Two a penny

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Southland celebrated a “once in a lifetime” Ranfurly Shield win in style in Invercargill on Tuesday with thousands turning out for the traditional tickertape parade.

The Stags players were rapturously received as fans crowded both sides of the main street.

A weekend of partying flowed into the formalities as the heroes were feted in the deep south.

Southland won the famous Log o’ Wood for the first time in 50 years last Thursday night when they upset holders Canterbury 9-3 in Christchurch. There are a lot of people here, it’s great for the community,” Southland co-coach Dave Henderson told Radio Sport from the back of one of the floats involved in the parade.

“She’s pretty exciting. Once you do these sorts of things .

“There are 50 years of players that have gone through before us – 30 or 40 challenges have come up with nothing…. this might only happen once in a lifetime . you have to celebrate them in a bit of style which we are doing today..Then to see them turn up at the airport the next day and now to see thousands here cheering us on, it’s quite emotional for some of the guys.

“It was such a thrill to see the faces of the fans at the game with the support we got up there in Christchurch.

The challenge for Southland now is to stay on track in the Air New Zealand Cup where last week’s win had taken them into the semfinals.”

Henderson admitted it had been a long weekend full of partying.

Henderson said the team had trained well on Monday and would face a big hitout on Wednesday. . We have focused on celebrating the Ranfurly Shield but we have also focused on the next Saturday in Wellington because we want to go the next step,” said Henderson.

“I don’t think some of the boys remember arriving back at the airport.

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Seven years after starting work as a furniture mover for a US bedding company, Gary Nisbet was joined by a new colleague, Randy Joubert, who looked so much like him that customers asked if they were brothers.

“We thought they were just trying to razz us,” Joubert said. They really are brothers – and the attention they got after finding each other has alsoturned up a sister. .

“This kid could have been anywhere in the world, and here I am riding in a Dow furniture truck with him,” Joubert said.

The two men were given up for adoption as babies about 35 years ago, then attended rival high schools and even lived in neighbouring towns on the Maine coast before working together at Dow’s Sleep Centre in tiny Waldoboro and uncovering their relationship. She said he knew from a young age he was adopted and she wasn’t surprised he would try to find his biological siblings when he grew up.

Joubert’s adoptive mother, Jacqueline, said she and her late husband raised him with four sisters.

“But when he said he was driving a furniture truck with him, that really surprised me,” she said.

She said she always thought he had a brother because a social worker at the time of his adoption had mentioned it.”

Dow’s hired Randy Joubert on July 7, and soon afterward co-workers began commenting on how similar he and Nisbet looked. “I think it’s great. Their goatees and curled-brim baseball caps add to the effect. Both are light-haired, wear glasses and have stocky builds. He started taking the comments more seriously when people also took notice while he and Nisbet, 35, were out making deliveries.

Joubert, 36, laughed off the commentary but admits he noticed the similarities himself, even mentioning them to his fiancee. “Then my brain started heading that way.

“Customers would ask if we were brothers more often than not,” he said.

With further help from statistics officials, he also learned that he had a brother – and his brother’s original name.”

Joubert had already taken advantage of a new state law allowing adoptees to see their original birth certificates and found out the names of his biological parents, who had died by then.

FAMILY CONNECTION

Well-armed with details, Joubert posed a few questions to Nisbet while the two were making deliveries about three weeks ago. Joubert and Nisbet had been removed from their birth parents’ home because the couple could not properly care for them.

Nisbet gave him a strange look and answered, yes, he was adopted.

“I said, ‘Gary, I’m going to ask you a strange question: Are you adopted?”‘ Joubert recalled.

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Air New Zealand is dismissing accusations its deputy CEO was involved in a global air-freight scandal with allegations of fix rates with key rival Emirates.

The airline issued a memo to staff earlier today when a story broke in Australian The Age and on that Air New Zealand’s deputy chief executive, Norm Thompson, has become one of the highest-ranking airline executives to be embroiled in the cartel investigation.

Letters, emails and telephone conversations between Air NZ managers and their counterparts at Emirates will be used as evidence in a case brought against the Middle Eastern carrier in the Federal Court by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

In the memo to staff CEO Rob Fyfe said no proceedings alleging any wrongdoing by Air New Zealand or Norm Thompson have been filed by the ACCC.

Mr Thompson is a 31-year veteran of Air NZ and also the chair of the Tourism Industry Association.”

Mr Thompson and an Emirates cargo executive, Ram Menen, allegedly first talked in October 2003 about prices they intended to charge for freight flown between Australia and New Zealand.

“In fact, our own thorough review of the documents shows that Air New Zealand acted appropriately in all our discussions and communications. Air NZ, Qantas and Emirates carry the lion’s share of air cargo across the Tasman. .

Mr Menen gave Mr Thompson, then Air NZ’s sales and marketing chief, assurances that Emirates would not undercut Air NZ’s or Qantas’ freight prices, court documents show. ”Similar activity is also occurring in the Auckland, Sydney and Melbourne markets.

