Category: news

Police seek help in finding a prisoner who absconded from a healthcare facility in Belfast.

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A dominant first-half display from Northampton sees them rip Perpignan apart and set up a Heineken Cup final against Leinster.

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A man has been charged with murder after the death of a 17-year-old mother in Cheshire.

Kelsey Marie Shaw, from Speke, Liverpool, was found unconscious at a flat in Foundry Lane, Widnes, on Friday night, and later died in hospital.

A 19-year-old man has been charged with murder and will appear before Warrington magistrates on Monday.

The family of Ms Shaw, who had a three-year-old daughter, said her death had left them “devastated”.

“Kelsey’s death will leave a huge hole in our lives,” they said in a statement.

“Like most other 17-year-old girls, Kelsey had her fair share of both good and bad times, but she always remained a positive person and she tried to make the best of her life.

“Her three-year-old little girl will no longer have a mummy, but we will ensure we keep Kelsey’s memory alive so she will know all about her. Helping her daughter to cope with this loss will be our main priority.

“Her death has left us all very shocked and we need time to come to terms with what has happened.”

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Six Scottish windfarms were paid up to £300,000 to stop producing energy, it has emerged.

The turbines, at a range of sites across Scotland, were stopped because the grid network could not absorb all the energy they generated.

Details of the payments emerged following research by the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF).

The REF said energy companies were paid £900,000 to halt the turbines for several hours between 5 and 6 April.

According to the REF research, the payments made cost up to 20 times the value of the electricity that would have been generated if the turbines had kept running.

The largest payment was given to Whitelee windfarm in East Renfrewshire, owned by Scottish Power, which was paid £308,000 in April.

The RWE nPower-owned Farr windfarm, south of Inverness, received £265,000 in the same month.

Hadyardhill in South Ayrshire, which is owned by SSE Renewables, was given £140,000 to stop producing energy, while Blacklaw windfarm in Lanarkshire – also owned by Scottish Power – was given £130,000.

The Millennium windfarm in the Highlands and Beinn Tharsuin, just north of Alness, each received £33,000 and £11,500 respectively.

Dr Lee Moroney, planning director for the REF, which has criticised subsidies to the renewable sector in the past, said: “The variability of wind power poses grid management problems for which there are no cheap solutions.

“However, throwing the energy away, and paying wind farms handsomely for doing so, is not only costly but obviously very wasteful.

“Government must rethink the scale and pace of wind power development before the costs of managing it become intolerable and the scale of the waste scandalous.”

The National Grid said the network had overloaded because high winds and heavy rain in Scotland overnight on 5 and 6 April produced more wind energy than it could use.

Spokesman Stewart Larque said: “One of our key roles is to balance supply and demand for energy.”

He added: “On the evening of the 5th into the 6th of April, the wind in Scotland was high, it was raining heavily, which also created more hydro energy than normal.”

Mr Larque said a transmission fault in the system meant the surplus energy could not be transferred to England and so generation had to be cut.

He also confirmed that the National Grid spent £280m balancing supply and demand.

A spokesman for the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC), described the incident as “unusual” and said more electrical storage was needed.

He added: “In future we need greater electrical energy storage facilities and greater interconnection with our EU neighbours so that excess energy supplies can be sold or bought where required.”

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Head teachers are preparing to vote on balloting for industrial action over plans to curb their pensions, as delegates gather for the final day of their union’s conference in Brighton.

Education Secretary Michael Gove will address the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) conference later.

The union says heads – who could lose £100,000 on average from their pensions – “feel betrayed” by the plans.

Ministers are urging unions not to rush into decisions on industrial action.

If the vote is passed at the conference on Sunday, the NAHT will become the third teaching union in recent weeks to opt for a strike ballot.

NAHT members have said they are “very likely” to vote to hold a ballot for industrial action, up to and including a strike.

The government is in talks with the unions and says it aims to announce firm proposals for all public sector pensions in the autumn.

From next April, teachers and other public sector workers are being asked to pay higher contributions to their pensions.

The Hutton review into public sector pensions recommended most employees should switch from “final salary” pension schemes to those based on a “career average”.

They should also retire at 65, in line with changes to the state pension, he said.

Heads and teachers say this will mean they will work longer, for less money.

Russell Hobby, general secretary of the NAHT – which has members in England, Wales and Northern Ireland – said heads felt angry and betrayed.

Many see the pension scheme as a reward for their accepting lower pay than than they might have earned in the private sector, he said.

“They rightly see the proposals as an attack on the fair rewards from a lifetime of public service, ” he continued.

“We are seeing a loss of about £100,000 from an average head teachers’ pension. That feels like a real betrayal to the profession.”

He said a “yes” vote on Sunday was “very likely”.

Schools could be affected by strikes over pensions before the government announces its full proposals in the autumn. Two classroom teachers’ unions voted for similar action at their annual conferences recently and they may ballot this term.

The NAHT is strongest in primary schools – where it says it represents 85% of heads in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

It says it represents 40% of secondary heads.

The government aims to set out “general principles” for changes to teachers’ pensions in England and Wales by the end of June. Teachers’ pensions in Scotland and Northern Ireland are decided by the national administrations.

