK division worth, including £120m set aside to cover mis-sold payment protection insurance.
NAB said it had completed a strategic review of its British assets to adapt to weak economic conditions, with the business to be simplified to focus on retail and small business lending in Scotland and northern England.
It plans to close 29 of the banks' 73 Financial Solution Centres, which offer services to businesses and better-off individual investors, and merge nine others with local retail branches, adding that the changes would mainly affect operations in the south of England.
Six back office locations would also shut. See Article

The Telegraph - Hollande's 'Growth Bloc' spells end of German hegemony in Europe
For two years Germany has had its way in Europe, treating historic nations much as Bismarck treated Bavaria – sovereign only in name. 
The French-led counter-attack and rumblings of revolt through every branch of the EU institutions last week have brought this aberrant phase of the eurozone crisis to an abrupt end.
"It’s not for Germany to decide for the rest of Europe," said François Hollande, soon to be French leader, unless he trips horribly next week. Strong words even for the hustings.
"If I am elected president, there will be a change in Europe's construction. We’re not just any country: we can change the situation," he said.
European allies are flocking to his cause from left and right, he claims. Not even Austria supports Germany’s austerity drive any longer.
This then is the birth of a Euroland growth bloc with well over 200m people and a commanding majority vote in the European Council, a defining moment in this saga. Mario Draghi at the European Central Bank is quickly bending to the new political dispensation with calls for a "Growth Compact". The Commission - liberated at last - is finding ways to "extend deadlines" on fiscal targets. See Article

I Wonder What Nigel Farage Will Tell The EU To Do With Their Flag?

An Article in the Daily Mail - Brussels orders EU flag must fly over Whitehall every day... and we could be fined if we fail to comply
Eric Pickles reacted with fury last night after being ordered by Brussels to fly the EU flag continuously over Whitehall.
The Cabinet Minister said the demand showed a ‘deep sense of political insecurity’ and called on the European Union to ‘grow up’.
Mr Pickles is currently obliged to fly the flag – a circle of 12 golden stars on an azure background – for a week each year, starting from Europe Day on May 9.
But under the proposed change, drafted by the European Commission and due to take effect within the next two years, the flag would have to fly permanently outside any organisation which managed development funding from Brussels.
Under the new rules, Mr Pickles, who is Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, could even face being fined by the EU if he fails to comply.
When the proposal landed on his desk Mr Pickles erupted because civil servants advised that, as drafted, it would mean more than 1,000 bodies being forced to comply, including Cambridge University, Jamie Oliver’s 15 restaurant in Cornwall and The Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, known as the ‘home of snooker’.
But last night, the Commission said the only stipulation was that Mr Pickles should fly the EU flag outside his local government headquarters in Westminster.
His HQ, Eland House, has two flagpoles – allowing officials to display the Union Flag in the ‘dominant’ position.
A Commission spokesman said: ‘The proposal on flags is limited to national managing authorities.
Most of them already fly EU and national flags and sometimes regional ones too. Every funding body everywhere – including no doubt Mr Pickles’s department – requires visible recognition of its funding role on project sites, and the Commission is no different.
‘Nobody is yet expected to comply. This is a proposal on the table for discussion.’
However, Mr Pickles hit back: ‘Any organisation which forces others to fly its flag betrays a lack of confidence and a deep sense of political insecurity. Will forcing people to fly the flag help balance the EU budget? I don’t think so.
‘Flying a flag should be a pleasure not a chore.There needs to be a more grown-up approach and a sense of proportion on this whole issue.’
The Minister was joined by Chris Heaton-Harris, Tory MP for Daventry, Northamptonshire, who last night said: ‘In a free country people should be able to choose if they want to fly a flag.
‘This symbolises much of what is wrong in the EU – using propaganda tactics to prove they have influence over people. It is completely unacceptable and this idea should be dumped.’
The new rules also demand that organisations should give ‘the widest possible media coverage’ to any activities funded by Brussels money and, on the internet, describe what is being done with the money in an EU language other than English.
The rules amount to an extension of current demands put in place by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), which require organisations that have received grants to put EU branding on their publicity material: they are even required to take a photograph of material and email it to the European Commission to prove that the regulations were being observed. If they fail to do so, they face being fined.
Because the regulations are drawn up by the European Commission, and not voted on by the UK Parliament, they do not form part of UK law, so the Commission imposes ‘financial corrections’ for ‘non-compliance’. During the past five years the Commission has punished dozens of British organisations for failing to display the EU’s branding.
These have included the National Museum of Labour History in Manchester, which was fined £7,223 for failing to put a Brussels logo on a billboard and Doncaster Council, which was hit for £5,250 for ‘failure to advertise ERDF support during a radio advert’.
The Commission spokesman said: ‘The rationale is that all projects should have information in a language not of their country so that non-national businesses and others can find out what is going on and possibly identify funding/procurement opportunities for themselves.
‘The biggest winners out of this will probably be the UK and Ireland as most projects Europe-wide will put up info in English.
‘I confirm that these rules, like all EU rules, will not be handed down by so-called Brussels bureaucrats but negotiated by national Ministers, including Mr Pickles, and by elected MEPs in the European Parliament. The UK always plays a full role in key EU negotiations.’  See Article

NEWS SNIPPETS 28TH APRIL 2012

The Telegraph - David Cameron cornered over Jeremy Hunt
Lord Justice Leveson will not rule on whether Jeremy Hunt broke the Ministerial Code in his dealings with the Murdoch empire, sources have disclosed. 
The judge’s position will undermine David Cameron’s refusal to order a Whitehall investigation into the Culture Secretary’s conduct in relation to the News Corporation bid for full control of BSkyB.
Sources said that Lord Leveson, who is carrying out a public inquiry into media standards, “does not consider himself to be the arbiter of the code”.
The judge has turned down a request from Mr Hunt to bring forward his session, “in the interests of fairness to all”, a spokesman for the inquiry said on Friday night.
The Prime Minister also faced pressure from his Coalition colleagues as Liberal Democrats lined up to insist that Mr Hunt should face an inquiry under the code.
The Culture Secretary faces allegations that his special adviser disclosed confidential details of the minister’s “quasi-judicial” decisions about the takeover bid to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. See Article

