Two a penny

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Lawyer on fraud charges

By – Sunday, 07 December 2008

An Aucklandbarrister is facing 29 fraud-related charges, including accessing the Law Society's website to renew his practising certificate and falsifying legal aid applications to earn close toly $3000. .
Police say he also ran up a bill of close to $2200 on a friend's credit card. Lawyers are required to renew their licences each year. There was also a $90 haircut. He allegedly spent up large on TradeMe, Woolworths, Noel Leeming and adult entertainment online shopping websites buying groceries, an iPod, pornography and pizza.
One of the alleged TradeMe victims told the Sunday Star-Times he paid Flewitt for a $350 hand-held computer that never arrived.
He is alleged to have falsified a tenancy agreement, stolen petrol from two service stations and ripped off two users of the online auction site TradeMe.
The barrister told the Star-Times most of the allegations came about because he had used his former partner's credit card and she then told police he was not authorised to do so.
TradeMe's commercial and regulatory head Mike O'Donnell said the company was working closely with police to build a case against Flewitt. The police allegations were misleading, he said. He said he had used his partner's credit card to renew his practising certificate online in the past and it had not previously been a problem.
The charges were "disastrous" and "devastating" for him. The charges would be defended.
A spokesperson for the Legal Services Agency declined to comment on the allegations of fraudulent legal aid applications, saying the matter was before the courts. He said he realised he would not be able to practice law unless he was cleared. The allegations relate to three legal aid payment applications in May and one in June.
However, the agency's records show Flewitt received $7392 in legal aid payments last year.

. Police say the applications earned him at least $2200

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Minister sinks varsity fee bid

Thursday, 27 November 2008

Education Minister Anne Tolley has rejected an attempt by universities to seize control of student fees, and is asking them to tighten their belts.
According to a proposal released yesterday, the New Zealand Vice-Chancellors' Committee wants the Government to raise its funding of $1. .149 billion by $230 million a year.
"We have five law schools. "It's nonsense for the Government to be controlling fees."
Victoria University Vice-Chancellor Pat Walsh said they believed they would set student fees responsibly, so fears that "we're going to be gouging outrageous fees out of students would not be warranted". Those students should be paying a hell of a lot more than people who are going to do a history degree, as a result of the difference in lifetime earnings.
"We don't want the fees to go up at all.
The National Government had inherited a policy which prevented fees rising by more than five per cent a year, a policy Ms Tolley said she would not change.
But the Government would look at ways to trim red tape to find more money for universities before the next Budget. They're going to have to cut their costs really," she said. Any funds we can release . "We believe the bureaucracy is too great…"
Mr Fletcher said because universities were putting off maintenance on their buildings, they risked losing students and teaching staff to "across the ditch". we'll certainly put back into frontline services as soon as we can. I mean it's Dickensian.
"You go into the Auckland medical school building and have a look."
Derek McCormack, Auckland University of Technology's vice-chancellor, said the present situation was untenable "when the Government says it cannot fund any more and it won't allow students to pay higher fees. It is an absolute disgrace."
Ms Tolley said the vice-chancellors' committee's report was a starting point for talks early next year. You can't shut both doors and expect universities to maintain their standards…. to look at ways of paring back some of the compliance costs which put economic pressure on those institutions."

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Bold crime fighting initiative

By MICHAEL FOX – Monday, 24 November 2008

WRIT LARGE: Police have hailed a business owner’s use of a billboard to track down a thief as a great example of the police and the community working together.

Police are appealing for help from the public tofind a man accused of stealing$5000 worth of transformers from an Auckland business.
Police said the owner of the transformers had taken the matter into his own hands and published the man's picture on billboards throughout the city in an attempt to identify him.
The man is believed to have stolen 15 transformers attached to a neon sign in Auckland's CBD.
Sergeant Roy Simpson said a witness to the theft had taken the photos and supplied them to police.
He is also offering a $500 reward for information.
"This is a classic example of how the community and police can, and do, work together to detect and resolve crime.
"The photographer has been able to provide excellent evidence and it's only a matter of time before the man in the photo is identified," he said.

