Bolton Wanderers 1 Sunderland 2

Bolton Wanderers 1

Klasnic 87

Sunderland 2

Zenden 45, Muntari 90+2

“We needed a bit of luck,” said Sunderland manager Steve Bruce afterwards. They certainly got it because as his Bolton counterpart Owen Coyle summed up succinctly the home side “missed a host of gilt edged chances.”

Not that there was anything fortunate about the away side’s injury time winner with Stephane Sessegnon slipping a superb pass beyond Gretar Steinsson where substitute Sully Muntari hit a precise powerful shot beyond keeper Jussi Jaaskelainen and the despairing dive of Zat Knight. Queue ecstatic celebrations amongst the 4,000 travelling army behind the goal as Sunderland grabbed their fourth away victory of the season.

Bolton had fashioned an equaliser with just three minutes remaining when their two substitutes combined with Ivan Klasnic accurately heading Rodrigo’s cross past Simon Mignolet. They should then have won the match but after Mignolet had kept out Rodrigo’s effort, Phil Bardsley somehow touched Kevin Davies five-yard shot over the bar. 

The Wearsiders had taken the lead on the stroke of half-time when the unimpressive Gary Cahill foolishly appealed for offside allowing Bolo Zenden to move onto Sessegnon’s fine through ball and advance thirty yards before taking the ball round Jaaskelainen and plonking it into the back of the net.

Bolton had earlier hit the bar through Daniel Sturridge, who in the second half did poorly with two penalty box opportunities, and might have taken an earlier lead through Matt Taylor whose close range effort was smartly blocked by Mignolet.

For Sunderland Bardsley should have done better but left unmarked he headed Jordan Henderson’s free kick over the bar from six yards. That was also the distance that C Y Lee managed to miss from for Bolton on 74 minutes and although the home side did finally grab the equaliser they deserved it was Sunderland’s never say die spirit that won out at the end.

Celebrating Sunderland fans at the end of the match 

Should royalty be laid to rest?

This article is taken from the Big Issue in the North magazine dated April 25th. Please try and buy the magazine as it's one of the best around. 

Britain’s only had one brief period of Republicanism in the last thousand years. However as monarchy supporters get ready to celebrate the Royal Wedding of Prince William to Kate Middleton on April 29^th that doesn’t mean there’s no one prepared to argue its case.

When Britain’s future King emerges newly wed from Westminster Abbey he’ll just be able to see the statue of a man who chopped off the head of one of his predecessors.  That was back in January 1649 when King Charles I was executed during a Civil War fought to decide whether parliament or royalty ruled.

“Off with their heads” has been reported as the chant of students as they abused the future Charles III and his wife during demonstrations in London in December against the raising of tuition fees. Oliver Cromwell’s appearance outside the Houses of Parliament stands as a reminder of a revolutionary time in the nation’s history.

If it hadn’t been for Cromwell’s subsequent suppression of the demands of the Levellers, a loose alliance of radicals and freethinkers, to abolish the House of Lords, introduce annual elections and redistribute land, that revolutionary movement may well have sent the country down a more democratic path.

Formed in 1983 Republic can count amongst its 12,000 supporters the author Sue Townsend, Caroline Lucas MP, comedian Jo Brand and film-maker Ken Loach. The organisation wants to end any constitutional royal family role, replacing them with an elected Head of State similar to the Irish Presidential system. Axing the monarch, accompanied by the introduction of a written constitution, would be done with the consent of the British people through a referendum.

Tower of London 

Republic’s spokesperson Graham Smith accepts most people wouldn’t currently vote to bring to an end an institution that’s evolved over hundreds of years. He claims that as many as twelve million adults in the UK are in favour of a republic but have their “regularly ignored” by the media. He particularly accuses the BBC of being “institutionally biased in favour of the Royal Family.” Armed with a specially commissioned ICM opinion poll showing 80% of the nation appears indifferent to events on April 29^th he believes the wedding coverage should be “toned down to reflect reality.”

James Edgecombe, Chairman of the British Monarchist League established last year in defence of Queen and Country, doesn’t agree saying: “Whilst there’s not as many street parties as on previous Royal occasions I feel that’s more to do with bureaucracy and the time of year. But you can bet that thousands will go to London to see the special event. Meanwhile millions, who wouldn’t watch the wedding of a president’s grandson, will witness it on the television.”

Even if true should that be a cause for celebration? Aren’t the outdated values of elitism, that many feel the monarchy embodies, holding Britain back? Not according to Edgecombe, from Doncaster: “In a world of constant change it’s comforting that there is the monarchy to provide a sense of stability and continuation. Also the Royal Family, through many of their charities, seek to help the least well off. They also often serve as important role models for people.”