The Telegraph - David Cameron has no plan to return Britain to growth, claims WPP chief Sir Martin Sorrell
David Cameron has yet to come up with a credible strategy to return Britain to growth, and risks being "blown off course" by news events, Sir Martin Sorrell has claimed. 
Sir Martin, chief executive of the world's biggest advertising agency, WPP, expressed relief that Britain's double dip has so far been "marginal" but warned that the Prime Minister does not yet have a clear strategy for saving the UK from a deepening recession.
"The Coalition Government has done well on attempting to reduce the deficit. What is needed now is a comprehensive plan," he said. "We don't seem to have a plan in place as yet. Oddly, I find myself in agreement with Vince Cable [the Liberal Democrat Business Secretary]."
Sir Martin's comments came as WPP reported a 7.6pc increase in its first-quarter revenues to £2.39bn and revised its full-year growth expectations slightly upwards to more than 4pc.
The increase was fuelled by strong growth in Asia and Latin America and demand for digital products. Revenues in Britain also rose ahead of expectations, at 2.5pc, as companies battled to grow their share of the market. See Article

The Telegraph - Gay marriage: Pope representatives calls for Catholic alliance with Muslim and Jewish groups
The Pope’s representative in Britain has urged Roman Catholic leaders to form a united front with their Muslim and Jewish counterparts to oppose gay marriage. 
Archbishop Antonio Mennini, the Apostolic Nuncio, called for closer co-operation with other faiths as well as Christian denominations to put pressure on the Government over its plans to allow same-sex couples to marry.
In an address to Catholic bishops from England and Wales, he echoed the recent comments of Pope Benedict who said the Church faced “powerful political and cultural currents” in favour of redefining marriage.
His comments come after a series of high-level interventions by some Muslim and Jewish leaders last month after the Equalities Minister, Lynne Featherstone, launched a national consultation on how same-sex marriage might be introduced. See Article

The Guardian - DSK: New York sex scandal orchestrated by political opponents
Dominique Strauss-Kahn accuses enemies linked to Nicolas Sarkozy of destroying bid for French presidency
DSK interview: 'I didn't believe they'd go that far'
The former head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, has accused political enemies linked to Nicolas Sarkozy and his ruling UMP party of destroying his bid for the French presidency by choreographing the scandal that erupted last year when he was accused of assaulting a New York hotel maid.
In an exclusive interview published by the Guardian, Strauss-Kahn stated that he believes the highly public undoing that followed his encounter with the housekeeper in the Sofitel hotel's presidential suite, and his imprisonment on charges of attempted rape, were orchestrated by his political opponents.
While he does not believe the incident with Nafissatou Diallo was a setup, he said the subsequent escalation of the events on 14 May into a criminal investigation that destroyed his chances of winning the presidency had been "shaped by those with a political agenda" and that "more was involved here than mere coincidence".
Strauss-Kahn, 63, alleges that he was put under surveillance by French intelligence weeks before he was arrested on suspicion of sexually assaulting Diallo. He accuses operatives linked to Sarkozy of intercepting phone calls and making sure Diallo went to the New York police, thus sparking an international scandal. See Article

The Guardian - Hollande and Merkel clash looms over eurozone austerity
German chancellor tells France it cannot rewrite fiscal pact but French presidential frontrunner says Berlin does not rule Europe. Germany and France moved towards a bruising and potentially destabilising showdown over how to tackle the European debt crisis when Chancellor Angela Merkel abruptly dismissed one of François Hollande's central presidential campaign pledges.
As the French Socialist leader extended his poll lead over Nicolas Sarkozy to 10 points on Fridaywith just over a week until the French vote, Merkel declared that his drive to reopen the EU's fiscal pact penalising spendthrift eurozone governments was futile.
"The fiscal pact has been negotiated, it has been signed by 25 government leaders, and has already been ratified by Portugal and Greece. Parliaments all over Europe are about to pass it. Ireland has a referendum on it at the end of May. It cannot be negotiated anew," Merkel told the WAZ media group.
But with governments across Europe falling victim to a backlash against austerity, the policy debate in Europe is shifting from German insistence on austerity towards a greater emphasis on boosting growth and creating jobs. See Article

The Guardian - Cispa approved by House but critics urge Senate to block 'horrible' bill
Free speech groups say the bill – which Obama has vowed to veto – hands US authorities too much power to use private data. Free speech advocates are calling for the Senate to block controversial cybersecurity legislation they claim will give the US authorities unprecedented access to online communications.
The House of Representatives on Thursday ignored the threat of a White House veto to pass the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (Cispa). The bill aims to make it easier for companies to share information collected on the internet with the federal government in order to help prevent electronic attacks from cybercriminals, foreign governments and terrorists.
Sponsors of the bill have made several amendments to Cispa in the past week, but critics say the bill still threatens to overrule existing privacy protections for citizens, and hands the National Security Agency too much power to access and use people's private information. See Article

The Guardian - Dutch government decrees that all cannabis cafes are off-limits to tourists
Non-Dutch visitors will no longer be able to legally buy soft drugs after judge upholds change to government policy. Long famous for "coffee shops" where joints and cappuccinos share the menu, the Netherlands' famed tolerance for drugs could be going up in smoke.
A judge on Friday upheld a government plan to ban non-Dutch residents from buying cannabis by introducing a "weed pass" available only to residents.
The regulation reins in one of the best known symbols of the country's reputation of tolerance.
For many tourists visiting Amsterdam, smoking a joint in a canalside coffee shop ranks alongside visiting the Van Gogh Museum on their must-do list.
Friday's ruling by a judge at The Hague district court clears the way for the weed pass to be introduced in southern provinces on 1 May.
The new law, which will turn coffee shops into private clubs with membership open only to Dutch residents and limited to 2,000 per shop – will roll out in the rest of the country, including Amsterdam, next year.
Amsterdam mayor Eberhard van der Laan is hoping to hammer out a compromise with the national government.
Coffee shops are also resisting the change. Maurice Veldman, a lawyer representing owners, said he would file an appeal against the ruling.
The most recent figures from the government say the country has more than 650 coffee shops, 214 of them in Amsterdam.
The number has been steadily declining with the imposition of tougher regulations, such as closing shops close to schools.
But the new membership rules are the most significant move in many years.
The government argues that it needs to crack down on so-called "drug tourists" – effectively couriers who drive over the border from neighbouring Belgium and Germany to buy large amounts of cannabis, which they resell at home. See Article

