The school holidays are well under way, and if the kids are driving you mad, check out our latest events and activities for children, from enchanted princesses to electric guitars Far, far away, Manchester From 2 August, the normally hushed rooms of Manchester Art Gallery will be disrupted by the squeals of children as they discover a fantasy world of princesses and knights. Set over the two top floors of the gallery, the transformed space will include three tents where kids under 12 can create costumes and make films of their stories to project on to the gallery walls. Artists will also be on hand to organise art activities, and there will be sensory play areas for babies and toddlers. • manchestergalleries.org . Free, 2-28 August, Tuesdays to Sundays, 1-3pm Bike It, nationwide Britain has 13,000 miles of walking and cycling routes, among them plenty of short, traffic free ones suitable for children. UK charity Sustrans is promoting its best family-friendly routes as part of its Free Range Kids campaign, aimed at ensuring future generations of independent, active children. The routes include the Spen Valley Greenway, near Bradford, a 5½-mile route along the River Exe in Devon and a nine-mile ride into the heart of the New Forest with Holmsey tearooms providing a handy pitstop. Or get a breath of sea air on a five-mile ride from Frinton to Clacton in Essex, building up an appetite for fish and chips. • sustrans.org.uk Steam fair and vintage vehicle rally, Somerset Sometimes the old ones are the best. A nostalgic day out is on the cards at the West Somerset steam fair and vintage vehicle rally held at Norton Fitzwarren, near Taunton, on 6 and 7 August. Steam engines, fire engines, tractors, steam rollers and buses will be on display, giving kids the opportunity to ride them and witness the huffing and puffing of the engines, not to mention all the fun of a fair(ground). • west-somerset-railway.co.uk . 10am-5pm each day, adults £8, children £4, family ticket £20 Traquair Fair, Scotland Traquair Fair, held in the grounds of Traquair House on the Borders on 6 and 7 August, is one of Scotland’s longest-running fairs, offering theatre, outdoor spectacles, music, dance, storytelling. This year’s theme is fire, and so there will also be flame-eating, glass-blowing demonstrations, forging and pottery-making. Included in the ticket price is a tour of the house, which dates from 1107 and was a hunting lodge for the kings and queens of Scotland. Bed and breakfast accommodation is available in the house (doubles £180), or you can camp in the grounds. • traquair.co.uk/content/traquair-fair . Adults £19 booked online, children over five £13, family ticket £46 Record-breaking, Carmarthenshire The Campbell family, famous for breaking land and water speed records in the 20th century, celebrate the centenary of their Bluebird car this year, and are showing no signs of slowing down. On 13 and 14 August, Don Wales, grandson of Sir Malcolm Campbell, will attempt to break his own electric land speed record of 137mph, as he aims for 150mph on a four-mile stretch of Pendine Sands in Carmarthenshire, where his grandfather set the world land speed record for the first time in 1924. With high adrenaline and fast cars, this will be an exciting weekend, with speed trials for the 500mph land speed attempt taking place, too. • bluebirdspeedrecords.com . Free. Record attempts 3pm on Saturday and Sunday School of Rock, Brighton Kids might balk at the idea of going to school in the holidays – unless it’s the School of Rock. The Brighton Institute of Modern Music (Bimm), which runs rock’n’roll colleges in Brighton and Bristol, has teamed up with Total Guitar and Metal Hammer magazines to offer three courses in August. The Total Guitar summer school (1-4 August, limited availability) covers artists from Bloc Party to Eric Clapton, with tutors including Paul Weller. The Skindred-to-Black Sabbath Metal Hammer school is from 8-11 August.
