The DUP leader Peter Robinson has said legislation to replace the Parades Commission has been put on hold after the Orange Order refused to review their decision to reject it.
The First Minister, Peter Robinson said it is now inevitable that the parades commission will be reappointed for another year
“I am disappointed by the outcome as considerable effort was made at Hillsborough to solve the issues around parades and protests.
“We had developed a new and improved framework to deal with parades.
“This framework was based on specifications outlined by the Orange Order,” he added.
Mr Robinson said the draft bill should have been submitted to the Executive by September, in order to be ready for January 2011.
The first minister said that the time frame has now been missed because the Grand Lodge, which met at the weekend, did not review its decision to reject the Bill.
He revealed he had written to the Grand Master on 15 September telling him the Bill would be left in abeyance until if, or when, the order decided to proceed.
Mr Robinson said the reappointment of the Parades Commission would “sadden many” within the orders as the Commission has proved to be “part of the problem rather than part of the solution” to parades disputes.
“I see no advantage in moving from one system which the Orange Order does not engage with to another which, at the present time, does not have its support, ” the minister said.
The original proposals were contained in the Draft Public Assemblies Bill and had been agreed by the DUP and Sinn Fein.
They were rejected by 37 votes to 32 by members of the Grand Lodge of Ireland in July.
The draft legislation focused on dialogue and a code of conduct for both residents and marchers. It also spelled the end of the Parades Commission.
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The FBI is being pressed to investigate further
FBI agents cheated on an internal exam by conferring, using crib sheets, and finding answers on computers, a Department of Justice probe has found.
Staff were required to take a test on their knowledge of new unified guidelines on domestic investigations.
Suspicions were raised when many passed the 90-minute exam in just 20 minutes.
The authors of the report said “a significant number of FBI employees engaged in some form of improper conduct or cheating”.
After the controversial guidelines were introduced, staff were required to take 16.5 hours of classroom tuition and then take a 51-question computerised exam that was expected to take most people between 90 minutes and two hours.
They were allowed access to the guidelines while taking the test, which was mostly sat between May 2009 and January 2010.
The Office of the Inspector General was called in to investigate after 200 workers passed the test in under 20 minutes.
After interviewing staff in a number of field offices, investigators found people taking the exam had conferred, and that direct cheating had been employed.
In one field office, staff had exploited a lack of computer security to call up the answers to the test.
In another office, of 11 workers interviewed, three supervisors and four agents said they had used answer sheets for the exam. Some tried to justify the usage on the basis that these were “notes”.
They also found that tutors were “training to the test”, indicating which part of lessons would be on the exam by stamping their feet loudly during the relevant sections.
The Office of the Inspector General is recommending that those who directly cheated be disciplined and that there be a wider investigation than the small sample they spoke to.
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Mr Heselden acquired the Segway operation in 2010
The millionaire owner of the UK Segway company has died after apparently riding one of his company’s motorised scooters off cliffs and into a river.
Jimi Heselden, 62, crashed into the River Wharfe while riding the vehicle round his estate in Thorp Arch, Boston Spa, West Yorkshire, on Sunday.
He was pronounced dead at the scene. The scooter was found in the water.
Mr Heselden, who founded Leeds-based company Hesco Bastion, acquired the Segway operation in 2010.
A spokeswoman for West Yorkshire Police confirmed Mr Heselden’s identity.
She said: “Police were called at 1140 yesterday to reports of a man in the River Wharfe, apparently having fallen from the cliffs above.”
She said a “Segway type” vehicle had been recovered.
Mr Heselden grew up in the Halton Moor area of Leeds, leaving school at 15 and working down local pits.
He worked as a miner before losing his job in a wave of redundancies in the 1980s.
His engineering business went from strength-to-strength and he had a fortune reported to be £166m, making him one of the top 400 richest people on the UK.
The tycoon was well known for his donations to charity, giving more than £20m to good causes.
Earlier this month he donated £10m to the Leeds Community Foundation.
A spokesperson for Hesco Bastion said: “It is with great sadness that we have to confirm that Jimi Heselden OBE, has died in a tragic accident near his home in West Yorkshire.”
The spokesperson added: “Jimi is perhaps best known for his charity work with Help for Heroes and the Leeds Community Foundation.
“A £10m gift to the foundation earlier this month saw his lifetime charitable donations top £23m.
“Our thoughts go out to his family and many friends, who have asked for privacy at this time.”
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Mr Miliband has long been considered a future Labour leader
David Miliband is due to address the Labour Party conference later, after narrowly losing the leadership to his younger brother Ed.
Mr Miliband, long considered the favourite for the top job, will attend a question and answer session in his role as shadow foreign secretary.