”After your comments on Emirate SkyCargo’s selling approach, I was interested to hear from our cargo sales people that we lost some of our consolidation cargo from the Brisbane to Auckland service last weekend to Emirates, at, what we are told, rates far more attractive than Air NZ’s,” he wrote.”

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LATEST:
Nearly 400 jobs at New Zealand Post Group have fallen victim to the recession.

Acting group chief executive Sam Knowles said there had been 237 redundancies in the first half of this year, 86 jobs were lost through attrition, and 61 fixed term contracts not renewed.

Not all the news was bad, with 90 new jobs created.

The group had about 10,000 permanent staff.

Mr Knowles said the recession, an unprecedented mail volume decline and challenging trading conditions were to blame for job cuts.

“Different businesses within the Group are being affected in different ways and each is responding appropriately,” Mr Knowles said.

Approximately 90 percent of total job reductions were in the postal services business, and 72 percent of that block took voluntary redundancy.

“While the postal services and data processing and management activities have been adversely affected, Kiwibank is experiencing substantial growth and has added 89 people to its payroll during the period.

Today’s figures did not include 74 potential redundancies arising from plans to close the Auckland call centre. .

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After he had stabbed and disfigured Sophie Elliott in a bedroom attack, Clayton Weatherston told a police officer: “I killed her” in a calm, normal tone, a court has been told.

“It appeared that he was in normal control … he was just standing with his hands either side of himself,” Constable John Cunningham has told the Christchurch High Court.

Weatherston is on trial for Elliott’s murder at Dunedin on January 9 last year.

Cunningham was the first person at Elliott’s Ravensbourne home the day she was killed. The defence says he was provoked to kill her.”

Cunningham said he went upstairs to Elliott’s bedroom.

He described talking to Elliott’s mother, Lesley Elliott, on the driveway who told him “that her daughter was dead.

“I tried the door handle but it was locked.

“I then heard the door being unlocked so I opened the door and walked in to a small bedroom.

I voice appealed to open the door or I would kick it in,” he said.

“I was confronted by a body, lying face up.

I saw in front of me on the floor a young female caucasian … I then saw a male standing a the end of the bed.

He asked Weatherston to lie prone on the floor, which he complied with, straight away.”

Cunningham said he asked the man, who was Weatherston, what he had done and he said: “I killed her” in a calm, normal tone. He said his name was “Clayt”. He said his name was “Clayt”.

“I then asked him, why did you kill her.

“I asked him if he understood these rights and he replied that he did,” Cunningham said.”

He asked what he had killed her with, and Weatherston said a knife. He replied, the emotional pain she has caused me over the past year.” Cunningham also asked him about a pair of scissors he found between Elliott’s legs. .

“All this time, the defendant Clay was lying face down in the room.

“He replied, I used them at the end,” Cunningham said.

“I could clearly see the stab wounds to the right side of her throat,” he said.” Cunningham said he put gloves on and checked Elliott’s carotid artery, finding no pulse. … Her legs were spread wide. … Her legs were spread wide. … She had multiple cut and stab wounds to the left side of the throat with a large amount of blood around the throat area.”

Cunningham said he took Weatherston downstairs and told him was under arrest for assault – “he replied he understood.”

Weatherston was on the ground outside the house and continued answering questions. “He was very forthcoming and just answered my questions.”

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He’s done it again for the seventh time.

Kiwi freediver William Trubridge has broken the world record in his specialist diving discipline of constant weight without fins considered the “purest form” of the sport because it uses no fins, weight, rope or any other aid.
On a s of air, he dived to an unassisted depth of 88 metres and swam back to the surface at the Vertical Blue 2009 event in the Bahamas.
The event was held in Dean’s Blue Hole, a 200m-deep sinkhole. He finished the dive, on Saturday morning, in three minutes and 30 seconds.
Trubridge, 28, set his first constant weight without fins record in April 2007, diving to 82m. It was Trubridge’s seventh world record, and his fifth in that discipline. That was broken by Austrian Herbert Nitsch, at 83m, but Trubridge bettered it again with 86m last year.
A few days earlier, he descended to 88m but he blacked out when he got to the surface and took his first breath, which disqualified him. . “But somehow I managed to remain calm and finished the dive completely lucid.
He said he felt anxious as he went for his second attempt.
“Freediving is a sport similar to marathon running, in the sense that athletes peak later in age.”
He planned to keep pursuing records and “extending the idea of the human aquatic potential” for at least another five to 10 years.”
Preparing for a dive required “years of training, months of specific depth adaptation, and a couple of hours of body and lung stretching and meditative exercises on the day”, Trubridge said.”
Preparing for a dive required “years of training, months of specific depth adaptation, and a couple of hours of body and lung stretching and meditative exercises on the day”, Trubridge said.”
Trubridge spent his teenage years in the Bay of Islands and Hawke’s Bay, he said. “He basically learned to walk on the boat before he walked on land.