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UK supreme court rules British prop designer, Andrew Ainsworth, may sell replicas of stormtrooper outfits he made for original Star Wars film A British prop designer has won his battle with Star Wars creator George Lucas over the right to sell replica stormtrooper outfits following a supreme court ruling. Twickenham-based Andrew Ainsworth, 62, built the original costumes used in Star Wars and has been selling the outfits, based on his moulds for the 1977 blockbuster, online for a number of years. He successfully argued the costumes were functional works rather than artistic ones, and therefore not subject to full UK copyright laws. “The judges concluded that the helmet could not be regarded as an artistic work because it was a mass produced item – remember how many stormtroopers there were? – and has an utilitarian role,” said leading intellectual property lawyer Simon Bennett of Fox Williams LLP. Lucas had taken the case before a succession of judges in an effort to halt Ainsworth’s work. He has now been forced to admit defeat – in the UK at least – following the ruling by the UK’s highest court for civil cases, which upheld a decision taken at the court of appeal in 2009. “This is a massive victory, a total victory, we’ve already got the champagne out,” Ainsworth told the BBC, adding that he had gone to court on a principle and was not going to allow the director to “buy his soul”. He told the Daily Telegraph: “I am proud to report that in the English legal system David can prevail against Goliath if his cause is right. If there is a force, then it has been with me these past five years.” However, the supreme court also ruled that Lucas’s copyright had been violated in the US, meaning Ainsworth will no longer be able to sell his costumes there. The film-maker successfully sued Ainsworth for $20m in the US when he began selling replicas of the models in 2004 , but a succession of UK courts overturned that ruling, culminating in today’s decision. “He lost on the US issue and as a result claims for infringement of foreign copyright can now be brought in the UK,” said Bennett. Ainsworth’s suits cost up to £1,500 and are highly sought after by Star Wars devotees, who wear them to fan conventions, as well as collectors. A spokesman for Lucasfilm told Sky News the court had “maintained an anomaly of British copyright law under which the creative and highly artistic works made for use in films … may not be entitled to copyright protection in the UK”. The BBC has posted a video in which Ainsworth shows how he makes the outfits. George Lucas Star Wars Science fiction and fantasy Intellectual property UK supreme court Design Fashion Ben Child guardian.co.uk
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Northern League member says Norwegian killer’s ideas are in defence of western civilisation One of Silvio Berlusconi’s former ministers has defended the thinking of the Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik. Interviewed on a popular radio show, Francesco Speroni, a leading member of the Northern League, the junior partner in Berlusconi’s conservative coalition, said: “Breivik’s ideas are in defence of western civilisation.” Speroni spoke as other right-wingers around Europe, including leading officials of his own party, distanced themselves from the massacre on Utøya and the ideology that inspired it . The Italian politician was endorsing the comments of another high-profile member of the league who had drawn fierce criticism for arguing that the killings might have been part of a plot to discredit hardline conservative thinkers. Like many in his party, Mario Borghezio, who sits in the European parliament, is an admirer of the writings of the late Italian journalist and author Oriana Fallaci, who popularised the term Eurabia to describe a future, supposedly Islamised Europe. Borghezio, a member of the European parliament’s committee on civil liberties, justice and home affairs, suggested that there was something suspicious about the fact that Breivik had been able to move around freely until last Friday. He said he disagreed with the way “this massacre is being used to condemn positions like that of Oriana Fallaci”. While describing the Norwegian killer as “unbalanced”, Borghezio said: “Christians ought not to be animals to be sacrificed. We have to defend them.” His comments brought outraged demands for his expulsion from opposition politicians and at least one member of the Berlusconi government. The party’s chief organiser, Roberto Calderoli, who also sits in the cabinet, responded with a public apology to Norway “and above all to the relatives of the victims for the terrible, unspeakable remarks made in a personal capacity by [Mario] Borghezio”. His gesture was almost immediately undermined, however, when Speroni spoke up in defence of his party colleague, using even franker language than Borghezio. Unlike his fellow MP, who is notorious for headline-grabbing, extremist comments, Speroni is a Northern League heavyweight. He was the minister for institutional reform in Berlusconi’s first government between 1994 and 1995 and has since been the league’s chief whip in the senate, the upper house of the Italian legislature, and the European parliament. “I’m with Borghezio. I don’t think he should resign”, Speroni said. “If [Breivik's] ideas are that we are going towards Eurabia and those sorts of things, that western Christian civilisation needs to be defended, yes, I’m in agreement,” he told Radio 24. In France, the National Front announced on Tuesday it had suspended a former local election candidate who made remarks on his blog that were interpreted as supportive of Breivik. Italy Europe Anders Behring Breivik Norway John Hooper guardian.co.uk