Considering Prince Charles is known to have spent the night before his 1981 wedding to Lady Diana Spencer with a “blonde woman”, who was almost certainly Camilla Parker Bowles, his current wife, is that really the case? And what of Prince Andrew’s well publicised relationship with businessman Jeffrey Epstein, who recently spent over a year in jail for soliciting prostitution from underage girls?

Edgecombe dismisses these points on grounds the Royal Family are “only human.” He defends Prince Andrew’s choice of a paedophile friend on grounds that this is not "as serious as the fact that the Prime Minister of Italy is facing trial for allegedly paying an underage girl for sex."

Critics of the Duke of York are not so willing to forgive, especially as he’s currently representing the country as a UK special representative for trade and investment. Yet when Chris Bryant MP called on Prime Minister David Cameron to dispense with his services this was rejected on grounds he was “doing a good job.” Which wasn’t the case with Bryant said Speaker John Bercow as he reprimanded the former Foreign Office minister for even raising the subject in the House of Commons on grounds that any references to the royal family must be “rare and very respectful.”

That would certainly mean former Fife Labour MP Willie Hamilton would be thrown out of the debating chamber if he were around to repeat his frequent 70s and 80s attacks on the royal family. These included calling the Queen “a clockwork doll” and Prince Charles “a twerp”, all as part of his support for a republic and the ending of the Civil List under which the monarch has their expenses for performing official duties paid by the taxpayer. This is currently £7.9 million annually, around a fifth of the total estimated £38.2 million costs when transport, security, property maintenance and other sundry expenses are included.

For John Masding of the Royal Society of St George, an organisation claiming to be ‘England’s Premier Patriotic Society’, it’s money well spent. Getting rid of the Royals “would destroy a huge part of our heritage that brings in many tourists from around the world, helping generate a huge income for the country. “ 

It’s a familiar argument and one that Smith disputes. Firstly by estimating an annual cost for the monarchy of £183 million, and then saying there is “no evidence to suggest tourism revenue is reliant on Britain’s undemocratic constitution, which includes not knowing how much tax the Queen pays as it is secret and entirely voluntary.”

What’s also not known is how much she’s worth. In the Sunday Times’ first Rich List in 1989 she was valued at £5.2 billion. It was a figure that rose to £7 billion in 1992 but which over the years has been continuously downgraded to the current figure of £290 million. Even at the lower level it’s a large sum for Prince Charles to inherit on his mother’s death.

Nevertheless Smith is more than happy for him to it and also retain the Balmoral and Sandringham estates with their combined 90,000 acreage. 

He’s also happy to wish Prince William and Kate Middleton “all the best for their big day.” He’s aghast however by the Queen’s invitation to the King of Bahrain, especially only weeks after he ordered his troops to open fire on pro-democracy demonstrators. He wants the invitation withdrawn and doesn’t want taxpayers, especially during these straightened economic times, paying the bill for the wedding.

Neither does he want the pair subsequently playing any role in the nations affairs “by privilege of birth.” He’s asked them to concede their rights to become king and queen in order to pave the way for the formation of a Republic.

But does it matter if, as Republic accepts, the monarch is little more than a figurehead for the nation? Smith believes it does and that abolition would mean “there can be elections for a president who can act as our constitutional protector and arbitrator of our political system.

Prime Minister’s have vast powers of patronage and the power to declare war. None of which is subject to any proper scrutiny. Not so under a republic. Getting rid of the monarchy will start a radical reform of our political system to make it truly democratic.” 

Blackburn Rovers 0 Manchester City 1

Blackburn Rovers 0

Manchester City 1

Dzeko

A late and first Premier League goal for Manchester City’s record signing Edin Dzeko puts the FA Cup Finalists in pole position to grab the final Champions League place next season from fifth placed Tottenham Hotspur.

It was a deserved victory for Roberto Mancini’s side but the result leaves Blackburn Rovers staring at the relegation trapdoor and with no victories in eleven games and with matches at West Ham and Wolves to come then victory at home to Bolton Wanderers on Saturday is absolutely crucial. Lose that and it’s difficult to see Steve Kean’s side surviving.

City might have taken the lead after three minutes but with Paul Robinson beaten David Silva’s 20 yard drive came back into play off the inside of the post. With Adam Johnson looking lively fullback Gael Givet experienced a difficult first half hour as the home side struggled to stay in the match and there was relief when Michel Salgado cleared Gareth Barry’s header off the line.

However with David Dunn playing some neat passes Blackburn were able after the half hour mark to seek some relief and Chris Samba might have done better with a headed opportunity. He certainly should have with his second headed chance on 40 minutes but with Joe Hart beaten the big central defender missed by a whisker. It meant the sides ran off with neither having troubled the scorer.

Yaya Toure saw his header palmed away by Robinson as City surged forward on the restart. Yet with Phil Jones playing marvellously at the centre of the home defence Rovers were by no means overawed, although Silva might have done better with his shot on the hour mark.