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Police have asked anyone with information to contact them on 09 302 6483

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‘Socialist Left factions in dire straits in Paris’

‘Grassroots militants pick S&eacutegol&egravene Royal – again’

France’s opposition Socialists vote Thursday for a new leader after a fierce contest laid bare deep divisions and threatened to scuttle their chances of building a challenge to President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Former presidential candidate Segolene Royal is putting her political survival on the line as she squares off against rivals Martine Aubry, the architect of France’s 35-hour work week, and leftist Euro-MP Benoit Hamon.

The stakes are high for France’s main opposition party.

The vote by the party’s 233,000 members — which could head into a runoff on Friday — comes on the heels of a party congress that ended in disarray at the weekend after delegates failed to agree on a consensus candidate.

Royal, 55, on Wednesday complained she should have been annointed leader after her manifesto for the party’s renewal came out first in a vote by the rank-and-file this month, beating out those of five other contenders.

After three consecutive defeats in presidential elections, the Socialists have been bogged down in internal squabbling and unable to score any points off Sarkozy since he took office last year. That’s the rule.

They should have united behind the programme that won the first place. . But because it was me and a new generation, they refused to abide by it, Royal said in an interview to Le Monde newspaper… That is my strength and this also unsettles some people. I have a special connection with the people.

Critics accuse her of wanting to transform the Socialist Party into her own personal electoral machine for the 2012 vote.

Royal, the president of the Poitou-Charente regional council, won the party’s nomination for the 2007 vote, but she has since lost support after waging a campaign in which she often brushed aside party dogma. The Socialists are not scheduled to nominate their presidential candidate before 2011.

They contend the party should be a forum of ideas to formulate alternative policies to those of the right-wing government.

Delanoe on Monday announced that he was backing Aubry, 58, the daughter of former European Commission president Jacques Delors, touching off a fresh round of mudslinging.

Party members are choosing a successor to Francois Hollande, Royal’s former partner and father of her four children, who sided with Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe during the leadership battle.

Royal, who was at times jeered and booed at the party congress, has promised to open debate on forming an alliance with centrists to defeat Sarkozy in 2012.

Hamon, a 41-year-old rising star in the party, lamented that the Socialists were creating the impression of being angrier at other Socialists than against the right.

The infighting has left most commentators wondering whether the party of late president Francois Mitterrand can overcome its divisions and become a governing force in time for 2012.

But both Aubry and Hamon maintain that the global financial crisis has vindicated their view that a clear leftist approach is needed, in favour of strong state intervention and social programmes.

Bertrand Delanoë – French politics – Martine Aubry – Ségolène Royal
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Bertrand Delanoë – French politics – Martine Aubry – Ségolène Royal

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A French appeal court overturned Monday a ruling that annulled the marriage of a Muslim couple after the husband discovered his bride was not a virgin, the husband’s lawyer said.

Public outrage at April’s annulment ruling forced the government to order the case be reviewed, against the wishes of both spouses. .

This ruling is very worrying, the groom’s lawyer Xavier Labbee said after Monday’s decision by a court in the northern town of Douai, adding: Our individual liberties are seriously threatened.

His wife, who admitted to him she had had pre-marital sex, said she accepted the annulment.

State prosecutors had said they were not against allowing the split if it were possible to replace the discriminatory motive of loss of virginity with a more general one, such as mistaken identity.

Lawyers for both parties had requested at a hearing in September that the annulment be maintained.

The court in the northern city of Lille that granted the initial annulment did not mention the couple’s religion but said the man’s belief in the woman’s virginity was a determining factor in his decision to marry her.

The ruling drew furious protests from rights groups, who slammed it as a victory for religious fundamentalists and a blow to the emancipation of women that set a dangerous legal precedent.

It said he had been misled about an essential quality of his bride-to-be.

Dati finally ordered an appeal in the face of a wall of protest, but she continued to insist the ruling was legally sound, based on a breach of trust between the pair, not the issue of virginity itself.

Some 150 European parliament members wrote to France’s Muslim-born justice minister, Rachida Dati, denouncing it as an unacceptable encroachment of religion in the public sphere.