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Tom Condliff’s claim that his human rights were breached was dismissed by appeal court judges A 22-stone, “morbidly obese” ex-policeman has lost his latest attempt to force the NHS to pay for stomach surgery, despite his lawyers saying he might have less than a year to live. Tom Condliff, who is 62 and 1.8m (6ft 2in) tall, had claimed that North Staffordshire primary care trust (PCT) was denying him his human rights by refusing to fund the operation. But while judges at the appeal court in London on Wednesday expressed sympathy for Condliff’s “desperate” situation, they dismissed his attempt to overturn an April high court decision in the trust’s favour. Condliff, from Talke, Staffordshire, who has diabetes and other associated illnesses, had argued he needed a laparoscopic gastric bypass operation. Condliff’s lawyers had argued that the PCT had applied a funding policy that was legally flawed and breached his human rights. The appeal judges – Lord Justice Maurice Kay, Lady Justice Hallett and Lord Justice Toulson – ruled that the funding policy did not breach human rights laws, although Toulson added: “Anyone in his situation would feel desperate.” Richard Clayton QC, for Condliff, had said his health was deteriorating and doctors feared he could have less than a year to live. He had a “severe needle phobia” and, over a number of years, insulin had not been delivered as effectively as it might have been. Condliff had developed a “gross appetite” and had started to “gorge himself” following a course of insulin. His weight had increased and his health problems multiplied. Clayton told a previous hearing: “He tried all other relevant, non-surgical interventions, including dietary and lifestyle and drug interventions, for his gain in weight, but was not successful.” The funding policy of the trust breached Condliff’s right to respect for his private and family life under article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, Clayton argued. But David Lock QC, for the trust, said the case involved difficult decisions about healthcare funding priorities, and that the trust was entitled to make such decisions without taking into account non-clinical and social factors. Toulson said there was no doubt that Condliff’s state of health “is having a seriously adverse effect on his private and family life in the most basic ways, which without bariatric surgery will continue and is likely to become worse”. But there was no violation of the European Convention of Human Rights, however harsh that might seem to Condliff, said the judge. Clayton had in effect argued that there should be “positive discrimination”, and that “private life” matters should be taken into account, which were “not clinically significant when making decisions on the allocation of funds for medical treatment”, the judges said. Toulson said: “Mr Condliff’s witness statement shows that his condition has seriously compromised his independence and dignity of life in ways which have an inevitable impact on his relationship with his wife. It is unnecessary to go into more intimate details. His life expectancy has been severely reduced. Anyone in his situation would feel desperate. “The sad fact remains that the [trust], on proper medical advice, does not consider his condition to be exceptional for someone with his diabetes, obesity and co-morbidities. As a medical judgment that is not challenged. “In my judgment the [high court] judge was right in his reasoning and his conclusion that the adoption of the policy did not contravene the [human rights] convention. I would therefore dismiss the appeal.” The other judges agreed. Condliff was refused permission to take his case to the supreme court. NHS Human rights Health James Meikle guardian.co.uk
