EasyJet pays maiden dividend after profit soars

 

EasyJet said on Tuesday it would pay a special dividend of 34.9 pence on top of an ordinary dividend of 10.5 pence, making a total payout of 195 million pounds. Stelios Haji-Ioannou, easyJet's founder and largest shareholder with 112.55 million shares, according to Reuters data, will get 51 million pounds. The company's shares were down 2.6 percent at 356.5 pence at 1110 GMT. The carrier had said in September it would return around 190 million pounds after "a robust" second half. The payout comes after Haji-Ioannou criticised plans to buy new aircraft. Sources close to Haji-Ioannou said he was still concerned about capital expenditure, which fell 1 percent to 478 million pounds, and may pile more pressure on the airline's board. The Luton, southern England-based company reported an underlying pretax profit of 248 million pounds, at the upper end of forecasts, on revenue 16 percent higher at 3.45 billion in the year to September. The rise was led by an 11.8 percent increase in passenger traffic -- with one million more people using easyJet for business travel -- and a 1.3 percent fall in underlying costs per seat. Looking ahead, industry body IATA expects airlines to suffer over the next year due to waning consumer confidence, sluggish international trade and high fuel prices. EasyJet chief executive Carolyn McCall echoed that caution. "The macroeconomic environment remains challenging for all airlines as weak consumer confidence across Europe slows the rate at which higher fuel prices and increased taxation can be passed onto passengers," she said. "Against this backdrop easyJet is taking a cautious approach to capacity deployment ... capacity in the first half of the year is planned to be flat, with growth of around 4 percent for the full year." Analysts have been calling for airlines to cut capacity to ease fierce price competition in Europe and improve paper-thin margins. EasyJet had been expected to report a full-year profit of 206-254 million pounds, with the average at 243 million, according to a Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S poll. "The results are just ahead of our and consensus expectations and we would expect the cautiously confident outlook commentary to comfortably sustain 2012 consensus forecasts (213 million pounds)," said RBS analyst Andrew Lobbenberg, who holds a 'buy' rating on the stock. EasyJet's larger European peers have struggled to overcome high oil prices and sluggish demand. German group Lufthansa (LHAG.DE) and Air France-KLM (AIRF.PA) have cut profit forecasts this year after results were battered by high fuel costs and slashed plans to expand capacity next year. EasyJet said around 45 percent of its winter seats had already been sold, adding first-half passenger revenue was expected to grow by mid-single digits. The airline's fuel costs rose a quarter to 917 million pounds during its 2010/11 year. At current fuel prices and exchange rates easyJet said it expected its fuel bill to rise around 220 million pounds in its 2011/12 year.

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Posted in: EasyJet pays maiden dividend after profit soars

private jets waved through customs and immigration checks

Home Secretary Theresa May (Pic:PA)

THERESA May was fighting for her job last night after damning new documents fuelled the scandal of lax security at our borders.

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Leaked emails showed that thousands of private jet passengers were allowed into the UK without going through immigration or customs.

They also revealed the Home Secretary relaxed checks at airports on at least 2,500 occasions this summer.

And the Mirror can reveal passport applications are being secretly subjected to a controversial new “postcode lottery” trial scheme.

The High Risk Applications scheme is based on fraud statistics. Staff were given a list of postcodes to check against every new passport application or renewal. Applicants in areas deemed to be higher risk face several weeks additional delay in getting their passports.

In London, the only areas which get virtually no checks are postcodes that begin with WC and EC – the most central and prosperous areas. Meanwhile applications from women aged 50 and over are often waved through.

A source said: “It’s a classic Tory policy, and it discriminates against those they deem to be living in ‘poor’ areas.

“The whole thing smacks of elitism and snobbery. A lot of people are very unhappy with the process.”

These revelations come on the day ousted Border Agency official Brodie Clark gives evidence to MPs on how he was pushed out by Mrs May.

Borders boss Brodie Clark

Labour yesterday released the leaked emails showing UK Border Agency staff were told NOT to check passengers arriving in the UK by private jets – at the instruction of the Home Office.

From March 2, 2011, anyone on a private charter did not have to show their passports and could avoid customs. Figures show there are between 80,000 to 90,000 private flights each year, carrying two to three passengers.

The emails show an unnamed official at Durham Tees Valley Airport warned the UK Border Agency that the policy was putting the UK’s security at risk.

He said that staff “continue to feel uneasy about an instruction that is at odds with national policy and is creating an unnecessary gap in border security which, if exploited by the unscrupulous, could bring the Agency into disrepute”.

He also warned there was no way of checking if the number of people arriving in the country was the same as they had been advised.

His manager at the UK Border Agency’s Border Force said the “no checks policy” was part of a “new national strategy”.

In a further blow to Mrs May, other leaked documents showed how Britain’s borders were abandoned on hundreds of occasions over summer.

The Home Secretary ordered a pilot scheme, which ran from July to October this year, under which Border Agency staff could relax checks on passengers. It meant people arriving from the European Economic Area did not have the biometric chip in their passport checked, while children under 18 could be waved through.

These “level 2 checks” were used on at least 2,600 occasions. The relaxed regime was used to speed up queues at immigration control.

According to an email from a Border Agency Border Force official, the checks were relaxed 100 times in the first week of the trial and more than 260 times in the sixth week.

We revealed last week that officials warned Mrs May the easing of border checks could lead to a rise in child trafficking.