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Online dating warning after alleged sex assault

By CLIO FRANCIS – Monday, 02 March 2009

Police have issued a warning over the perils of online dating after an alleged sexual assault in Hamilton over the weekend.
Detective Inspector Greg Nicholls said a 41-year-old man was facing a variety of charges relating to the alleged sexual assault of a woman in her home on Saturday morning.
"The offender and victim had connected via the internet sometime last November and had been in subsequent contact since by phone, text and email but had not previously met in person.
He would appear in Hamilton District Court this afternoon, he said.
He urged people to exercise caution.
"The pair had planned to meet on Friday night, however when that fell through the accused had gone to the victim's house and sexually assaulted her," Mr Nicholls said."
The woman, 36, struck up an online friendship with a man she believed was a 33-year-old PhD student from Dunedin in October.
"Wherever possible when meeting with someone for the first time meet in a public place, such as a cafe or restaurant and inform someone where you are going and who you are meeting.
She went to his house, where chickens lived inside among cartons and rubbish, and there was no electricity.
When she arrived on February 8, she realised the unkempt, unemployed 54-year-old had lied about his identity.
The Armed Offender Squad were called while the pair were in Kaikoura, but she was later rescued by police.
When he refused to let her leave the house on her own or take her passport, she contacted a person she had met on her plane, who called police.
The man would not be prosecuted, police said.

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It doesn’t pay to be female, report shows

– Saturday, 27 December 2008

Women in public-sector jobs continue to lag behind the pay of their male equals by up to 35 per cent, a government report reveals.
The Human Rights Commission says the evidence of workplace gender inequality is now indisputable, and it calls on public organisations to take action.
"We want people to start fixing the problem, not just identifying it," equal employment opportunities commissioner Judy McGregor said.
The taskforce found:
Every organisation found a gender pay gap, ranging from 3% to 35%.
A progress report of the five-year pay and employment equity taskforce shows a gender pay gap persists across all 27 public-sector organisations surveyed.
Gender pay gaps widen after appointment, and men move more rapidly through the pay scale.
Starting pay rates between men and women differed within the same occupation.
All reviews except one found under-representation of women in a range of senior management.
Women were more likely to believe that performance appraisal systems were unfair.
Over half of staff said their organisations were not actively addressing or preventing harassment and bullying. "It seems to be almost unbridgeable for some reason.
McGregor said the gender pay gap had been a problem for some time.
"We still have a long way to go in relation to pay equity."
The average gender pay gap was about 12%. What these results show is that we need to move more quickly on the remedial work that follows," McGregor said. What these results show is that we need to move more quickly on the remedial work that follows," McGregor said.
Women got lower starting salaries in the same jobs in some occupational groups. Among the most common reasons were:
Female-dominated occupations were lower paid. .
Women had fewer promotion opportunities and/or progressed more slowly through pay scales.
Organisations got complacent after reviewing their gender pay gap.
"We want to see proper targets set and whether people regard that as positive discrimination, affirmative action or just redressing a natural balance doesn't matter; it's got to be done," she said.
"People commit to the review and they do the review and they think the job's done, but what we want now is more action around implementing the action plans.
"We have found that the implementation (of changes) is too slow," McGregor said.
The private sector was "pretty resistant to challenges" on how it paid and employed people."
Council of Trade Unions president Helen Kelly said the same issues identified in the public sector were also present in the private sector.
"It is often presumed that the man's job is more important than the woman's, so we give them the bonuses.
"It is often presumed that the man's job is more important than the woman's, so we give them the bonuses."
The report was the third from the taskforce, which is about three years into its five-year term.

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Tourist’s keenness to take photos dampened

Wednesday, 19 November 2008

He may not have the pictures to prove it, but an American tourist will remember his visit to Napier after stepping backward off a wharf while taking a photo.
Entranced by a line-up of vintage cars yesterday, the 75-year-old cruise-ship passenger stepped backward on the wharf in the Port of Napier to fit them all into his viewfinder.
Police said the man struggled in the water, but was quickly rescued by crew member Paul Haggerty, who dived into the narrow gap.
He dropped five metres into the sea, falling between the wharf and the Dutch cruise ship Volendam. .
The passenger appeared to be in good shape when returned to land but was taken by ambulance to Hawke's Bay Hospital in Hastings to check for suspected water inhalation.
The vintage cars had been lined up on the wharf to add to Napier's art deco ambience for the passengers on the ship, which has a capacity of 1400. The camera was thought to have ended up in a watery grave.
"I would also like to express my thanks to the hospital and all the staff who have looked after me so well," he said.
Speaking from the hospital, the man – who lives in California – declined to give his name but thanked Mr Haggerty for jumping into the water to save him.
The Volendam sailed for Tauranga later in the afternoon, and the ship's agents were arranging for the rescued man to fly there to rejoin his cruise.