Marriage – Muslim
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The justice minister also warned the case should not be used to stigmatise France’s five-million-strong Muslim community, Europe’s largest

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‘Socialist Left factions in dire straits in Paris’

‘Grassroots militants pick S&eacutegol&egravene Royal – again’

Paris mayor Betrand Delano&euml has called Socialist party militants to vote for his rival Martine Aubry during Thursday election to choose the party new leader. On Sunday, the race former front runner had announced he was stepping down, but withheld from giving his supporters voting instructions, a sure sign the bitter climate that plagued the weekend negotiations between himself and the former employment minister. He claims that the very identity of the Socialist party is at stake, adding that militants have a huge responsibility to elect the right person.

In a letter addressed to all socialist militants in the aftermath of the party annual congress in Reims, Delano&euml wrote that he had made up his mind to support Aubry candidacy and called to vote massively in her favour. 6, Bertrand Delano&euml proposed motion came in second, behind that led by former presidential candidate S&eacutegol&egravene Royal.

When party members first voted on Nov.

Despite her relative popularity among grassroots militants, Royal is detested by other leading figures in the party and found herself isolated after the initial vote. The motion led by Lille mayor Martine Aubry came in a close third.

Bertrand Delanoë – French politics – Martine Aubry
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Also read : Week of strikes set to disturb public services

By Air

Air France pilots are on strike from 12am (00h) on Friday Nov. 14 to 12pm (24h) on Monday Nov.

Between 65% and 70% of international flights departing from Paris are expected to operate normally on Monday. 17 to protest the extension of their profession legal retirement age from 60 to 65.airfrance. To check if your flight is maintained or cancelled, see www. Cancelled flights are usually reported the day before their scheduled date at 8pm, but there are risks of surprise cancellations at the last minute.fr section Book online/ Flight status .
Strike N.

A special Air France information number is available for additional information:
From France: 0800 240260
From overseas: +33157 02 10 55

By Rail

Two consecutive strikes will disrupt service at the SNCF, France national railway company, with 7 out of 8 railway unions mobilized against plans to increase the maximum number of consecutive driving hours and night shifts. 18 at 8pm, lasts 48 hours
Strike N. 1: begins Tuesday Nov. 23 at 8pm, duration not specified

The percentage of cancelled or delayed trains has not been specified yet. 2 : begins Sunday, Nov. . For more information, or to confirm if a specific train has been cancelled or maintained, consult the SNCF traffic information site InfoLignes .com .transilien. Follow them’s coverage tomorrow for live updates.
Union leaders have announced that the strikes may be postponed or cancelled if negotiations currently underway give workers satisfactory guarantees. However, dense traffic jams can be foreseen in Paris and most major cities as tens of thousands of protesting civil servants are expected to march on Thursday 20th (state school teacher strike) and Saturday 22nd (post office worker strike).

By Road

No disturbances are expected along France highway network.Covoiturage.

If your inter-city train has been cancelled, check out some of these car-sharing sites to catch a ride with drivers heading the same way as you : www.Covoiturage.Covoiturage.com , www.123envoiture.fr .

Schools

School children can expect a day off on Thursday as teachers demonstrate against planned job cuts in most major French cities. A recent law makes it compulsory for schools to at least take in and look after pupils whose parents cannot find alternative day-care solutions, but not all towns have implemented the practice. Check with your child school before turning to one of several existing baby-sitting sites : http://www.yoopala.com/ , http://www.123babysitter.com/ .

Other strikes

Postal workers, unemployment bureau (ANPE) officers, telecom workers and public television journalists will also be on strike on Saturday, and should take part in protests against a wide array of President Sarkozy’s reforms in Paris and other major cities.

Airfrance – Strike – train – Working in France

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Air NZ flight in emergency landing

Manawatu Standard Monday, 17 November 2008

JONATHAN CAMERON/Manawatu Standard
DISRUPTION: An Air New Zealand flight was forced to make an emergency landing at Palmerston North airport after an engine failed 10 minutes into a flight.