Schools minister Nick Gibb recently told a teachers’ conference that public service pensions should remain a gold standard – but that rising costs and greater life expectancy meant reform was needed. The government is urging teachers – and head teachers – not to rush their decisions.

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The M1 motorway has been closed in both directions near Northampton after police were called to an incident.

A spokesman for Northamptonshire Police said officers were called to a bridge over the motorway between junctions 15 and 15A to help “a person in crisis”.

Traffic has come to a standstill in both directions and motorists have been urged to remain patient and avoid the area if possible.

The incident began at 1345 BST and is ongoing.

Insp Carl Sturman of Northamptonshire Police said: “We are dealing with a person in crisis on a bridge.

“We have police-trained negotiators at the scene and we’re trying to resolve this incident as swiftly and safely as possible for all people involved.

“We ask members of the public to please bear with us and be patient.”

The Highways Agency said a diversion route had been set up for southbound traffic.

It should leave the M1 at junction 15A, follow the black hollow triangle diversion symbol, and re-join the motorway at junction 15.

The diversion route for northbound traffic has yet to be confirmed.

A Highways Agency spokesman said there were long delays in both directions on the approach to the scene.

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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ended a boycott of his official duties by chairing a cabinet meeting, Iranian media say.

Mr Ahmadinejad had not been seen at work for more than a week, amid reports of a rift with the supreme leader.

The confrontation came to light after supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei rejected the dismissal of Intelligence Minister Heidar Moslehi last month.

Conservatives MP had put pressure on Mr Ahmadinejad to resume his duties.

Tensions between supporters of the president and of Ayatollah Khamenei came to a head on 17 April when the intelligence minister, a conservative, was forced to resign.

Mr Moslehi was promptly re-instated by the supreme leader.

Mr Ahmadinejad then stayed away from official work. He was not seen in public, missed two cabinet meetings and cancelled a visit to the holy city of Qom.

On Saturday, it was reported that a letter signed by nearly 300 MPs had urged Mr Ahmadinejad to resume his duties and respect Ayatollah Khamenei’s decision.

Fars news agency says a group of conservative lawmakers met Mr Ahmadinejad on Saturday, and quotes them as saying that the president had renewed his allegiance to Ayatollah Khamenei.

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Rallies and demonstrations have taken part in dozens of countries to mark May Day.

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Fire crews in the Highlands are using a helicopter to drop water on a heath fire that is threatening properties near Torridon.

Highland Fire and Rescue Service said it was currently dealing with three large heath fires at Dundonnell, Lochaber and Torridon.

The brigade has been tackling the fires since Saturday.

It is understood the blaze also resulted in hillwalkers being airlifted to safety from Liathach, Torridon.

Meanwhile, a number of roads have been closed while firefighters tackle a blaze at Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park.

Central Scotland Fire and Rescue service said a large area of scrub and gorse was on ablaze at Glengyle, at the northern end of Loch Katrine.

The brigade said it was also using a helicopter to drop water in the area in a bid to douse the flames.

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Arsenal blow the Premier League title race wide open as leaders Manchester United are deservedly beaten at The Emirates Stadium.

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By Jonathan Amos

The final mission of Nasa’s Endeavour shuttle has been delayed by at least 72 hours because of technical problems.

The orbiter is being held on the ground while engineers investigate a hitch in a unit that powers the vehicle’s hydraulics.

The youngest of America’s reusable spaceplanes is set to deliver a $2bn (£1.2bn) particle physics experiment to the International Space Station (ISS).

US President Barack Obama was due to attend the lift-off in Florida.

Also present at the Kennedy Space Center is Endeavour commander Mark Kelly’s wife, Gabrielle Giffords, the Arizona politician shot in the head by a gunman in January.

The lift-off had been targeted for 1547 local time (1947 GMT; 2047 BST), but was postponed just after midday.

Kelly and his crew had already suited up and were making their way to the shuttle. By tradition, their “Astrovan” would normally stop briefly outside Kennedy’s launch control centre before moving on down to the pad, but on this occasion the vehicle pulled in front of the building and parked.

The “scrub” was called moments later.

Managers and engineers are now discussing how long a turn-around they need to deal with what appears to be an electrical problem associated with one of the three auxiliary power units in Endeavour.

A heater that prevents freezing in a fuel line leading to the unit stopped working. Another heater was also displaying unusual behaviour.

Nasa managers suspect a short in an electrical switchbox may lie at the heart of the failure but they will not know for sure until engineers can get inside the shuttle to inspect the unit.

“As we say in this business, ‘we will not fly before we are ready’,” said shuttle launch director Mike Leinbach.

Local police were expecting up to 750,000 people to gather near the Kennedy spaceport to watch the launch. The impeding retirement of the shuttle programme has drawn huge interest in the final flights of the orbiters.

The Discovery ship was the first to bow out with a mission in February. It is now being dismantled and made safe for museum display.

Endeavour is next. After its 14-day trip to the space station, it will be prepared for exhibition at a science centre in California.

The Atlantis orbiter will end the shuttle programme with a mission in June or July.

Nasa hopes by the middle of the decade to be buying crew transportation services from a range of commercial providers.

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Corporate espionage is becoming more common, with bribery and bugging playing a large part in businesses keeping up with their competition.

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