Daily Express - £64 A DAY RISE IN HOUSE PRICES
HOUSE prices shot up by three per cent in the first quarter of this year.
The rise of £5,864 on the price of the average home works out at more than £64 a day.
And there was more good news for home- owners with experts ­predicting prices will increase by a similar amount during the rest of the year.
Figures for the first three months put the cost of a typical three-bedroom house at £202,017 – the highest value recorded by the Assetz Property Price Watch since July 2008.
The investment firm believes prices will go up by another three per cent by the end of the year, adding an additional £6,000 to average home values. See Article

Daily Express - EX-MP UNFIT FOR EXPENSES TRIAL 
FORMER Labour MP ­Margaret Moran is unfit to stand trial for allegedly falsely claiming £80,000 of parliamentary expenses, a court heard yesterday.
The former Luton South MP was said to be virtually housebound suffering from severe depression, agitation and extreme anxiety.
Experts said the stress of the allegations as well as public vilification made it impossible for her to participate in a criminal trial.
Yesterday at Lewes Crown Court consultant forensic psychiatrist Philip Joseph said the 57-year-old former Labour whip had tried to harm herself and was at risk of suicide because of the case against her.
The court heard how Ms Moran had gone into ­meltdown and told doctors being caught up in the expenses scandal which shocked the nation was a way of being “punished” for transgressions in her childhood and adolescence.
Dr Joseph said: “The ­problem is the depression is related to these proceedings. It fluctuates (but) when she is required to apply her mind to these things that is when the depression becomes most severe. The feeling of shame and public vilification was causing her to become a ­broken woman. See Article


Daily Express - NO SICKNESS BENEFITS FOR AFGHAN HERO
A FORMER soldier who saw his friends blown up while fighting the Taliban has been denied sickness benefit despite being diagnosed with severe post traumatic stress.
Ryan Rodgers, 24, is trying to rebuild his life after being discharged from the Army last August following two tours of Afghanistan.
He is having psychiatric treatment but benefit bosses have told him he is fit to work even though doctors insist he is suffering from severe trauma.
Ryan, of Worksop, Notts, began training with the Mercian Regiment in 2007 and was posted to Afghanistan three weeks after passing out.
He said: “I’m disgusted at the way I am being treated after serving my country on the front line.
“I was dismissed from the Army suffering from post traumatic stress and yet I am supposed to be fit enough to work. If that was the case I wouldn’t have been discharged.
“I saw very good friends of mine blown up in front of my eyes. We also lost a couple of Afghan national army soldiers and I had to help bag up their dismembered body parts. It was truly horrific. “It’s totally unacceptable. You fight for your country and come back with scars both on the inside and outside and yet you are treated like dirt.”
Things started to go wrong soon after Ryan returned home. He became aggressive and the father of one, who had been married for less than a year, split from his wife. He said: “I was ordered to see an Army therapist in 2008 but I tried to get myself fit and ready to return to Afghanistan for my final tour in 2009. See Article

Daily Mail - The chilling (and balaclava-clad) face of modern British policing: London siege reveals armed-to-the-teeth team preparing for the Olympic Games 
Bristling with guns, his face masked, a police officer moves in on a suspected suicide bomber.
Just 91 days away from the start of the Olympics, the dramatic scene gave a foretaste of what can be expected this summer after a man threatened to blow himself up in a busy office block.
Thousands were evacuated, Tube stations were closed and streets locked down over a wide area of London's West End.
Snipers, bomb disposal squads, nuclear biological and chemical warfare specialists and dozens of armed police were scrambled to the building on Tottenham scrambled to an office block on Tottenham Court Road, one of the city's busiest shopping streets.
As marksmen took up positions on rooftops, office workers were banished from their buildings while others were trapped as the man with canisters strapped to his body yelled that he would 'blow everybody up'.
For three hours, as negotiators spoke with the man, named last night as 49-year-old Michael Green from Hemel Hempstead, terrified office workers and children were held back behind police cordons. See Article

Daily Mail - One third of unemployed in the eurozone are Spanish as country's financial woes deepen
Fears for Spain's 'imploding' economy grew yesterday as figures revealed that one in four people in the country are out of work.
The figure – 24.4 per cent – is so high it means that one jobless person in three inside the eurozone is Spanish.
Unemployment in the country now tops 5.6million – its highest jobless rate in almost two decades. 
More than half of its young people are out of work, the figures released yesterday also showed.
Spain is expected to be declared in recession within days, for the second time since 2009.
Yesterday's figures emerged hours after the country was downgraded by ratings agency Standard & Poor's. 
Fears are growing that the eurozone crisis could erupt again prompted by the problems in its fourth largest economy. See Article

Daily Mail - Now elderly told to collect pension from local shops as Giro cheques are set to be scrapped
Tens of thousands of elderly people who receive their state pension by cheque will soon be forced to collect it from a local shop instead. 
Pensioners have this week received letters from the Government telling them Giro cheques will be scrapped. 
The move, due in the summer, means the end of queuing to collect benefits from a post office. Instead, pensioners will be given a plastic card which must be presented at a local PayPoint, typically found in shops such as Spar and Costcutter and garages. They will then be given their money.
Around 230,000 people currently receive their state pension or benefits by cheque. Consumer groups are worried the new system will leave older pensioners vulnerable to crime. 
Andy Burrows, of lobbyists Consumer Focus, said: ‘The layout of some convenience stores doesn’t offer the same level of privacy and security as a post office.’ See Article

Debate about Sarkozy and the EU - Courtesy RT News

Interesting Debate from RT News CrossTalk:

NEWS SNIPPETS 27TH APRIL 2012

Daily Express - EU MIGRANTS TO GET FREE HEALTHCARE HERE 
In a move that could cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of pounds, the Brussels-based European Commission insisted that immigrants from within the EU are entitled to stay and use the service indefinitely even if they do not pay UK taxes.
The Eurocrats ordered the British Government to scrap current rules stating that jobless EU citizens cannot stay in the country for more than three months unless they have their own health insurance.
“This breaches EU law,” said a statement from the commission.
It insisted that “entitlement to treatment by the UK public healthcare scheme” was sufficient to allow migrants without health insurance to stay indefinitely.
The Government was given just two months to comply or face being dragged to the EU’s European Court of Justice and hit with a swingeing fine. And it was also instructed to go much further in giving full rights to EU citizens to live and work in Britain.
Furious critics of the EU last night urged David Cameron to stand up and flout the latest diktat coming out of Brussels.
Tory MP Peter Bone said: “We cannot allow the EU to force us to allow health tourists to come and sponge off our NHS. I hope the Government will do all it can to resist this directive.”
Fellow Tory MP Douglas Carswell said: “Another week, another outrage from Brussels.
“I thought we elected a government to run Britain but it seems we are governed by Europe.  See Article