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ITV announces interim dividend of 0.4p and plans to launch payment systems for its online ITV Player ITV is to launch its long-awaited TV micropayment system in January, as the broadcaster forecast an end to its summer advertising slump in September with television ad revenues expected to be “broadly flat”. ITV, which announced its first payment to shareholders since 2008 with an interim dividend of 0.4p in results for the six months to 30 June, said it intends to launch a range of pay systems for its online television ITV Player. The broadcaster added that total revenues were up 4% year on year to £1.03bn in the six months to the end of June. Within this the broadcasting and online division grew revenues by 3% to £887m. Online revenues increased by 33% year on year as the ITV Player recorded a 19% increase in average monthly unique users and “long-form video views” – essentially whole TV shows watched via PC or handheld devices such as phones and tablets – rose 64% to 180m. “Our pay mechanism will launch at the turn of the year; we have picked our partners,” said Adam Crozier, chief executive of ITV. “We are working on the consumer proposition, what people are prepared to pay for and what will work and won’t work.” Crozier said ITV would probably run a number of different [payment] models in the first few months after the launch. The broadcaster has been experimenting with different online viewing models with “register-to-view trials” for Champions League matches, Indian Premier League games, The Only Way is Essex and webisodes of Coronation Street. ITV originally announced plans to launch a micropayment system for the ITV Player in August last year, with a launch timeline of the fourth quarter this year , a delay that Crozier downplayed. “We originally said there was a possibility of doing it then [in the fourth quarter],” he said. “From a technical point of view we could do it but we want the consumer proposition right. We want a softer launch.” ITV, which has experienced a tough early summer , reporting the first fall in TV ad revenue in 18 months in May, said TV ad revenues will be down 2% in July and 4% in August. Looking ahead to September, a key month for the broadcaster, ITV is tentatively forecasting TV ad revenue to be “broadly flat” year on year. The broadcaster said that overall TV ad revenue across the third quarter will be “slightly down” year on year, but ahead of the market. Commenting on the level of the dividend, Crozier said that the aim was for a “dividend that was sustainable” and that ITV has adopted a “progressive policy” for future payouts. ITV will be particularly pleased with what analysts at UBS described as a “stronger than expected” performance at ITV Studios, the broadcaster’s in-house production arm, which grew total revenues by 4% year on year to £264m. The performance was primarily driven by ITV Studios international production operation, which helped boost the division’s “external revenues” – commissions for broadcasters other than ITV – by 11% to £140m. “While there’s still a long way to go, we’re starting to see potential in the level of new work coming through ITV Studios with 68 new commissions so far this year, of which 29 are international,” said Crozier. Crozier pointed to the success of Prime Suspect, which is being remade for the US in a co-production for NBC, and Titanic, which has been penned by Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes and already sold to 15 broadcasters. Earnings before interest, tax and amortisation at the division fell by £5m, to £38m, but Crozier said this was primarily due to a strategy of investing in new talent and more pilots. Asked about looking at making acquisitions to boost the production division – ITV has just £52m in debt and has access to almost £1bn in cash – Crozier said that the real issue was looking to organically fix ITV Studios. Crozier also said that ITV is not working on any plans to potentially buy back the TV rights to Formula One motor racing, which the BBC is widely expected to drop when the current deal expires. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”. • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook ITV ITV Digital Digital media Television Television industry Media business Mark Sweney guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Teen, 14, given three-year jail term for murder and organised crime in Mexico
July 27, 2011 No Comment
‘El Ponchis’, a US citizen who confessed to working for South Pacific drug cartel, given maximum sentence allowed for a minor A Mexican judge on Tuesday sentenced a teenage US citizen to three years in prison for homicide, kidnapping and drug and weapons possession. Authorities say the teen confessed to killing four people whose beheaded bodies were found suspended from a bridge. Edgar Jimenez Lugo, known as “El Ponchis”, was given the maximum sentence allowed for a minor in the central state of Morelos, said state prosecutor Jose Manuel Serrano Falmerol. Jimenez, 14, was tried in a state court because Mexico does not have a justice system to try minors at the federal level. Authorities say the teenager confessed to working for the South Pacific drug cartel, led by reputed drug lord Hector Beltran Leyva. When he was handed over to federal prosecutors, the boy calmly said in front of cameras that he participated in four killings while drugged and under threat. The bodies were found in the tourist city of Cuernavaca. In November, stories of a hit boy, maybe as young as 12, spread after a YouTube video appeared with teens mugging for the camera next to corpses and guns . One boy on the video alleged that “El Ponchis” was his accomplice. Jimenez was born in San Diego, California. He and a sister were arrested in December as they tried to board a plane to