He has not said whether he will accept a job in his brother’s shadow cabinet – saying on Saturday it was “Ed’s day”.
But there is speculation he may be offered the shadow chancellor’s role.
The current shadow chancellor, Alistair Darling, who is stepping down from the front bench, is due to make a speech later in which he will defend his original plans to halve the budget deficit over four years.
The new leader has described the plans as “broadly the right starting point” but said he wanted to look at how they could be improved.
Nominations have opened for the 19 shadow cabinet posts which are elected by a ballot of MPs, but David Miliband and other leadership candidates are expected to take prominent jobs.
Mr Miliband, who remains shadow foreign secretary until the elections, will speak to delegates in a question and answer session on foreign affairs at the Labour Party conference in Manchester.
On Sunday he ducked questions about his future, saying it was “not a day to take anything away from what Ed is doing”.
“This conference is not about jobs for me, this is about a new future for the Labour Party,” he said.
BBC political editor Nick Robinson says a friend of David Miliband has told him that the defeated leadership contender is contemplating not running for the shadow cabinet. But Labour colleagues insist he has yet to make up his mind.
Ed Miliband has praised his brother’s “generosity and graciousness”, adding: “I think he needs time to think about the contribution he can make – I think he can make a very big contribution to British politics.”
Although David won a higher percentage of votes from Labour MPs, MEPs and party members, Ed Miliband’s success with trade union members and affiliated societies pushed him into first place.
He defeated his brother in the e leadership race by just over 1% from his brother after second, third and fourth preference votes came into play.
Ed Balls was third, Andy Burnham fourth and Diane Abbott last in the ballot of MPs, members and trade unionists.
The party has revealed that nearly a tenth of the votes cast – more than 36,000 out of 375,000 – were spoiled.
A spokesman said many voters had failed to comply with “clear” instructions to tick a box confirming they were Labour supporters.
Ed Miliband has been portrayed as being to the left of his brother and been dubbed “Red Ed” by some newspapers. But he rejected the tag as “rubbish” in a BBC interview on Sunday and said his leadership would not see “a lurch to the left”.
Mr Miliband told a fringe meeting at the conference that people had joined the party at the rate of one a minute since he was elected.
Shadow cabinet candidates have until Wednesday to put their names into the ring, with about 50 already in the running for the 19 slots up for grabs. The other members of the shadow cabinet – party leader, deputy leader, chairman of the Parliamentary Labour and the chief whip – are voted in separately.
The vote takes place until 7 October. The 19 successful candidates will then be allocated posts in the shadow cabinet by the new party leader.
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Security guard Sam Bawden claims he was just doing his job
A security guard who denies the manslaughter of a man he caught shoplifting said he was hit in the face in the struggle.
Sam Bawden, 25, denies unlawfully killing Aaron Bishop at Swansea’s Quadrant shopping centre in July 2009.
The jury at Swansea Crown Court was told the centre’s manager saw the incident.
Allan Wallace said he would have intervened if he felt his staff were doing wrong or Mr Bishop was in danger.
Related stories
Mr Bishop, a former soldier of Treboeth, Swansea, died after he was caught stealing a £35 bottle of perfume from Debenhams.
Mr Bawden, known as Josh, from Neath, told the court the shoplifter had hit him in the face as he tried to restrain him.
The jury has already heard that Mr Bawden was one of four shopping centre security guards who chased down Mr Bishop and held him in place awaiting the police.
Patrick Harrington QC, prosecuting, has alleged Mr Bawden had his arm around Mr Bishop’s throat.
In court on Monday, the jury was shown a video of Mr Bawden’s police interview, which took place soon after Mr Bishop died.
Aaron Bishop was restrained after stealing a bottle of perfume at Swansea’s Quadrant centre
In it he is shown telling officers: “A guy was shoplifting in Debenhams and we were asked over the radio if we could detain the male as he was about to leave.
“One of the boys grabbed him and I get hold of him, it’s a bit of a struggle but between us we’ve managed to get him to the ground.
“He’s a large male, quite strong, it’s taken four of us to restrain him and take him down and he’s struggling throughout.
“The police arrive and place handcuffs on him. He was turned over then and he wasn’t breathing.”
Mr Bawden is also shown claiming that at the start of the struggle Mr Bishop hit him in the mouth.
He said: “He hit out at me to try to stop me getting him.
“My left arm was under his body and I had my right arm on his back and on his head trying to stop him getting up.
“I was just doing my job. We were not going to get off him because he’s been shoplifting and being aggressive.”
The trial continues.