Mrs May admits to bringing in the pilot scheme without informing MPs. But she claims that Mr Clark went further by extending it to include passengers from outside Europe.

Mr Clark, who resigned last week, denies he acted without ministerial authority. His testimony to the Commons select committee could prove very damaging to Mrs May.

Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said last night: “This is startling new information about the scale of the borders fiasco.

“Ten days on there are even more questions than answers about what on earth was going on at our borders.

“Last week the Home Secretary told us no one had been waived through without checks. But these documents show passengers on private flights weren’t even seen.

"Last week the Home Office wouldn’t admit to having figures about how often checks were downgraded. Now we know those figures exist and that checks were downgraded 260 times in one week alone.

“The Home Secretary needs to show she is capable of sorting this fiasco out rather than making it worse.”

Last night, the Home Office refused to comment on the trial.

The UKBA said: “It is not true that we don’t carry out ­passport and warnings checks on private flight passengers and will deploy officers to airfields where we have concerns.”

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Posted in: private jets waved through customs and immigration checks

private jets waved through customs and immigration checks

Home Secretary Theresa May (Pic:PA)

THERESA May was fighting for her job last night after damning new documents fuelled the scandal of lax security at our borders.

Advertisement >>

Leaked emails showed that thousands of private jet passengers were allowed into the UK without going through immigration or customs.

They also revealed the Home Secretary relaxed checks at airports on at least 2,500 occasions this summer.

And the Mirror can reveal passport applications are being secretly subjected to a controversial new “postcode lottery” trial scheme.

The High Risk Applications scheme is based on fraud statistics. Staff were given a list of postcodes to check against every new passport application or renewal. Applicants in areas deemed to be higher risk face several weeks additional delay in getting their passports.

In London, the only areas which get virtually no checks are postcodes that begin with WC and EC – the most central and prosperous areas. Meanwhile applications from women aged 50 and over are often waved through.

A source said: “It’s a classic Tory policy, and it discriminates against those they deem to be living in ‘poor’ areas.

“The whole thing smacks of elitism and snobbery. A lot of people are very unhappy with the process.”

These revelations come on the day ousted Border Agency official Brodie Clark gives evidence to MPs on how he was pushed out by Mrs May.

Borders boss Brodie Clark

Labour yesterday released the leaked emails showing UK Border Agency staff were told NOT to check passengers arriving in the UK by private jets – at the instruction of the Home Office.

From March 2, 2011, anyone on a private charter did not have to show their passports and could avoid customs. Figures show there are between 80,000 to 90,000 private flights each year, carrying two to three passengers.

The emails show an unnamed official at Durham Tees Valley Airport warned the UK Border Agency that the policy was putting the UK’s security at risk.

He said that staff “continue to feel uneasy about an instruction that is at odds with national policy and is creating an unnecessary gap in border security which, if exploited by the unscrupulous, could bring the Agency into disrepute”.

He also warned there was no way of checking if the number of people arriving in the country was the same as they had been advised.

His manager at the UK Border Agency’s Border Force said the “no checks policy” was part of a “new national strategy”.

In a further blow to Mrs May, other leaked documents showed how Britain’s borders were abandoned on hundreds of occasions over summer.

The Home Secretary ordered a pilot scheme, which ran from July to October this year, under which Border Agency staff could relax checks on passengers. It meant people arriving from the European Economic Area did not have the biometric chip in their passport checked, while children under 18 could be waved through.

These “level 2 checks” were used on at least 2,600 occasions. The relaxed regime was used to speed up queues at immigration control.

According to an email from a Border Agency Border Force official, the checks were relaxed 100 times in the first week of the trial and more than 260 times in the sixth week.

We revealed last week that officials warned Mrs May the easing of border checks could lead to a rise in child trafficking.

Mrs May admits to bringing in the pilot scheme without informing MPs. But she claims that Mr Clark went further by extending it to include passengers from outside Europe.

Mr Clark, who resigned last week, denies he acted without ministerial authority. His testimony to the Commons select committee could prove very damaging to Mrs May.

Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said last night: “This is startling new information about the scale of the borders fiasco.

“Ten days on there are even more questions than answers about what on earth was going on at our borders.

“Last week the Home Secretary told us no one had been waived through without checks. But these documents show passengers on private flights weren’t even seen.

"Last week the Home Office wouldn’t admit to having figures about how often checks were downgraded. Now we know those figures exist and that checks were downgraded 260 times in one week alone.

“The Home Secretary needs to show she is capable of sorting this fiasco out rather than making it worse.”

Last night, the Home Office refused to comment on the trial.

The UKBA said: “It is not true that we don’t carry out ­passport and warnings checks on private flight passengers and will deploy officers to airfields where we have concerns.”