Tijuana, where they planned to cross the border and reunite with their mother in San Diego. The teenager has been in a juvenile detention centre in Morelos since his arrest and will serve his time there, Serrano said. The two siblings allegedly worked for Julio “El Negro” Padilla, a reputed drug trafficker who authorities say has been fighting for control of the drug trade in Morelos. Morelos was formerly under the control of the Beltran Leyva gang, which broke up after alleged leader Arturo Beltran Leyva was killed in a shootout with Mexican marines a year ago. The battle among remnants of the gang has caused an unprecedented spike in violence in Morelos and in neighbouring Guerrero state, where the resort city of Acapulco is located. A relative has said Jimenez was nicknamed “Ponchis” by his family because he was a pudgy child. Mexico Drugs trade United States guardian.co.uk
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Embarrassment for Congress speaker John Boehner after budget office finds $350bn hole in his original proposal The US debt crisis has escalated after Republicans were forced to rewrite their proposal to lift the debt ceiling, because they miscalculated how much the original plan would cut spending. In an embarrassing development for John Boehner, the Republican Congress speaker, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) ruled on Tuesday night that his bill would have only cut spending by $850bn over the next decade, not the $1.2tr he had aimed for. Republicans are now racing to rewrite the legislation, and have pushed back a Congressional vote on the plan from Wednesday to Thursday at the earliest. Although Boehner was already struggling to find support for his package, the delay increases the risk that Washington will fail to agree a deal to raise the debt ceiling before 2 August, when the federal government is expected to run out of money. The dollar dropped against other currencies on Wednesday morning as investors faced the possibility that America could default. Several economists believe the country will lose its AAA credit rating within months, which would push up its borrowing costs, even if the $14.3tr debt ceiling is increased in time. The White House said on Tuesday it was working with Congress to devise a “Plan B” that might attract enough support. The two sides have been deeply divided for weeks, with Republicans demanding deep spending cuts and Democrats anxious to include tax rises as a major part of the deal. The US people may be losing patience with their political leaders. The Congressional telephone system was swamped with calls from the public on Tuesday, coming close to collapse. The websites of several members of Congress have crashed this week, after president Obama urged Americans to make their voices heard. Across the globe, there is growing astonishment that the world’s biggest economy is on the brink of a technical default because its elected leaders cannot hammer out a deal. Nouriel Roubini, the leading economics professor, said there was disbelief in China. “Biggest concern in meetings in Hong Kong: will the US default on its debt? Folks here are shocked by the dysfunctional US political system,” he tweeted from Shanghai. In London, the FTSE 100 fell 39 points at the start of trading to 5890, following widespread losses in Asia overnight. Traders are braced for the debt ceiling negotiations to go right to the wire. “Equity markets remain on the back foot as the US debt impasse continues to dominate the agenda. The political spat continues and as a result the expectation is that negotiations will be ongoing into next week, right up to that August 2nd deadline,” said Chris Weston, Institutional trader at IG Markets. Complacency rules, ok? Analysts have suggested that America may have more time to resolve the crisis than the government has admitted, with Barclays Capital calculating that the country might be able to function until 10 August before needing to borrow again. The yield, or interest rates, on US 10-year bonds remained below 3% on Wednesday – meaning America still enjoys some of the cheapest borrowing costs of any country. There are indications, though, that investors are becoming more anxious, with the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) volatility index, which tracks Wall Street confidence, rising by 4.5%. “We are finally seeing a little bit of risk priced in, but not a lot is being priced in yet,” said Louise Cooper, markets analyst at BGC Partners. “There’s still complacency … I don’t think anyone expects this to go wrong.” One possibility is that Obama could approve a short-term rise in the debt ceiling while Congress wrestles with a long-term fiscal plan. “The can would then be being kicked down the road in the States as well as in Europe,” said Cooper, referring to the Eurozone’s own debt problems. The Financial Times reported on Wednesday that banks are now holding onto more cash, bolstering their liquidity levels in preparation for a US credit rating downgrade that could potentially prompt a second credit crunch. “We’ve been here before, post-Lehman Brothers, and we don’t want