On 71 minutes Dzeko replaced Johnson and three minutes later he delivered the killer touch. It came after a desperate attempt by Jones to clear Silva’s cross landed at the £27 million man’s feet and with Givet advancing he curled the ball into the net past the despairing dive of Robinson. Cue ecstatic celebrations amongst the 4,500 travelling fans whose constant chants throughout the game of ‘Who put the ball in the Munichs' net?’ is unlikely to be welcomed warmly by the Football Association at next months Cup Final.

Only once did Rovers seriously look like they might grab a draw, Jones heading over with just four minutes remaining. It’s strongly rumoured that when Indian company Venky took over Blackburn in December they didn’t realise that English Football extended beyond the Premiership and that a club doing badly could be relegated. Certainly it’s almost beyond belief that they would have replaced experienced manager Sam Allardyce with Kean if they knew anything about football, and Championship football beckons.

Out of the frying pan and into the fire - what comes next after government scraps labour's fiasco?

The coalition government’s eminently wise decision to scrap Labour’s wasteful FiReControl project shouldn’t mean it can just wash its hands of what comes next.

FiReControl was formally launched in 2004. The project was designed to replace 46 regional control centre’s across the country with nine state of the art buildings incorporating an IT system to handle emergency calls across England.

From the start the Fire Brigades Union [FBU] said the £1.4 billion project was an unnecessary waste of resources with a union spokesperson saying in 2009 “they can’t make the technology work because what they’ve established are call centres. “Command and Control’ underpins all fire service health and safety procedures but the new centres will only be able to provide very limited support to commanders at an incident - for example they wouldn’t get a service on major emergency procedures, which is vital when fire fighters are trapped.”

By the time Labour had left office in May 2010 it was clear the FBU had been right all along. In the north of the country the two regional centres, at Warrington and Wakefield, which both should have opened 18 months previously remained closed. Hoped for savings of £1.8 million per annum at Wakefield had been revised the previous summer after additional costs of £2.1 million a year were added to the running costs.

In late 2009 over a hundred MPs, of all political colour’s, had signed an Early Day Motion calling for FiReControl to be finally scraped with the then opposition Tories committing themselves to do so if elected.

It was a promise the FBU was keen to see kept although according to Sharon Riley, FBU executive member, the union faced some resistance on grounds that “contracts have already been signed and some Fire Authorities believed the proposed changes have already gone too far. “

Nevertheless just before Christmas Bob Neill, Minister for the Fire Services,

finally brought the expensive fiasco to a halt after announcing he had reached “an acceptable [financial] settlement with Cassidian [the main contractor] after concluding that the requirements of the project requiring the main IT system to be completed in three control centres by mid-2011 cannot be delivered to an acceptable timeframe.”

Great news therefore and one certainly welcomed by the FBU. Problem was what was to come next? And on this the Government appears to have washed its hands.

Suffolk County Council had already agreed a deal to sell off their Ipswich control room site in anticipation of FiReControl coming good. Now with money tight, and no transitional assistance being offered by the government, they’re intending to transfer all 999 emergency fire and rescue calls in the county to be handled at the emergency fire control room at Hinchingbrooke in Cambridgeshire. As Ipswich works perfectly adequately it’s clear that the move is motivated by money. 

Meanwhile on the Isle of Wight councillors are being recommended to back plans to transfer the answering of emergency calls to Surrey Fire and Rescue Service’s control room in Reigate that is sited more 70 miles from the island. Councillors have just the Easter period to consider their options before taking a decision, giving no time at all to discuss this with their constituents even though the move will see those answering the calls in the future lacking the local knowledge that can be vital in saving peoples lives and property.

In December when FiReControl was scrapped the FBU said it was: “important we now see a measured response by the Government and Fire and Rescue Services ensuring we see investment in a structure known to work, with solutions delivered that continue to ensure all fire services have suitable and effective mobilising systems.” No one in the Government appears to be listening. 

Schools budget crisis hits teachers jobs

Thousands of teaching and support staff posts will disappear across the north over the summer as school budgets come under pressure from falling pupil numbers, increased costs and the loss of specialist education projects.

Head teachers are working frantically to cut costs. On their return in September pupils will experience larger class sizes and fewer subject options and out-of- hours school activities. The job losses will undermine the government’s claim that cuts will not affect front line services.

Many of the losses will come at schools where pupil numbers are falling, including Laurence Jackson School in Guisborough, North Yorkshire where head teacher Tony Gavin is budgeting for 60 fewer pupils, meaning a cut of nearly £250,000 in its budget as schools get £4,300 a year for each pupil.

However as National Union of Teachers official Andy Willis said he has dealt with “two major redundancy situations” in Peterborough - where pupil numbers are growing.