Daily Express - UKIP PINS ELECTION HOPES ON ‘DISENCHANTED’ VOTERS
ANTI-Brussels party Ukip is expecting a “big increase” in its vote at next week’s local elections – thanks to unprecedented disenchantment with the traditional main parties, leader Nigel Farage said yesterday.
Launching the party’s manifesto for the May 3 polls he said Ukip was attracting support from across the political spectrum, including disaffected Labour and Lib Dem supporters, as well as Conservatives.
One recent poll put Ukip ahead of the Lib Dems in voter support. But Mr Farage said he could not predict how many seats the party would have by next Friday. Ukip is contesting only about 30 per cent of seats up for election.
Mr Farage said that unlike some other parties it could not pinpoint specific areas where its supporters were concentrated since it had backers right across the country.
“I just don’t know how many seats we are going to win – but we will travel optimistically,” he said. 
“We expect a big increase in our vote, particularly in seats where we have stood before although I also think in seats we are fighting for the first time we will do respectably well.”  He was “very confident”, however, that Ukip would win its first seats in the London Assembly. 
Last year Ukip won control of its first council – Ramsey Town Council in Cambridgeshire. 
In 2009 it secured the second largest share of votes after the Conservatives in UK elections to the European Parliament, pushing Labour into third place.
Mr Farage said his party had evolved from a “protest group” focused on winning independence from Brussels to develop policies for how Britain could be governed once that goal was achieved. 
Ukip’s “straight-talking manifesto for the local elections” includes freezing permanent immigration for five years and withholding state benefits from migrants until they have been lawfully here for five years. Mr Farage also pledged to end the “unrestricted, open door flow of labour from eastern Europe”. 
Other Ukip policies include halting cuts to frontline council, police and health staff; giving local people more power over police, planning, education and transport services; opposing wind farms and the HS2 high speed rail link; building more grammar schools; and “insisting that schools teach the three Rs”.
Mr Farage also pledged to hand “power to the people” locally or nationally to call binding referenda on key issues. 
He told the launch: “Disenchantment with the so-called main parties has never been greater. You cannot put a cigarette paper between them on issues of major substance.”  See Article

RT News - Ron Paul wins Iowa

Daily Mail - Our history lessons are 'worst in West': Failing curriculum needs overhaul, says academic
History teaching in England is among the worst in the western world, a Cambridge University don has warned in a devastating report.
Youngsters are taught a ‘mis-cellany of disconnected fragments’ and examined on barely anything before 1870, he claimed, missing out on vast swathes of British, European and world history.
Professor Robert Tombs, a history fellow at St John’s College, Cambridge, said it was ‘difficult to name’ a European country that taught the subject so poorly. See Article

Daily Mail - Is Lotus about to be the new Chinese takeaway? Iconic car maker could follow MG Rover to Far East
Legendary British sports car firm Lotus is under threat of being sold to China, MPs have warned.
In a repeat of the MG Rover fiasco, they fear up to 1,400 UK jobs could be lost and the 60-year-old business exported lock, stock and barrel to the communist People’s Republic.
Lotus was sold 16 years ago to Malaysian car-maker Proton which developed and nurtured the firm. See Article

Daily Mail - Has the double dip kicked off a Coalition civil war? Spending must be axed even more, says Osborne 'outrider' Fox
The double-dip recession has prompted the Tory Right to rise up against the Liberal Democrats, saying public spending must be slashed further, business taxes cut and employment rights watered down.
Former defence secretary Dr Liam Fox, who is emerging as an ‘outrider’ for Chancellor George Osborne, is leading calls for more radical economic reforms to try to kickstart the faltering recovery.
Dr Fox insists National Insurance contributions by employers must be reduced and competitiveness boosted by making it easier for firms to hire and fire staff.  See Article

Daily Mail - Nice work if you can get it: The extraordinary perks of Britain's fat cats including £25k clothes allowance, £300k for private jet fees and £100k for private school
When the shareholders of Barclays file into the Royal Festival Hall today for the bank’s annual meeting, they will be heading for a showdown with chief executive Bob Diamond that could prove a watershed for boardroom pay.
Diamond’s multi-million-pound jackpot this year has ignited a furious battle with big City investors, and a last-minute attempt by the bank to placate shareholders’ fury by attaching performance conditions to one of his bonus schemes failed to soothe tempers. 
It is being predicted that as many as a third of  shareholders could vote against his pay package today.
Some leading investors are so frustrated at the bank’s stubborn behaviour over top pay, which has remained in the stratosphere despite the austerity sweeping the country and Barclays’ poor investment performance, that they are threatening to retaliate.See Article

Daily Telegraph - Elderly care funding will force closure of libraries, councils warn
The crisis in funding elderly care could lead to the closure of libraries, parks and leisure centres, the leaders of every major council in England and Wales warn today. 
In an unprecedented show of cross-party unity, local government chiefs have issued a direct plea to David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband, urging them to act now to avoid “dangerous” delays in agreeing reform to elderly services.
A failure to reach agreement soon on how to pay for care for the rapidly ageing population could set a long-term solution back years, they warn.
Such a delay could force councils to divert money from so-called “discretionary” services such as parks and libraries to “plug the gap”, they say. See Article

Daily Telegraph - Europeans will never accept a federal banking system
Hope springs eternal when it comes to efforts to save the euro. 
The latest crackpot idea for shoring up Europe's monetary union, much discussed at last week's spring meeting of the International Monetary Fund and now widely promoted by eurocrats, is the establishment of a federal banking system, with a single framework for regulation, bailouts, deposit insurance, supervision and resolution. 
There is, of course, nothing particularly new in the proposal; for many economists, it's long been seen as an essential precondition for successful monetary union, at least as important as the federalisation of fiscal and political systems. The one cannot work without the others. 
The dollar, for instance, couldn't function effectively without a federal banking system, if only for this rather obvious reason; many US banks are of a size that would overwhelm the ability of the individual states in which they are based to underwrite them. Take the example of Citigroup, with assets at the last count of nearly $2 trillion. If it had been solely Citi's home state of New York that had been responsible, Citi would have taken New York down with it when it went bust in the sub-prime banking crisis three years ago as surely as the Irish banks have sunk Ireland, and Spanish banks are now bankrupting Spain. 
The fact that Citi was regarded as a federal responsibility, not a state one, saved New York from a ruin as otherwise certain as that of Iceland. Citi was the collective responsibility of the US as a whole. Yet in the eurozone, banks are deemed to be a sovereign liability, not a federal one. See Article