Read more »

Posted in: private jets waved through customs and immigration checks

I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here! contestant Freddie Starr has been taken to hospital after suffering a severe allergic reaction in the jungle

I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! contestant Freddie Starr has been taken to hospital after suffering a severe allergic reaction in the jungle. According to the Daily Mail, Starr started feeling sick after completing the Greasy Spoon Bushtucker trial with The Only Way Is Essex star Mark Wright and doctors were called to assess the 68-year old's condition. An ITV spokesman has since confirmed the comedian's illness, stating: "Freddie Starr was taken unwell in the jungle. He was immediately attended to by on-site medics and taken to hospital where he was assessed by doctors." They added: "He will remain in hospital overnight as a precaution, and further tests continue. However, Freddie is in great spirits and keeping nursing staff entertained." A show-insider Down Under also explained to the newspaper that Starr's bout of ill-health has nothing to do with his well-documented heart problems, explaining: "Doctors have told us that it’s highly unlikely that what’s happened is related to any pre-existing condition, cardiac or otherwise." "They think he’s had a severe allergic reaction, but they may not be able to pinpoint the cause. The reaction could be due to a spider bite, he might have reacted badly to a leech or a tic, or even a snake he hadn’t noticed." They continued: "He might have reacted badly to the bark of a tree he leant on, or a leaf he touched in passing. Doctors are testing all of these things. The jungle is an alien environment for most of us, but the show is always prepared for all eventualities and this is no exception." "The unpredictability of the jungle is what sets this programme apart from other shows. The element of jeopardy is always there. However, the  celebs are watched 24-hours a day by a huge team of people." The Mail's source added: "There are dozens of cameras on the celebs, as well as 24-hour security in the camp and a huge crew around them. There are also on-site medics around the clock." As for weather the gruesome bug eating task was to blame, the mole claimed: "The foods are all tested on people before they reach the celebrities." "Extreme precautions are taken and bush tucker like the cockroaches are all bred hygienically. It’s unlikely that this is the cause of his reaction, but tests are continuing and we can't rule out anything."

I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! contestant Freddie Starr has been taken to hospital after suffering a severe allergic reaction in the jungle. According to the Daily Mail, Starr started feeling sick after completing the Greasy Spoon Bushtucker trial with The Only Way Is Essex star Mark Wright and doctors were called to assess the 68-year old's condition. An ITV spokesman has since confirmed the comedian's illness, stating: "Freddie Starr was taken unwell in the jungle. He was immediately attended to by on-site medics and taken to hospital where he was assessed by doctors." They added: "He will remain in hospital overnight as a precaution, and further tests continue. However, Freddie is in great spirits and keeping nursing staff entertained." A show-insider Down Under also explained to the newspaper that Starr's bout of ill-health has nothing to do with his well-documented heart problems, explaining: "Doctors have told us that it’s highly unlikely that what’s happened is related to any pre-existing condition, cardiac or otherwise." "They think he’s had a severe allergic reaction, but they may not be able to pinpoint the cause. The reaction could be due to a spider bite, he might have reacted badly to a leech or a tic, or even a snake he hadn’t noticed." They continued: "He might have reacted badly to the bark of a tree he leant on, or a leaf he touched in passing. Doctors are testing all of these things. The jungle is an alien environment for most of us, but the show is always prepared for all eventualities and this is no exception." "The unpredictability of the jungle is what sets this programme apart from other shows. The element of jeopardy is always there. However, the  celebs are watched 24-hours a day by a huge team of people." The Mail's source added: "There are dozens of cameras on the celebs, as well as 24-hour security in the camp and a huge crew around them. There are also on-site medics around the clock." As for weather the gruesome bug eating task was to blame, the mole claimed: "The foods are all tested on people before they reach the celebrities." "Extreme precautions are taken and bush tucker like the cockroaches are all bred hygienically. It’s unlikely that this is the cause of his reaction, but tests are continuing and we can't rule out anything."

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Posted in: show-insider Down Under also explained to the newspaper that Starr's bout of ill-health has nothing to do with his well-documented heart problems

I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here! contestant Freddie Starr has been taken to hospital after suffering a severe allergic reaction in the jungle

I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! contestant Freddie Starr has been taken to hospital after suffering a severe allergic reaction in the jungle. According to the Daily Mail, Starr started feeling sick after completing the Greasy Spoon Bushtucker trial with The Only Way Is Essex star Mark Wright and doctors were called to assess the 68-year old's condition. An ITV spokesman has since confirmed the comedian's illness, stating: "Freddie Starr was taken unwell in the jungle. He was immediately attended to by on-site medics and taken to hospital where he was assessed by doctors." They added: "He will remain in hospital overnight as a precaution, and further tests continue. However, Freddie is in great spirits and keeping nursing staff entertained." A show-insider Down Under also explained to the newspaper that Starr's bout of ill-health has nothing to do with his well-documented heart problems, explaining: "Doctors have told us that it’s highly unlikely that what’s happened is related to any pre-existing condition, cardiac or otherwise." "They think he’s had a severe allergic reaction, but they may not be able to pinpoint the cause. The reaction could be due to a spider bite, he might have reacted badly to a leech or a tic, or even a snake he hadn’t noticed." They continued: "He might have reacted badly to the bark of a tree he leant on, or a leaf he touched in passing. Doctors are testing all of these things. The jungle is an alien environment for most of us, but the show is always prepared for all eventualities and this is no exception." "The unpredictability of the jungle is what sets this programme apart from other shows. The element of jeopardy is always there. However, the  celebs are watched 24-hours a day by a huge team of people." The Mail's source added: "There are dozens of cameras on the celebs, as well as 24-hour security in the camp and a huge crew around them. There are also on-site medics around the clock." As for weather the gruesome bug eating task was to blame, the mole claimed: "The foods are all tested on people before they reach the celebrities." "Extreme precautions are taken and bush tucker like the cockroaches are all bred hygienically. It’s unlikely that this is the cause of his reaction, but tests are continuing and we can't rule out anything."