to be there again,” commented Cooper. The wrangling over the debt ceiling could do long-term damage to America’s economic credibility, warned Christopher Molumphy, chief investment officer of Franklin Templeton Fixed Income Group. “The lack of a credible long-term solution would likely raise questions about the creditworthiness of the US, push up the cost of capital for private and public borrowers and thus prove a further impediment to economic recovery. There is still time for a deal to be reached on raising the debt ceiling, but continued doubts about a longer-term solution to the US’s federal deficit may well threaten the country’s AAA credit rating and the status of US Treasuries as assets previously perceived as virtually ‘risk-free’, and against which many other products are gauged,” said Molumphy. US economy Economics Global economy Global recession John Boehner US Congress United States US politics Republicans Graeme Wearden guardian.co.uk
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Bomber detonated explosives in corridor of Ghulam Haidar Hamidi’s office in volatile southern Afghanistan city The mayor of Afghanistan’s southern Kandahar city was killed in a suicide bomb attack on Wednesday, officials said. The incident occurred just two weeks after the controversial and powerful brother of Afghan president Hamid Karzai was assassinated in the same city. Mayor Ghulam Haider Hamidi was killed when a suicide bomber detonated his explosives in a corridor near his office, said Zalmay Ayoubi, the spokesman for the Kandahar provincial governor. “It appears the bomber was carrying the bomb in his turban,” Ayobi added. Kandahar police chief Abdul Razaq said the mayor was meeting some elders from a district of Kandahar city when one of them got close to the mayor and detonated a bomb hidden in his turban. Hamidi’s death comes at a time when there is a dangerous power vacuum in volatile Kandahar province, the Taliban’s birthplace and a focus of recent efforts by a surge of US troops to turn the tide against the insurgency. Karzai’s brother, Ahmad Wali Karzai, one of the most powerful and controversial men in southern Afghanistan, was assassinated by a trusted family security guard at his home in Kandahar city on 12 July. At a funeral service for Ahmad Wali Karzai, a suicide attacker who appeared to have concealed his explosives inside a turban killed a senior cleric and at least four other people in Kandahar. Kandahar was the site of more than half of all targeted killings in Afghanistan between April and June, a UN report found. Afghanistan guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Bomber detonated explosives in corridor of Ghulam Haidar Hamidi’s office in volatile southern Afghanistan city The mayor of Afghanistan’s southern Kandahar city was killed in a suicide bomb attack on Wednesday, officials said. The incident occurred just two weeks after the controversial and powerful brother of Afghan president Hamid Karzai was assassinated in the same city. Mayor Ghulam Haider Hamidi was killed when a suicide bomber detonated his explosives in a corridor near his office, said Zalmay Ayoubi, the spokesman for the Kandahar provincial governor. “It appears the bomber was carrying the bomb in his turban,” Ayobi added. Kandahar police chief Abdul Razaq said the mayor was meeting some elders from a district of Kandahar city when one of them got close to the mayor and detonated a bomb hidden in his turban. Hamidi’s death comes at a time when there is a dangerous power vacuum in volatile Kandahar province, the Taliban’s birthplace and a focus of recent efforts by a surge of US troops to turn the tide against the insurgency. Karzai’s brother, Ahmad Wali Karzai, one of the most powerful and controversial men in southern Afghanistan, was assassinated by a trusted family security guard at his home in Kandahar city on 12 July. At a funeral service for Ahmad Wali Karzai, a suicide attacker who appeared to have concealed his explosives inside a turban killed a senior cleric and at least four other people in Kandahar. Kandahar was the site of more than half of all targeted killings in Afghanistan between April and June, a UN report found. Afghanistan guardian.co.uk
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Energy watchdog said firm breached rules by failing to re-open cases when customers indicated issue was not resolved British Gas has been fined £2.5m by the energy watchdog for failing to deal with complaints correctly. The company, which serves nearly half of the UK’s households, failed to re-open cases when customers indicated their complaint had not been resolved, Ofgem found. The regulator also said the company failed to provide key information about the energy ombudsman to customers when complaints were not resolved or put in place a process to deal with businesses with 10 employees or fewer. Ofgem said British Gas breached regulations setting standards for complaint handling which came into effect in October 2008. More details soon… Gas Energy bills Commodities Consumer affairs Household bills guardian.co.uk
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