The Guardian - Far right voters to play key role final stage of French election campaign
The 6.4m voters who backed Marine Le Pen in the first round are likely to play a decisive role in the final run-off. Are there really 6.4 million fascists, racists or xenophobes in France? Not at all, says the French political class. Yet this question continues to dominate the final stages of the French presidential election campaign.
The Socialist François Hollande topped the first round vote on 22 April ahead of the rightwing president, Nicolas Sarkozy, creating a dynamic for the left. But Hollande and Sarkozy now face each other in a final run-off on 6 May that is far from clear cut.
The far right dominates headlines after the Front National's Marine Le Pen came third, with the party's highest ever score of 17.9%. Her 6.4 million voters now hold the result in the balance.
Sarkozy has little chance of being re-elected unless he wins over a majority of Le Pen's voters. For the unpopular president, things are extremely difficult but, political experts say, not totally impossible.
Analysts say he needs the support of around 80% of Le Pen voters to win. Polls – which vary wildly – show on average around half Le Pen voters voting Sarkozy, 20% choosing Hollande and 30% abstaining or spoiling their ballot. Sarkozy's camp says all is to play for, despite recent polls showing Hollande winning. See Article

Protest Against Petrol Price Hikes!

The cost of petrol affects us all, and it's not only private car use that takes the hard earned money out of our pockets, it's the knock-on effect with manufacturers and food suppliers who are also paying more for petrol and therefore have to pass the cost onto to their customers via increases in prices for food and other goods.  Well there is something we an do about it, join the FairFuelUK Campaigne  group and write to our MPs to find out if he or she is supporting the further increase in tax on petrol. See http://www.fairfueluk.com/ 

Hundreds Turn Out To See Nigel Farage in Plymouth

From This is Devon - Hundreds attend UKIP leader's meeting in city:
More than 250 people turned out to hear UKIP leader Nigel Farage speak at a Guildhall meeting in Plymouth.
Mr Farage said the UK Independence Party was ahead of the Liberal Democrats in national opinion polls and was now "the third force in British politics".
Mr Farage, the scourge of the European Commission in his role as an MEP, said advocates of the euro were "happy to see millions of people in the Mediterranean countries driven into poverty and despair in order to protect their pet project".
"Everything we have said, everything we have predicted about the European entanglement of this country has come to pass."
Mr Farage told the meeting, which was organised by local UKIP election candidates, that elected prime ministers had already been removed from office and replaced with technocrats in Greece and Italy.
"When you remove democracy and voting doesn't matter any more, all you are left with is civil disobedience and violence.
"They intend to destroy democracy. They think they know what is best for us."
Lord Hesketh, the party's defence spokesman and a former deputy chairman of Babcock, criticised government defence policy. He said: "The Guildhall in Plymouth bears the scars of why we have to have a defence policy.
"Plymouth is a very good reason to believe in the defence of a maritime power."  See Article

Local Council Elections Broadcast for UKIP

UKIP Local Party Election Broadcast 2012

NEWS SNIPPETS 26TH APRIL 2012

Daily Mail - Gordon and Rupert's war of words: Furious Brown hits back at mogul's claim of threatening phone call
Gordon Brown last night accused Rupert Murdoch of misleading the Leveson Inquiry after the media tycoon claimed the ‘unbalanced’ former prime minister vowed to ‘declare war’ on his empire.
In extraordinary testimony at the inquiry which prompted a war of words between the two men, Mr Murdoch claimed Mr Brown phoned him in 2009 to demand to know what was going on when The Sun, his flagship newspaper, declared it was switching its backing from Labour to the Tories.
He said that during the conversation, accounts of which have circulated for months at Westminster, it was clear that Mr Brown was not in a ‘balanced state of mind’. 
Mr Murdoch said that when The Sun declared its support for Mr Cameron in September 2009 he had told Mr Brown: ‘I’m sorry to tell you Gordon, we will support a change of government when there is an election.’ 
He said Mr Brown responded: ‘Well, your company has declared war on the Government. We have no alternative but to declare war on your company.’ See Article

Daily Mail - Hunt at bay: Tories in crisis as Minister faces THREE inquiries and his adviser quits over damning Murdoch emails
Jeremy Hunt could face three investigations after his special adviser resigned for leaking privileged information to the Murdoch empire.
The beleaguered Culture Secretary had hoped the decision of Adam Smith to throw himself on his sword would buy him some breathing space.
But the Financial Services Authority is looking at claims that Mr Smith’s giving News Corporation price-sensitive information about its BSkyB takeover bid constitutes the serious offence of ‘market abuse’. See Article

Daily Mail - BBC Olympics squad bigger than Team GB... as Corporation plans to squeeze 33 hours of TV out of every day of the Games
When our athletes march out into the Olympic stadium in July, they will be one of the largest British squads ever at the Games.
Apart from the BBC’s team that is.
The army of Corporation staff being sent to broadcast at London 2012 easily outnumbers the competitors on Team GB. In fact 765 BBC staff will be at the sporting spectacular, compared with the 550 athletes on the British team. See Article

Daily Mail - Betrayal of a war hero: Why did the Army pursue Para through the courts for two years at a cost of £300,000... just for stopping a Taliban suspect fleeing?
A paratrooper who was dragged through the military courts for hitting a Taliban suspect – in a case that cost more than £300,000 – was finally cleared yesterday.
A judge threw out the Army’s case after describing the evidence against the soldier as ‘weak and tenuous’.  The alleged victim couldn’t even be bothered to turn up. The 31-year-old defendant, known only as Corporal C, punched the prisoner once in the face as he interrogated him in Helmand Province. The Special Forces soldier had been desperate to discover the possible location of improvised explosive devices. Cpl C, who served for nine years before quitting in disgust at his treatment, admitted hitting the captive, whom he insists was trying to escape. But the military refused to drop the case – even though the captive, Ahmed Wali, did not want to make a formal complaint, and there were no witnesses to the incident. See Article