I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! contestant Freddie Starr has been taken to hospital after suffering a severe allergic reaction in the jungle. According to the Daily Mail, Starr started feeling sick after completing the Greasy Spoon Bushtucker trial with The Only Way Is Essex star Mark Wright and doctors were called to assess the 68-year old's condition. An ITV spokesman has since confirmed the comedian's illness, stating: "Freddie Starr was taken unwell in the jungle. He was immediately attended to by on-site medics and taken to hospital where he was assessed by doctors." They added: "He will remain in hospital overnight as a precaution, and further tests continue. However, Freddie is in great spirits and keeping nursing staff entertained." A show-insider Down Under also explained to the newspaper that Starr's bout of ill-health has nothing to do with his well-documented heart problems, explaining: "Doctors have told us that it’s highly unlikely that what’s happened is related to any pre-existing condition, cardiac or otherwise." "They think he’s had a severe allergic reaction, but they may not be able to pinpoint the cause. The reaction could be due to a spider bite, he might have reacted badly to a leech or a tic, or even a snake he hadn’t noticed." They continued: "He might have reacted badly to the bark of a tree he leant on, or a leaf he touched in passing. Doctors are testing all of these things. The jungle is an alien environment for most of us, but the show is always prepared for all eventualities and this is no exception." "The unpredictability of the jungle is what sets this programme apart from other shows. The element of jeopardy is always there. However, the  celebs are watched 24-hours a day by a huge team of people." The Mail's source added: "There are dozens of cameras on the celebs, as well as 24-hour security in the camp and a huge crew around them. There are also on-site medics around the clock." As for weather the gruesome bug eating task was to blame, the mole claimed: "The foods are all tested on people before they reach the celebrities." "Extreme precautions are taken and bush tucker like the cockroaches are all bred hygienically. It’s unlikely that this is the cause of his reaction, but tests are continuing and we can't rule out anything."

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Posted in: show-insider Down Under also explained to the newspaper that Starr's bout of ill-health has nothing to do with his well-documented heart problems

Phone hacking: the names of nearly 30 News International staff appear in Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks

Phone hacking: the names of nearly 30 News International staff appear in Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks, the Leveson inquiry has heard. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

The names of 28 News International employees appear in notebooks belonging to Glenn Mulcaire, the private investigator who worked for theNews of the World, the Leveson inquiry into press standards heard on its first day at London's high court.

 

Lord Justice Leveson's inquiry also heard that Mulcaire wrote the words "Daily Mirror" in his notepad, which suggests he may have carried out work for the paper.

 

Robert Jay QC, counsel for the inquiry, told the high court that "at least 27 other News International employees" are named in Mulcaire's paperwork, as well as former News of the World royal editor Clive Goodman, who was jailed for phone hacking along with the private investigator in January 2007.

 

Jay also told the inquiry, which began formal hearings at the high court on Monday: "The inquiry is beginning to receive evidence to indicate that phone hacking was not limited to that organisation [News International]."

 

He said the number of News International names and the scale of the activity indicated there was a culture of phone hacking at the company. "Either management knew what was going on at the time and therefore, at the very least, condoned this illegal activity," he said, or there was "a failure of supervision and oversight".

 

Mulcaire received a total of 2,266 requests from News International journalists, Jay said, 2,142 of which were made by four unnamed reporters. The most prolific of them made 1,453 of those requests.

 

A total of 690 audio tapes were also recovered from Mulcaire's office, Jay revealed, and there was a record of 586 recordings of voicemail messages intended for 64 individuals. The evidence was seized by Metropolitan police officers during a raid in 2006.

 

Mulcaire's 11,000 pages of notes mentioned 5,795 names, he confirmed, who could be potential phone-hacking victims.

 

Jay also said the inquiry had seen documents that suggest Mulcaire was hacking into phone messages ago as early as May 2001.

 

It had been thought until today that the earliest phone hacking by Mulcaire occurred in 2002. The new date is potentially significant because it falls before the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

 

It has been alleged that News International instructed private investigators in the US to target relatives of the victims of the 9/11 attacks, although no proof has so far emerged that this took place.

 

The Sun is also named in Mulcaire's notes, Jay said. Jude Law had cited the Sun along with its former sister paper the News of the World in his civil case against News International, although the Sun has since been dropped from his claim.

 

Several public figures are believed to be preparing civil cases against the Daily Mirror, but none have so far come to court.

 

The paper's publisher, Trinity Mirror, continues to insist that its journalists operate within the law and follow the Press Complaints Commission's code of conduct.

 

A Trinity Mirror spokesman said the company has "no knowledge of ever using Glenn Mulcaire".

 

Jay said the Mulcaire notes showed a "thriving cottage industry" and the "scale of activity gives rise to the powerful inference that it must have occupied Mulcaire full time".

 

Outlining the vast remit of the inquiry, Jay described a "root and branch" investigation of the press that would not be cowed by the powerful range of institutions in the media.

 

He said the inquiry would consider granting "protected measures" to whistleblowers who were afraid of criticising their employer or speaking truthfully about press ethics.

 

The inquiry will not be limited to phone hacking, Jay said, adding that Leveson was keen to learn about all "unlawful and unethical" newsgathering methods, including subterfuge and blagging.

 

The former News of the World undercover reporter, Mazher Mahmood, has submitted written evidence and will give oral evidence to the inquiry at a later date, Jay said.

 

Opening the hearing, Leveson said he had "absolutely no wish" to stifle freedom of speech and expression, and that the inquiry would monitor media coverage to see if it appears that anyone who speaks out is being "targeted adversely".