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Wind turbine manufacture in the UK would help bring costs down, the report says
The UK government should build a home-grown wind power industry if it wants to meet EU targets on renewable energy, a report concludes.
The UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC) says this would significantly bring down the costs of offshore wind power.
The price of building offshore wind farms in has doubled in five years.
The report, Great Expectations, suggests that the UK can learn from countries such as Spain that recently boosted their wind power industries.
Analysts suggest that in order to meet its EU target of producing 15% of its energy through renewables by 2020, the UK will need to have 15-20 gigawatts (GW) of wind energy capacity installed offshore.
Despite some recent developments such as the opening of the Thanet wind farm off the north Kent coast – the biggest offshore wind farm in the world – the UK’s current total capacity offshore is just under 1.5GW.
“There’s no point in getting planning consent for a large wind farm out at sea if a local authority can then block an application for an electricity substation on shore”
Dr Robert Gross UKERCIn Pictures: Giant farm
Costs of all electricity generation have markedly in recent years, but the highest rise has been seen for offshore wind, says UKERC.
This is accounted for by increasing raw material costs, currency movements (particularly the pound’s fall against the euro), bottlenecks in the supply chain and construction in progressively more challenging sites.
Stimulating a UK supply chain would, says UKERC, be instrumental in keeping costs down.
“The UK’s support system offers a generous subsidy, but may not do enough to build confidence in the companies making components, providing vessels or delivering support services,” said Robert Gross, the report’s lead author and UKERC co-director.
“At the moment, it’s quite uncertain where the coalition in going in terms of providing the kind of support to the supply chain that we were beginning to see under Labour,” he told BBC News.
At the moment, about 80% of the materials and services involved in constructing an offshore wind farm are imported.
Tom Foulkes, director-general of the Institution of Civil Engineers, backed the UKERC’s conclusions.
Offshore wind could become a major player in the UK renewables portfolio, but this would “require massive development in a relatively narrow timeframe,” he said.
“Government will need to provide clear leadership, ensuring the regulatory framework and fiscal mechanisms are fit for purpose and the supply chain is developed concurrently to make the UK a hub for offshore design and manufacturing.”
The government says it is intent on using grants to help build a domestic supply chain.
A recent batch of grants saw £10m go to companies that are developing turbines, bearings, cabling and other equipment.
“The UK has incredible offshore wind resources and this sector will play a key part in improving security of supply and decarbonising our electricity generating system,” said a spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc).
Despite planning concerns, the UK is speeding ahead of other nations on offshore wind
“We are also keen to realise the economic benefits to the UK – some commentators have estimated between 45,000 and 70,000 jobs could be created in the UK supply chain for offshore wind.”
The UKERC report also notes that the planning system can entail a period of up to nine years between applying for and opening an offshore wind farm.
Of 15 farms approved in the 2001 licensing round – “Round One” – only five came on stream within five years, while four have been withdrawn or lie dormant.
The previous government pledged to streamline the planning process through a new body, the Infastructure Planning Commission; but that has been scrapped.
Instead, the coalition has pledged to introduce “a new rapid and accountable system where ministers, not unelected commissioners, will take the decisions on new infrastructure projects”.
But Dr Gross said the government had yet to fill in the details on how that will work.
“There’s also a need to do these things holistically,” he said.
“There’s no point in getting planning consent for a large wind farm out at sea if a local authority can then block an application for an electricity substation on shore.”
However, UKERC says the future is optimistic for offshore wind. It suggests costs may have reached a plateau, and will come down if the “right incentives” are put in place.
In the pipeline now are offshore wind farms that would dwarf the 300MW capacity installed at Thanet.
Triton Knoll off the Lincolnshire coast and the Argyll Array west of the Isle of Mull are among the prime contenders to become the first sites to host a 1GW farm, while the collective potential capacity of sites offered under the government’s Round Three, in 2008, is about 32GW.
These giant farms may begin to come onstream in 2015.
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No details of the double murder were given at the hearing
A 27-year-old lodger has admitted murdering a Polish woman and her 11-year-old son at their home in Flintshire.
Monika Wasko, 29, and her son Patryk died after a stabbing at their house in Cae Hir, Flint where Krystian Krysztof Rozek had been staying.
Rozek denied the attempted murder of Mrs Wasko’s husband Rafael and the charge will lie on file.
His sentencing was adjourned to a date to be fixed in the future.
Caernarfon Crown Court was told that paperwork for the case was incomplete.
Rozek was accompanied by a female interpreter in court.
Judge Merfyn Hughes QC told him: “Within the next few days you will be informed of the date upon which you will be sentenced.
“You understand of course that the only sentence which the court can impose upon you is life imprisonment.”