Daily Mail - Brussels demands 7% budget increase: PM anger at move that would cost us an extra £1bn
EU demands for an inflation-busting 7 per cent budget increase have been met with outrage by politicians.
Britain would have to shell out an extra £1billion under the European Commission’s proposals for a massive spending boost.
Downing Street and the Treasury vowed to fight the demands, saying they were unrealistic.
The Commission’s proposal would increase the EU’s budget by 6.8 per cent to nearly £114billion. Britain’s share, at around 12.5 per cent, would be £16.6billion – a rise of more than £1billion. See Article

Daily Mail - HSBC to slash 2,000 British jobs as part of cost-cutting drive 
Banking giant HSBC is set to announce 2,000 job cuts in the UK today as part of a brutal cost-saving drive. 
A day after the economy officially plunged back into recession, Britain’s most profitable bank will give staff another dose of grim news. 
It is understood that most of the cuts will occur in middle and senior management role. See Article

Daily Express - BRITAIN IN DOUBLE-DIP RECESSION
BRITAIN is in a double-dip recession according to new figures yesterday described as “very, very disappointing” by David Cameron. But he insisted the Government will stick to its austerity programme.
The economy shrank in the first three months of the year for a second quarter in a row – meeting the definition of a “technical recession” – according to first estimates from the Office for National Statistics.
The figures dominated a rowdy Prime Minister’s Question Time as Labour leader Ed Miliband repeatedly branded the news “catastrophic”. He blamed Coalition cuts. It was “a recession made by the Prime Minister and the Chancellor in Downing Street,” he said. 
“It is families and businesses who are paying the price for your arrogance and complacency. What’s your excuse this time?”
Mr Cameron admitted: “These are very, very disappointing figures. I don’t seek to excuse them, I do not seek to try to explain them away. There is no complacency at all in this Government in dealing with what is a very tough situation, that, frankly, has just got tougher. See Article

Daily Express - ROYAL MAIL BOSS WARNS STAMPS COULD RISE AGAIN 
MORE stamp price rises could follow after the boss of Royal Mail warned its business faced a “spiral of decline”. 
Chief executive Moya Greene said competition from private delivery companies like TNT was an “immediate threat” to the future of Royal Mail.
She fears they may cherry-pick the most lucrative routes, leaving it to deliver to unprofitable areas and leading to a more expensive service. 
The warning comes as customers prepare for Monday’s price hike, which will see first-class stamps soar from 46p to 60p, and second-class from 36p to 50p. 
The price increases follow operating losses of £41million at Royal Mail in 2011. See Article

The Telegraph - French President Nicolas Sarkozy's fiscal pact referendum deals a hammerblow to Angela Merkel's austerity plan
Nicolas Sarkozy has promised to hold a referendum on Europe's fiscal pact, dealing a hammerblow to Angela Merkel's "non-negotiable" plans to impose austerity on the eurozone.The French president, who is struggling in his bid to be re-elected, said he intended to insert the "balanced budget" rule into the French constitution, as agreed in the pact. But in a concession that will dismay the German Chancellor, he said he was prepared offer the electorate a say on the controversial issue. See Article

The Telegraph - RBS could lose £20bn of its value if banking reforms are introduced, warns chief Stephen Hester
Royal Bank of Scotland could see £20bn wiped off its market capitalisation once controversial reforms are introduced across the industry, the company's chief executive Stephen Hester has warned.Mr Hester said proposed reforms, including those set out by the Independent Commission on Banking (ICB), could restrict the part-nationalised lender's growth. RBS has a current market value of £25.6bn. See Article


Infowars.com - Ron Paul Has Been Quietly Piling Up Delegates – For a Brokered Convention?
Two networks yesterday, CNBC and MSNBC, broadcast a little known fact – Ron Paul appears to be winning the Republican nomination for President. When the popular Texas Congressman repeatedly assured supporters that the race was about delegates, not beauty contests, he apparently knew what he was talking about. Now, after three more states locked in delegates to the GOP nominating convention – CO, MN and IA – indicators point to a brokered convention with a possible, even probable, Ron Paul victory.
Mitt Romney in a panic
The only report announcing the news of another Paul victory yesterday was the Doug Wead Blog. That write-up, which included the headline, ‘Romney in a Panic’, was picked-up and reprinted by a number of independent news outlets like RT News and The Daily Paul. Wead’s conclusion is based on a number of factors. First and foremost, Ron Paul continues to win more delegates than Mitt Romney during each state’s respective slating processes. Additionally, the writer points to drastic, last-minute changes to GOP procedure showing an attempt to limit the Paul vote. Some measures include a new poll tax in Washington and robo-calls in New York telling Republican voters that only Mitt Romney remains in the race. See article


The Guardian - Newt Gingrich to concede Republican nomination to Mitt Romney next week
Delay in quitting GOP race will allow supporters to gather in Washington after Gingrich's crushing defeats in recent primaries.  Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is to quit the Republican presidential campaign next week in the face of a mountain of debt and dismal election results.
Gingrich had stubbornly remained in the race weeks after it became obvious that Romney was going to win the nomination.
With Gingrich out, only the maverick Ron Paul is left in the field with Romney, intent on staying until the last primary in Utah on June 26. See Article

The Guardian - Silly placenames: welcome to Dull, twinned with Boring
Yes, there really are villages called Dull and Boring. But if you lived in one of them, would you see the joke? A town or village with an embarrassing name has two options: they can change it or get in on the joke. This week there were examples of both. The latter was in Scotland, where the whimsical folk of the tiny village of Dull embraced silliness on a transatlantic scale by becoming the official sister community of the Oregon town of Boring. See Article

The Guardian - Young men in Mexico say the US no longer offers them a better future
Seismic shifts in immigration and demographics leave towns full of young men who once would have dreamed of the US. 
In a typical year, the young men in this agricultural region of western Mexico would have made the journey north to America. But not this year or for this generation: a better future across the border is a promise they no longer trust.
"For years, we dreamed of America, but now that dream is no good," says 18-year-old Pedro Morales, sitting in the elegant Spanish colonial square of Comala under the shadow of the spectacular Volcan de Fuego. "There are no jobs and too many problems. We don't want to go."
In an historic shift, the tide of immigration from Mexico to the US has stalled. Villages that were empty of young men are now full. A report published by the Pew Hispanic Center this week confirmed what was already anecdotally clear: the largest wave of immigration in US history has stalled and is now close to slipping into reverse. See Article