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Posted in: Phone hacking: the names of nearly 30 News International staff appear in Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks

Phone hacking: the names of nearly 30 News International staff appear in Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks

Phone hacking: the names of nearly 30 News International staff appear in Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks, the Leveson inquiry has heard. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

The names of 28 News International employees appear in notebooks belonging to Glenn Mulcaire, the private investigator who worked for theNews of the World, the Leveson inquiry into press standards heard on its first day at London's high court.

 

Lord Justice Leveson's inquiry also heard that Mulcaire wrote the words "Daily Mirror" in his notepad, which suggests he may have carried out work for the paper.

 

Robert Jay QC, counsel for the inquiry, told the high court that "at least 27 other News International employees" are named in Mulcaire's paperwork, as well as former News of the World royal editor Clive Goodman, who was jailed for phone hacking along with the private investigator in January 2007.

 

Jay also told the inquiry, which began formal hearings at the high court on Monday: "The inquiry is beginning to receive evidence to indicate that phone hacking was not limited to that organisation [News International]."

 

He said the number of News International names and the scale of the activity indicated there was a culture of phone hacking at the company. "Either management knew what was going on at the time and therefore, at the very least, condoned this illegal activity," he said, or there was "a failure of supervision and oversight".

 

Mulcaire received a total of 2,266 requests from News International journalists, Jay said, 2,142 of which were made by four unnamed reporters. The most prolific of them made 1,453 of those requests.

 

A total of 690 audio tapes were also recovered from Mulcaire's office, Jay revealed, and there was a record of 586 recordings of voicemail messages intended for 64 individuals. The evidence was seized by Metropolitan police officers during a raid in 2006.

 

Mulcaire's 11,000 pages of notes mentioned 5,795 names, he confirmed, who could be potential phone-hacking victims.

 

Jay also said the inquiry had seen documents that suggest Mulcaire was hacking into phone messages ago as early as May 2001.

 

It had been thought until today that the earliest phone hacking by Mulcaire occurred in 2002. The new date is potentially significant because it falls before the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

 

It has been alleged that News International instructed private investigators in the US to target relatives of the victims of the 9/11 attacks, although no proof has so far emerged that this took place.

 

The Sun is also named in Mulcaire's notes, Jay said. Jude Law had cited the Sun along with its former sister paper the News of the World in his civil case against News International, although the Sun has since been dropped from his claim.

 

Several public figures are believed to be preparing civil cases against the Daily Mirror, but none have so far come to court.

 

The paper's publisher, Trinity Mirror, continues to insist that its journalists operate within the law and follow the Press Complaints Commission's code of conduct.

 

A Trinity Mirror spokesman said the company has "no knowledge of ever using Glenn Mulcaire".

 

Jay said the Mulcaire notes showed a "thriving cottage industry" and the "scale of activity gives rise to the powerful inference that it must have occupied Mulcaire full time".

 

Outlining the vast remit of the inquiry, Jay described a "root and branch" investigation of the press that would not be cowed by the powerful range of institutions in the media.

 

He said the inquiry would consider granting "protected measures" to whistleblowers who were afraid of criticising their employer or speaking truthfully about press ethics.

 

The inquiry will not be limited to phone hacking, Jay said, adding that Leveson was keen to learn about all "unlawful and unethical" newsgathering methods, including subterfuge and blagging.

 

The former News of the World undercover reporter, Mazher Mahmood, has submitted written evidence and will give oral evidence to the inquiry at a later date, Jay said.

 

Opening the hearing, Leveson said he had "absolutely no wish" to stifle freedom of speech and expression, and that the inquiry would monitor media coverage to see if it appears that anyone who speaks out is being "targeted adversely".

Read more »

Posted in: Phone hacking: the names of nearly 30 News International staff appear in Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks

THE mother of missing Madeleine McCann said yesterday she still wished she could “stop time”.

03:44 | THE mother of missing Madeleine McCann said yesterday she still wished she could “stop time”.

 

Poignant: Kate McCann

 

Kate McCann, who marked the fourth anniversary of Maddy’s disappearance in May, said she and husband Gerry would not give up on finding their little girl.

In a poignant message on the Maddy search website, she wrote: “My grandparents always said the years pass more quickly the older you get. It certainly feels that way. I still dream of being able to stop time.

“Our only alternative however is to continue doing as much as we can to the best of our ability to enhance the search for Madeleine. So that is what we’ll do.”

She added: “It is a big relief that our Government finally agreed to a review. It will be lengthy and difficult but definitely a major step.”

Maddy was nearly four when she vanished from her family’s holiday flat in Praia da Luz, Portugal, in 2007.

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Posted in: THE mother of missing Madeleine McCann said yesterday she still wished she could “stop time”.

Rio de Janeiro’s most wanted drugs baron who controlled the drug trade in South America’s biggest favela with fear and intimidation for 30 years has been arrested

Rio de Janeiro’s most wanted drugs baron who controlled the drug trade in South America’s biggest favela with fear and intimidation for 30 years has been arrested after a high risk undercover police operation.  Photo: AP

Antonio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, known as Nem, was captured after being discovered hiding in the boot of a car stopped at a roadblock, as police surrounded the sprawling Rocinha shanty-town in an attempt finally to wrest back control of the area.

Pictures showed Lopes, 35, looking anguished in handcuffs as he was led to an armoured vehicle by heavily-armed police following his arrest at around midnight on Wednesday.