Rozek will be sentenced for the double murder at Caernarfon Crown Court on 18 October.
Mr Wasko, 33, has since returned to Poland. Simon Mills, prosecuting, said he did not intend to return to Britain unless absolutely necessary.
The charge of attempted murder was ordered to lie on file.
Full details of the stabbing tragedy which unfolded at the house on Sunday 11 July were not given in court.
Police and paramedics were called to the Waskos’ home in Flint at 0130 BST.
Mrs Wasko, a council cleaner, died at the scene. Her son died in Alder Hey Hospital in Liverpool three days later.
Members of St Mary’s Roman Catholic Church in Flint joined local members of the Polish community to launch a fundraising appeal so that the pair could be returned to their homeland for burial.
The collection was organised by the parent teacher association at St Mary’s RC Primary School in Flint where Patryk was a pupil.
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The BBC’s Jon Donnison on the extent of Israeli construction work
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is to talk to Arab governments next week before deciding whether to continue talks with Israel.
His spokesman said there would be no official response yet to Israel’s lifting of the ban on building in West Bank settlements.
Limited construction work began on Monday, with bulldozers clearing land on a handful of settlements.
The BBC’s Wyre Davies in Jerusalem says peace negotiations are in the balance.
As the 10-month moratorium came to an end at midnight local time on Sunday (2200 GMT), Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on the Palestinians to continue peace talks, which recently resumed after a 20-month pause and have the strong backing of US President Barack Obama.
“Israel is ready to pursue continuous contacts in the coming days to find a way to continue peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority,” he said in a statement.
On Monday morning, Israeli media said bulldozers had started levelling ground for 50 homes in the settlement of Ariel in the northern West Bank.
Similar activity was also reported in the settlements of Adam and Oranit.
However, construction work was expected to be slow because of the Jewish holiday of Sukkot.
The Palestinian leader, who was due to meet French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Monday, made no immediate comment on the end of the freeze.
“President Abbas will consult with the Arab governments and will come back to the Palestinian leadership to take the right decision ”
Nabil Abu Rudeina Palestinian spokesman
His spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeina, said there would be no official answer until the Palestinian leader had consulted other Arab leaders in Cairo on 4 October.
“During that day President Abbas will consult with the Arab governments and will come back to the Palestinian leadership to take the right decision and the right answer, with all what we have from the Americans and the Israelis,” he said.
He added that there should be an immediate halt to settlement activity.
On Sunday, Mr Abbas warned that the peace talks renewed earlier this month would be a “waste of time” unless the ban continued.
The BBC’s correspondent in Ramallah, Jon Donnison, says Palestinian negotiators are planning to meet there on Wednesday.
If they see that the extent of construction in the West Bank has been limited, that might be enough to keep them at the table, our correspondent says.
In his statement, Mr Netanyahu made no direct mention of the issue of the settlement freeze.
But he maintained that it was possible “to achieve a historic framework accord within a year”.
He had earlier urged settlers “to display restraint and responsibility”.
Some Jewish settlers celebrated the end of the construction ban.
At the settlement of Revava, near the Palestinian town of Deir Itsia, they released balloons and broke ground for a new nursery school before the moratorium expired.
Earlier in the evening, a pregnant Israeli woman and her husband were slightly wounded in a gun attack in the West Bank.
Israeli police said Palestinian gunmen had opened fire on their car south of the city of Hebron. The woman later gave birth in hospital.
Compromise deal
Meanwhile, the US has renewed calls for Israel to maintain the construction freeze, saying its position on the issue remained unchanged and the US state department was staying “in close touch” with all parties.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke to Mr Netanyahu and also to Tony Blair, the representative of the Middle East Quartet (the EU, Russia, the UN and US), as the end of the construction freeze neared, a spokesman said.
Israel says the settlements are no bar to continuing direct talks on key issues, and US negotiators have been working intensively to secure a deal.
Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that controls Gaza, is strongly opposed to the talks.
On Saturday, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak told the BBC he would attempt to convince government colleagues of a compromise deal, and said the chances of a deal on the issue were “50/50”.
It is estimated that about 2,000 housing units in the West Bank already have approval and settler leaders say they plan to resume construction as soon as possible.
The partial moratorium on new construction was agreed by Israel in November 2009 under pressure from Washington.
It banned construction in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since the Middle East war of 1967, but never applied to settlements in East Jerusalem.
US President Barack Obama has urged Israel to extend the moratorium, saying it “made a difference on the ground, and improved the atmosphere for talks”.
Nearly half a million Jews live in more than 100 settlements built since Israel’s 1967 occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. They are held to be illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.
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