NEWS 25TH APRIL 2012

The Telegraph -  by Jeremy Warner - What next for the euro if France rejects austerity?
At a time when the UK Government is imposing another £16bn of spending cuts, is abolishing pensioner tax reliefs, and is apparently so financially stretched that it needs to tax warm pasties, it has somehow managed to find an additional £10bn to bail out the eurozone. This from a prime minister who declares himself a "eurosceptic". Is it any wonder that the Tories are trailing in the polls?  See Article

Daily Express - 'BRITAIN DOES NOT WANT TO LIVE UNDER GERMAN-DOMINATED AUSTERITY'
GERMANY could be left isolated in Europe if France rejects austerity following the elections, it has been claimed. 
Ukip leader, Nigel Farage said last night that the British people 'did not want to live under German-dominated austerity.'
Speaking on BBC's Newsnight, he said: "Let's think of a Europe of democratic nation states not being dominated by German economic policy or unelected bureaucrats in Brussels. 
"People do not want to live under German-dominated austerity and we're seeing a democratic rebellion across the whole of Europe." 
The comments come after French President Nicolas Sarkozy was beaten in the first round by socialist Francois Hollande. See Article

RT News - Going Dutch: The Netherlands to abandon the euro?
The Dutch government has collapsed after failing to win coalition support for its austerity plans. Elections are set to be held in September and analysts say one of the EU’s strongest economies may bring the unified currency’s demise
Prime Minister Mark Rutte, a strong advocate of the Euro, has been trying to get the Parliament to adopt 14-16 billion euros worth of austerity cuts. The deficit slashing is aimed at getting the Dutch budget deficit under the three per cent of deficit to GDP limit established by the new EU fiscal pact.
Rutte was unable to win the support of the far-right Freedom Party, whose leader Geert Welders said his country should not fund the new European Stability Mechanism and, at the same time, be expected to implement Brussels’ budget deficit caps. See Article

The Daily Mail - The damning email trail: Dossier of messages reveals astonishing secret relationship between Culture Secretary Hunt and the Murdoch empire
As Culture Secretary, Jeremy Hunt was supposedly the impartial government arbitrator tasked with deciding whether to allow News Corp to take control of BSkyB.
But dozens of devastating emails between Mr Hunt’s office and James Murdoch’s chief lobbyist Frederic Michel have laid bare an astonishing secret relationship between the media empire and the minister.
The 163-page dossier – containing 161 pages of emails – released by the Leveson Inquiry reveal that Mr Murdoch was being provided with a running commentary on government thinking and being leaked confidential ‘inside’ information on an almost daily basis.
Crucially, they also suggest Mr Hunt privately backed the controversial deal. See Article

The Daily Mail - James Murdoch DID discuss BSkyB takeover with David Cameron... over a Christmas dinner at Rebekah Brooks's house
David Cameron and George Osborne are facing questions about their roles in the controversial BSkyB bid after James Murdoch claimed he had discussed it with both men.
Mr Murdoch said he raised the subject with the Prime Minister during a cosy Christmas dinner at the Cotswolds home of former News International boss Rebekah Brooks.
Downing Street spent months dodging questions about that occasion, which took place on December 23, 2010, two days after Business Secretary Vince Cable had been stripped of responsibility for the bid and Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt had taken charge. See Article

The Daily Mail - Bankers are receiving 'Himalayan pay packages' despite poor performance, says senior Bank of England executive
Bankers’ pay is still at Himalayan heights while their performance is in the foothills, according to a senior Bank of England executive.
In a hard-hitting speech, Andrew Haldane said top financiers were on an ‘upwards-only pay escalator’ where they cash in whatever happens to profits or their employer’s share price.
‘While bank performance has fallen off a cliff, executive pay remains close to pre-crisis Himalayan heights,’ he said in a speech published by the Bank yesterday.
Mr Haldane said the pay package enjoyed by a UK banking chief executive rose by an average of 13 per cent a year for nearly two decades prior to the 2007 credit crunch. In 1989, it was £310,000 but had shot up to £2.7million by 2007.
Mr Haldane, who is executive director for financial stability, said banks were playing a game which is ‘a case not so much of keeping up with the Joneses as keeping up with the Goldmans’. See Article

The Daily Mail - Scots 'risk loss of top credit rating if they quit the UK', says leading agency
Scotland would not automatically get a triple-A credit score if it declared independence from Britain, a leading ratings agency suggested yesterday.
Fitch, one of the three major ratings agencies in the world which judge the financial strength of countries and companies, cast doubt over the health and stability of the Scottish economy if it stood alone.
It came during heated exchanges between MPs on the influential Treasury Select Committee and senior officials at Fitch, Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s.  See Article

Daily Express - MILLIONS FORCED TO WORK ON PAST RETIREMENT AGE
MILLIONS of workers aged over 50 will have to work up to 11 years beyond their expected retirement date if they don’t want to face poverty in their old age, worrying new research reveals today.
Half of those currently aged 50 to 65 will put in an extra six years past their state pension age, according to the Pension Policy Institute.
But the rest will need to work on for more than a decade to maintain a target replacement rate of living – defined as 50-80 per cent of their salary.
Joanne Segars of the National Association of Pension Funds said: “This report will dash the retirement hopes of an alarming number of people.
“The core problem is that our society is failing to match longer lifespans with an increase in savings. Millions of workers are in for a rude wake-up call when they find they can’t afford to retire and instead see their retirement date slipping away into the distance.
“Those who don’t want a fall in their living standards face a stark choice: work longer or save more, or do both. See Article

Daily Express - HOW PAY IS BOOMING FOR TOWN HALL FAT CATS
A RECORD 3,097 town hall bureaucrats earn salaries in excess of £100,000.
The number of local government bosses on six-figure incomes has soared by 13 per cent in the past 12 months, a report on council waste reveals today.
And a staggering 880 get paid more than the Prime Minister’s annual salary of £142,500.
Of these 658 staff earned between £150,000 and £249,999 in 2010-2011, while 52 broke the £250,000 mark.
England’s highest paid council chief was Peter Gilroy, chief executive of Kent County Council, who got a colossal £439,071 – but that included a redundancy package.
Top of the 2010-2011 Rich List when redundancy packages were excluded was Geoff Alltimes, then chief executive of Hammersmith and Fulham Council, on £281,666. See Article