Brazilian police said the man driving the car had claimed to be a Congolese diplomat in an attempt to avoid the vehicle being searched before the occupants offered a bribe of one million Brazilian reais (£357,000) for police to let them go.

Residents of Rocinha and wealthy neighbouring districts alike were gripped by fear amid concerns that the operation could lead to open street battles between police and criminal gangs armed with machine guns, assault rifles and grenades.

Twelve families were reportedly forced from their houses in the night by gang members who wanted to use them as hideouts, while children who attend schools in the area were being excused from lessons.

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Posted in: Rio de Janeiro’s most wanted drugs baron who controlled the drug trade in South America’s biggest favela with fear and intimidation for 30 years has been arrested

Wife of murdered Liverpool gangster Colin Smith appeals for information four years on

 

THE wife of a Liverpool gangster who was shot dead outside a gym four years ago today called for his killers to be brought to justice. Caroline Smith made a public appeal for information on the anniversary of the death of husband and dad-of-six Colin Smith. He was gunned down as he left Nel’s Gym, in Alderwood Road, Speke, on Tuesday November 13, 2007. Caroline, who was with her husband for 13 years and had four sons aged between seven and 12 with him, said: “It has been four years since Colin was murdered and I cannot rest until the people who carried out this cowardly attack on my husband are caught and put before the courts. “I am convinced there are people out there who know who killed Colin and I cannot understand how they can stand by and say nothing. They are as cowardly as the person who pulled the trigger. “Our worlds were turned upside down the night Colin was killed and I ask anyone who has any information which could lead to the arrest of those responsible to contact the police, so we as a family can find some closure.” On the night of his death, 40-year-old Mr Smith, a passionate Evertonian, took his eldest son to football training. Police believe he was “lured” to the gym, in Alderwood Avenue, for the attack. As he left the gym at about 8pm to return to his black Ford Galaxy car, he was shot twice at close-range in the stomach. It was believed to be a gangland hit. Officers today appealed to anyone who was in the area at the time who may have seen anything which could help inquiries to come forward.

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Posted in: Wife of murdered Liverpool gangster Colin Smith appeals for information four years on

Wife of murdered Liverpool gangster Colin Smith appeals for information four years on

 

THE wife of a Liverpool gangster who was shot dead outside a gym four years ago today called for his killers to be brought to justice. Caroline Smith made a public appeal for information on the anniversary of the death of husband and dad-of-six Colin Smith. He was gunned down as he left Nel’s Gym, in Alderwood Road, Speke, on Tuesday November 13, 2007. Caroline, who was with her husband for 13 years and had four sons aged between seven and 12 with him, said: “It has been four years since Colin was murdered and I cannot rest until the people who carried out this cowardly attack on my husband are caught and put before the courts. “I am convinced there are people out there who know who killed Colin and I cannot understand how they can stand by and say nothing. They are as cowardly as the person who pulled the trigger. “Our worlds were turned upside down the night Colin was killed and I ask anyone who has any information which could lead to the arrest of those responsible to contact the police, so we as a family can find some closure.” On the night of his death, 40-year-old Mr Smith, a passionate Evertonian, took his eldest son to football training. Police believe he was “lured” to the gym, in Alderwood Avenue, for the attack. As he left the gym at about 8pm to return to his black Ford Galaxy car, he was shot twice at close-range in the stomach. It was believed to be a gangland hit. Officers today appealed to anyone who was in the area at the time who may have seen anything which could help inquiries to come forward.

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Posted in: Wife of murdered Liverpool gangster Colin Smith appeals for information four years on

UK border checks are 'a bad joke', whistleblower claims

 

Under-pressure staff are said to be relying on false data and "massaging" official figures to mask the full extent of the immigration chaos at Britain's borders. The whistleblower, a middle manager who does not want to be identified, said UKBA staff lack the resources to track down asylum seekers. As a result, it is claimed, complicated immigration cases are being abandoned to save time, while detention centres employ a "one in, one out" policy that sees low-risk detainees released to allow more dangerous foreigners to be locked up. The whistleblower said British border checks had become "haphazard" and "a bad joke". "The whole place is a basket case," he told The Sunday Times (£). "Asylum seekers run rings around us and we are virtually powerless to do anything about it. It is depressing."

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Posted in: UK border checks are 'a bad joke',whistleblower claims

UK border checks are 'a bad joke', whistleblower claims

 

Under-pressure staff are said to be relying on false data and "massaging" official figures to mask the full extent of the immigration chaos at Britain's borders. The whistleblower, a middle manager who does not want to be identified, said UKBA staff lack the resources to track down asylum seekers. As a result, it is claimed, complicated immigration cases are being abandoned to save time, while detention centres employ a "one in, one out" policy that sees low-risk detainees released to allow more dangerous foreigners to be locked up. The whistleblower said British border checks had become "haphazard" and "a bad joke". "The whole place is a basket case," he told The Sunday Times (£). "Asylum seekers run rings around us and we are virtually powerless to do anything about it. It is depressing."