An Air New Zealand flight was forced to make an emergency landing at Palmerston North airport after an engine failed 10 minutes into a flight.
The Q300 plane, which had33 passengers onboard, was flying from Napier to Wellington when one of the propeller engines malfunctioned just before midday.
Passenger Mike Rodgers, of Gore, heard a bang when the engine shut down and saw oil seeping from the propeller.
The pilot shut the engine down and flew to Palmerston North with a single engine.
Fire fighters and St John ambulance crews were called to the airport but were not needed.
No passengers were injured but a few were shaken by the experience, he said.
Palmerston North airport operations manager Roy Bodell said the passengers had alternative travel arrangements made by Air New Zealand.

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France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy urged Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev Friday not to deploy missiles on Europe’s border, promising to support his call for a new continental security treaty.

Moscow has reacted with fury to US plans to expand a missile defence system into Eastern Europe, seeing it as an attempt to gain the strategic upper hand, and has announced a plan to respond with new weapons of its own.

Medvedev, already at odds with the West over August’s war in Georgia, has threatened to deploy medium-range Iskander missiles in Russia’s Kaliningrad region that could strike targets across northern and eastern Europe.

I told President Medvedev how much we are concerned about his declarations, and how there should be no deployment in any enclave as long as we have not discussed the new geopolitical conditions of pan-European security, he said.

Speaking after an EU-Russia summit in Nice, Sarkozy said he had tried to assuage Russian anger by giving his backing to Medvedev’s desire to renegotiate the security agreements governing Europe since the end of the Cold War.

I propose that in mid-2009 we meet in a framework, which could be the OSCE, to lay the foundations of what could be Europe’s future security, he said, urging Moscow to refrain from unilateral measures.

Sarkozy said he would bring up the missile question at a NATO summit in April and called for a security summit with Russia under the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

It would not be a conclusive summit, but we could lay the foundations of what could be an accord between us, Sarkozy said.

Medvedev welcomed the idea of security talks, but was far from mollified.

Until then we should not talk about missile deployments which lead to nothing for security, which complicate things and rather make things go backwards, he said, standing alongside Medvedev.

Russia’s move was a response to various nations in Europe who, without consulting anyone, agreed to deploy new weapons on their soil, he said. Rather than standing down his missile threat, he insisted that it had come in response to unilateral decisions by US allies in Europe.

Washington insists its system is a defensive project designed to intercept missiles fired by so-called rogue states — such as Iran — while Moscow regards it as an attempt to undermine its strategic deterrent. Poland and the Czech Republic have agreed to host elements of the US missile shield.

Friday’s summit, which included talks on Europe and Russia’s plans to deal with the global economic crisis, also underlined tensions over the situation in Georgia, where Russian troops are deployed in two breakaway regions. .

I had an opportunity to say to Mr Medvedev that there needs to be progress on the retreat of Russian forces in two particular parts of Ossetia, I’m thinking of Akhalgori and Perevi, outside South Ossetia, he said.

But the French leader also called on Medvedev to complete the pull-out from a village in a district on the outskirts of the South Ossetia, which Russia regards as independent and Georgia as illegally occupied territory.

Under the terms of a ceasefire brokered by Sarkozy in August, Russian forces were supposed to return to their previous positions.

Medvedev reiterated Moscow’s support for the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, a second Russian-occupied Georgian region.

European Union – missile shield – Russia
. Tbilisi insists that this has not happened and Europe has called for further withdrawals

.Final preparations are taking place in Europe for commemorations to mark the 90th anniversary of the end of World War I. .
Ms Bryce met Mr Sarkozy in Paris a short while ago.
There will also be ceremonies in Paris, London and many small communities throughout Europe including Villiers Brettoneux at the Australian memorial in northern France.
She will be in Verdun for the main service along with leaders from many other countries.
Meanwhile, Veterans’ Affairs Minister Alan Griffin will mark Remembrance Day by reading the ode at Ypres in Belgium.
Several thousand people are expected at the war cemetery for the anniversary of the end of the Great War.
“It was a place where there were a number of extremely bloody battles where Australians lost many lives,” he said.”

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“It was also the scene of one of the signature battles of World War I, Passchendaele, which really encapsulated the mud and the horror of what occurred during that war