The Telegraph - German Chancellor Angela Merkel defends austerity in face of open rebellion in Europe
In a rare concession, the German Chancellor admitted that austerity alone would not solve the crisis but she insisted that the wave of political opposition to fiscal discipline was wrong.
"We're not saying that saving solves all problems," Ms Merkel said at a conference in Berlin. "[But] you can't spend more than you take in. You can't live your whole life this way. Everybody knows this."
European markets regained some of their losses from Monday's rout after the Netherlands and Spain held successful bond auctions. Spain's Ibex rose 2.24pc, Italy's MIB was up 2.48pc, the French CAC jumped 2.29pc and the DAX climbed 1.03pc. In London the FTSE 100 rose 0.78pc.
Mark Rutte, the deposed Dutch prime minister, made a passionate plea to politicians to stick to his proposed budget cuts. "The problems are serious, the economy is stalling, employment is under pressure and government debt is growing faster than the Netherlands can afford," he said. "Those are the facts and nobody can run away from them. I'm standing here without pretences, it is up to parliament and the voters."
Mr Rutte said the Netherlands had to confirm its budget intentions in a letter to the European Commission by April 30. See Article

The Telegraph - FSA chief Hector Sants blames financial sector for global crisis
Hector Sants used his last speech as head of the City regulator to lay the blame for the financial crisis at the door of the financial sector. 
The outgoing chief executive of the Financial Services Authority said that mismanagement and incompetence at the corporate level had fuelled the crisis.
He said: "Ultimately, management are responsible for running firms and ultimately firms fail because of the decisions taken by their boards and their management. These decisions are made within a firm's corporate governance framework.
"The crisis exposed significant shortcomings in the governance and risk management of firms and the culture and ethics which underpin them. This is not principally a structural issue. It is a failure in behaviour, attitude and, in some cases, competence."
Speaking at an event in the City Mr Sants said that while planned changes to financial sector rules and supervision would reduce the risk caused by "bad decisions", it would not be eliminated altogether. See Article

The Telegraph - EU cookie law ‘will cost businesses £10billion’
New regulations on internet cookies which come into force tomorrow will cost UK businesses £10billion, researchers have claimed. 
The EU Privacy and Communications Directive will force businesses to obtain explicit consent for all forms of website tracking from users.
The study claims that UK businesses could lose £10 billion due to a combination of lost sales, damage to existing technology and advertising businesses and the migration of online businesses overseas as they seek to avoid the costs of compliance.
The latest guidelines suggest that website owners will need to ask for varying degrees of consent to differentiate between cookies that they need simply to make a website work, those that provide enhanced functionality, and those that exist simply to gather information about you for the site’s own purposes.
When the draft code was launched at the beginning of the month, Robert Bond of law firm Speechly Bircham said “The impact of the new law is far-reaching and incredibly onerous for website owners. This will affect all UK companies.” See Article

The Guardian - Berlusconi paid 'conspicious sums' of protection money to Sicilian mafia
The former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi paid large sums of money to the Sicilian mafia to protect himself and his family from kidnapping in the mid-1970s, Italy's highest appeals court has said.
Cosa Nostra's protection "was not free", the court said, adding that the media magnate had been a victim of extortion. "Berlusconi handed over conspicuous sums of money to the mafia," the supreme court of cassation said in a 146-page document explaining its decision last month to quash a trial against Marcello Dell'Utri, a Sicilian who worked for Berlusconi during those years.
In the 1970s, Italian criminal organisations frequently kidnapped wealthy people or their children, often in the richer northern regions of the country, and held them for ransom. See Article

Press tv - UK voters mock PM’s remarks on Twitter
People took to the popular site to post their condemnation and add their voice to a stream of comments criticizing the Tory PM for being out of touch with the lives of people. It comes after Cameron rejected the accusations made by Conservative MP Nadine Dorries, who described the PM and his Chancellor George Osborne as two “arrogant posh boys” who “show no remorse, no contrition and no passion to want to understand the lives of others - and that is their real crime."
Meanwhile, Cameron brushed aside the claims, saying, “The government is having to do difficult things.”
"You have, sometimes, MPs who don't agree with you. My job is to try to run the country on behalf of the people in the country. People in this country,” he said.
He then vowed to stay in touch with British voters, while insisting he had been doing the right thing to make the UK “more pro-enterprise, more pro-get-up-and-go, more pro-work, more pro-effort.”
Meanwhile, thousands of the people use Twitter, “davekeepsitreal” hashtag, to mock Cameron’s remarks and criticize the coalition government’s false policies, including unpopular austerity measures and sting of controversies.
“By using any left-over roast swan sandwiches through the week,” a Twitter user posted. “by thinning out his port and partridge jus with tomato ketchup,” added by another user.
Political observers believe that the voters’ remarks have apparently undermined the favorite Conservative slogan that “we’re all in this together.” See Article

Infowars.com - Secretive Bilderberg Group Set To Meet In Virginia May 31st-June 3rd
Speculation that the location of the Bilderberg Group’s annual meeting would be chosen to coincide with this year’s U.S. presidential election appears to have been accurate with the likelihood that Bilderberg will hold their confab in Chantilly, Virginia from May 31st to June 3rd. See Article

Prensa Latina - Spain to Close Border for Summit of the European Central Bank
Madrid, Apr 24 (Prensa Latina) Spain will restore border controls to France on Saturday, during a summit of European Central Bank (ECB) to be held on 3 May in Barcelona, said Monday the Ministry of Interior.
The measure, which will run until next May 4, will involve the temporary suspension of the Schengen Agreement on free movement of citizens among the 27 European Union countries.
According to the conservative government of Mariano Rajoy, the land boundaries with France will be reinforced at the border of La Jonquera, Port Bou, Puigcerdá, Camprodon, Les and Canfranc and air borders of Girona and Barcelona airports.
The Schengen Agreement text states that the free movement of persons in Europe without borders can be temporarily interrupted in the case of "a serious threat to public order or national security." 
The Spanish authorities fear the arrival of protesters from other countries to Barcelona as part of the unrest prevailing in the so-called Old Continent due to the adjustment measures implemented by governments to overcome the crisis. See Article

Do They Want Both America and Britain to Fail? - Not to Mention All The Other EU Countries!

Swap the word 'America' for 'Britain' and you can see the similar pattern  "If I wanted America to fail"

Nigel Farage on the rise of UKIP - Sky News (22Apr 2012)

Nigel Farage on the rise of UKIP - Sky News (22Apr 2012)