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Posted in: UK border checks are 'a bad joke',whistleblower claims

Ex-policeman jailed over VAT fraud

 

former police officer who admitted his part in a £365 million VAT fraud has been jailed for 10 years and three months. The conspiracy that Nigel Cranswick directed has taken the equivalent of 25 years of work to investigate, Judge Brian Forster said. The 47-year-old ex-South Yorkshire Police officer was a director of Ideas 2 Go, and, despite its modest base in a Sheffield business park, he claimed it bought and sold £2 billion worth of goods in just eight months. He has since admitted that the firm's trading, largely in mobile phones and computer software, was fictitious, and the aim was to generate paperwork from fake sales in order to claim back a fortune in VAT from HM Revenue and Customs. Judge Forster, sitting at Newcastle Crown Court, said: "This case concerned planned dishonesty resulting in the loss to the Revenue in the region of £365 million. "There were purported sales of billions of pounds. "The prosecution rightly described the case as an unprecedented attack on the Revenue. "The case has taken 25 man-years to investigate." Cranswick was recruited to play his role in the MTIC (missing Trader intra-community) fraud by others. Also known as carousel fraud, it involves importing goods from other EU states which are then sold through contrived business-to-business transactions. Cranswick, of Danby Road, Kiveton, Sheffield, admitted conspiracy to cheat HMRC at a hearing last month. After the sentencing, Exchequer Secretary David Gauke said: "This Government will not tolerate dishonest people stealing public money. "This sentence shows that those who try to commit fraud need to think again - HMRC will find you and the courts will punish you. "The additional £917m we have invested in HMRC will see more cases like this successfully prosecuted, sending a clear and powerful message." The judge said the sentencing exercise was to punish the offending and deter others. "The figures in this case are astonishing, they reveal the blatant nature of the fraud," he said. Between June 2005 and February 2006, I2G supposedly carried out almost 6,000 deals, with a turnover of £2.4 billion. Sentencing Cranswick, the judge said: "You were immediately before this fraud a serving police officer. Almost unbelievably you retired from the police force and became the organiser of this fraudulent operation. "You set up the company, you clearly accepted the direction of others - the organisers who are not before this court." Outside court, HMRC said Cranswick went "from rags to riches" soon after retiring, having been heavily in debt as a police officer. A spokeswoman said: "He made lavish improvements to his home, rented a luxury apartment in the Spanish town of Marbella and paid for private schooling and tennis lessons for his children. "Cranswick claimed that in the first six weeks of trading Ideas 2 Go had turned over more than £527 million. "The company had traded over £47 million before they even got round to opening a bank account for the business." HMRC assistant director for criminal investigation Paul Rooney said: "As a police officer Cranswick knew full well that he was breaking the law, yet, motivated by greed, he chose to overlook it for the opportunity of making what he wrongly assumed would be easy money. "He now has to pay a very high price for his poor judgment and lack of integrity. "This was a sophisticated fraud designed to steal hundreds of millions of pounds of tax, but it started to unravel when our investigations identified sales for more than 50,000 mobile phones, which the manufacturers hadn't even begun producing in their factories." Cranswick nodded as the judge passed sentence, and gestured to members of his family in the public gallery as he was led away. Also sentenced after admitting conspiracy to cheat the Revenue were Thomas Murphy, 27, of Dinnington, who was jailed for four and a half years; Cranswick's brother-in-law, Darren Smyth, 42, from Beech Road, Maltby, and Brian Olive, 56, from Buttermere Close, Doncaster, who were sentenced to three years and four months each; and former housing officer Andrew Marsh, 28, from Sheffield, who was jailed for two years and eight months. Cranswick's 44-year-old sister, Clare Reid, married to Smyth, was handed a nine-month sentence, suspended for 18 months, and ordered to carry out 150 hours of unpaid work after admitting two counts of false accounting. Cranswick styled himself as a singer-songwriter and can be seen on his website strumming a guitar to a song called Hit And Miss with the opening lines: "I'm in trouble, falling down a hole. How I got here, I won't ever know." He was lead singer with an indie band called Not The Police.

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Posted in: Ex-policeman jailed over VAT fraud

Ex-policeman jailed over VAT fraud

 

former police officer who admitted his part in a £365 million VAT fraud has been jailed for 10 years and three months. The conspiracy that Nigel Cranswick directed has taken the equivalent of 25 years of work to investigate, Judge Brian Forster said. The 47-year-old ex-South Yorkshire Police officer was a director of Ideas 2 Go, and, despite its modest base in a Sheffield business park, he claimed it bought and sold £2 billion worth of goods in just eight months. He has since admitted that the firm's trading, largely in mobile phones and computer software, was fictitious, and the aim was to generate paperwork from fake sales in order to claim back a fortune in VAT from HM Revenue and Customs. Judge Forster, sitting at Newcastle Crown Court, said: "This case concerned planned dishonesty resulting in the loss to the Revenue in the region of £365 million. "There were purported sales of billions of pounds. "The prosecution rightly described the case as an unprecedented attack on the Revenue. "The case has taken 25 man-years to investigate." Cranswick was recruited to play his role in the MTIC (missing Trader intra-community) fraud by others. Also known as carousel fraud, it involves importing goods from other EU states which are then sold through contrived business-to-business transactions. Cranswick, of Danby Road, Kiveton, Sheffield, admitted conspiracy to cheat HMRC at a hearing last month. After the sentencing, Exchequer Secretary David Gauke said: "This Government will not tolerate dishonest people stealing public money. "This sentence shows that those who try to commit fraud need to think again - HMRC will find you and the courts will punish you. "The additional £917m we have invested in HMRC will see more cases like this successfully prosecuted, sending a clear and powerful message." The judge said the sentencing exercise was to punish the offending and deter others. "The figures in this case are astonishing, they reveal the blatant nature of the fraud," he said. Between June 2005 and February 2006, I2G supposedly carried out almost 6,000 deals, with a turnover of £2.4 billion. Sentencing Cranswick, the judge said: "You were immediately before this fraud a serving police officer. Almost unbelievably you retired from the police force and became the organiser of this fraudulent operation. "You set up the company, you clearly accepted the direction of others - the organisers who are not before this court." Outside court, HMRC said Cranswick went "from rags to riches" soon after retiring, having been heavily in debt as a police officer. A spokeswoman said: "He made lavish improvements to his home, rented a luxury apartment in the Spanish town of Marbella and paid for private schooling and tennis lessons for his children. "Cranswick claimed that in the first six weeks of trading Ideas 2 Go had turned over more than £527 million. "The company had traded over £47 million before they even got round to opening a bank account for the business." HMRC assistant director for criminal investigation Paul Rooney said: "As a police officer Cranswick knew full well that he was breaking the law, yet, motivated by greed, he chose to overlook it for the opportunity of making what he wrongly assumed would be easy money. "He now has to pay a very high price for his poor judgment and lack of integrity. "This was a sophisticated fraud designed to steal hundreds of millions of pounds of tax, but it started to unravel when our investigations identified sales for more than 50,000 mobile phones, which the manufacturers hadn't even begun producing in their factories." Cranswick nodded as the judge passed sentence, and gestured to members of his family in the public gallery as he was led away. Also sentenced after admitting conspiracy to cheat the Revenue were Thomas Murphy, 27, of Dinnington, who was jailed for four and a half years; Cranswick's brother-in-law, Darren Smyth, 42, from Beech Road, Maltby, and Brian Olive, 56, from Buttermere Close, Doncaster, who were sentenced to three years and four months each; and former housing officer Andrew Marsh, 28, from Sheffield, who was jailed for two years and eight months. Cranswick's 44-year-old sister, Clare Reid, married to Smyth, was handed a nine-month sentence, suspended for 18 months, and ordered to carry out 150 hours of unpaid work after admitting two counts of false accounting. Cranswick styled himself as a singer-songwriter and can be seen on his website strumming a guitar to a song called Hit And Miss with the opening lines: "I'm in trouble, falling down a hole. How I got here, I won't ever know." He was lead singer with an indie band called Not The Police.

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Posted in: Ex-policeman jailed over VAT fraud

How a Financial Pro Lost His House

 

ONE night a few years ago, when the value of our home had collapsed, our debt was out of control and my financial planning business was shaky, I went to take out the trash. He wrote a book based in part on lessons learned by losing his Las Vegas home in the housing crisis. There was this enormous window that looked right in on the kitchen table, and through it I could see my wife, Cori, and our four children eating dinner. It was dark outside, so they couldn’t see me, and I just stood there looking at them. After a while, I pulled up a bucket and I sat on it, just watching my children eat. I found myself wishing that I could get back there, connected to the simple ordinary stuff of my family’s life. And as I sat and watched, filled with longing and guilt, two questions kept arising: How did I get here? And how am I going to get out of this? There are many stories these days of people who lost their financial bearings during the housing boom and the crisis that followed, but my story is a bit different from most. I’m a financial adviser. I get paid to help people make smart financial choices, and I speak and write about personal finance issues for this publication and others. My first book comes out in January, “The Behavior Gap: Simple Ways to Stop Doing Dumb Things With Money” (Portfolio, a Penguin imprint). The thing that few people know, though, is that I learned a lot of this from experience. I made a bunch of mistakes, the very same ones that I now go around warning people to avoid. So this is the story of how I lost my home, the profound ethical questions that arose along the way, and what my wife and I learned from the mistakes that led us to that point. It made me better at what I do, but it wasn’t much fun getting there. Like most financial stories, this one is personal. It starts with me getting into the financial services industry more or less by accident. I answered an ad in 1995 that I thought was for a job related to “security” (as in security guard) but was in fact related to “securities.” That’s how little I knew about the stock market. A few months later I found myself working a phone at a Fidelity Investments call center. Things went well, and by 1999 I was a Merrill Lynch financial adviser and a certified financial planner. By then, we also owned a house in Salt Lake City. We’d bought it two years earlier, with a $25,000 down payment. A few years later, an opportunity arose to form a partnership with a successful Merrill adviser in Las Vegas. The place was on our top 10 list of never-move-to cities because we had always associated it with the Strip. But Cori and I were looking for an opportunity to have an experience somewhere else, and we met some great people when we visited the city. I took the job, and we moved down there. That was May 2003. Housing prices were already crazy, so we rented. But our neighborhood had zero character and lots of cookie-cutter houses. Within a few weeks, we were looking for a place to buy. I felt we could afford around $350,000. We called a real estate agent named Mitch, who had signs on all the bus stops: Talk to Mitch! He picked us up in a gold Jaguar, and suddenly we were looking at houses that listed at $500,000 or more. It felt a little crazy to be shopping for houses that cost half a million dollars, but my income was growing rapidly. Everywhere I looked, people were being rewarded for buying as much house as they could possibly afford, and then some. There was this excitement in the air, almost like static. I started to think that if I didn’t buy a house right then, I would never be able to afford one. At moments during our house hunt, I felt in my gut that something wasn’t right. We’d go to open houses for $400,000 homes and see lines of couples in their late 20s — younger than we were — waiting to get inside. I kept wondering where all the money was coming from. How did all these people make so much?

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Posted in: How a Financial Pro Lost His House