 A range of funding streams for schools are being cut, including Harnessing

 Technology that funded some ICT equipment, the Aim Higher programme

 to help people from poorer backgrounds into University and the Extended

 Schools programme which funds homework clubs, arts and crafts activities and

 community access to schools.

Last week it was reported that education secretary Michael Gove had made a £155 million cut in the 2010-11 standards fund, withholding the last of the year’s payments for everything from free school meals to extra tuition for children who need help with literacy or numeracy. 

Laurence Jackson School has also been hit by the 87.5% cut in schools Sports Partnership budgets, as it is a specialist sports school. The result is that it will lose five full-time teaching posts and at least the same number of teaching assistants as Gavin seeks to make savings of £500,000 and secure a future for his 1,300 pupil school.

               

Those still at LJS in the autumn will be working with more pupils in each class. 

Years 7 and 8 currently operate with ten tutor groups with 25 in each. That will be going down to nine with numbers in each increasing to 28. Any specialist subjects that fail to recruit at least twelve students will be going.

Gavin said this will leave more experienced teachers with less time to counsel students excluded from lessons. He added that the government did not also appreciate the importance of teaching assistants in maintaining high standards of behaviour.

 Gavin’s especially concerned that trainee teachers are going to lose out, and is aware the Times Educational Supplement’s jobs columns are down by around 75% on last year. 

“Everyone will just try to do their best in difficult circumstances,” noted Gavin tersely, aware from talking to the various unions representing staff that no one is happy.

In Rotherham that’s most definitely the case, where attempts by a new head, Stuart Wilson, in November to reduce the school budget deficit of £1.3 million at Rawmarsh Community School for 11-16 year olds has led to a series of strikes by NUT members.

The union was concerned that plans to reduce staff numbers by 34, including up to 25 teachers, will mean a school that has lost 20% of its pupils in recent times will now be forced to function with a staff team reduced by a third.

Rawmarsh NUT rep Ralph Dyson said his members had “little option” to take strike action to oppose compulsory redundancies after the local authority failed to help out financially. This angered staff who feel Rotherham Council was at least partly to blame for not having previously monitored the emerging crisis.

Critics fear Gove’s plans for more free schools and academies may cut local authorities out of such a role anyway. Local education authorities have long supervised a majority of schools but in Lincolnshire, for example, the county council no longer oversees school budgets, with any school getting into trouble advised to contact a list of private consultants for assistance.

Dyson said this trend would involve more schools getting into financial trouble, especially as they face rises in costs at the same time as budget cuts.

A head teacher in Nidderdale, North Yorkshire said: “National insurance, gas and water, supplies and service costs have all risen, and I am having to budget for higher level of inflation than before. The budgetary problems schools face aren’t going to be resolved in a year. In my case, like many others, they are going to be greater in 2012 and 2013.” 


Defend Ralph Dyson - stop press on Rawmarsh developments as of mid-April
From John Dalton of Rotherham Nut 

I am writing to thank everyone for their messages of support to the Striking teachers at Rawmarsh Comprehensive School Rotherham and to keep you up to date with the course of the dispute.

You will recall that the dispute started when the new headteacher announced that due to projected financial difficulties they were intending to make 25 teachers and 9 support workers redundant at the end of the Spring term 2011 out of a staff of just 81 teachers; an unheard of number in a small school and particularly absurd mid-year. Rotherham NUT and the members at Rawmarsh responded with a unanimous ballot for industrial action. 

The head fairly quickly moved from his initial position and deferred many (but not all) of the redundancies to September.  Our members however stuck to their guns and have so far taken 9 days discontinuous strike action.  Other teacher unions did not follow our lead but many of their members of since joined the NUT.  Over the period of the strikes last term, management were pushed made a series of adjustments allowing more and more and more of our members to have guaranteed employment beyond September.  We only suspended our action in return for a guarantee to make no members redundant at Easter and made it clear it would resume again if the remaining redundancies were not resolved.

Last Friday we called a meeting with members to discuss action and let management know we were doing so.  At this point the number of redundancies was down to seven with three of them being our members.  Some last minute activity by management produced an employment offer for two more of our members.  There is now just one Rawmarsh NUT member at risk of redundancy in September.  Unfortunately that is our school rep, Ralph. 

Management expected us to call off action at this point but I am proud to report that our members voted overwhelmingly to continue action until the number of NUT redundancies is zero.  As one of the members put it “We are not going to abandon Ralph to sink when he held the life boats for the rest of us to get in”.  We have not announced action as we are giving the school a short time to finally resolve the situation but if we have to we will.

During this dispute we have received well over a hundred messages of support such as yours from organisations and individuals all over the country plus many visits to the picket line and these have been crucial in maintaining moral. 

The fact that we have been able to forward a constant stream of such Emails to members have shown them they are not alone and reaffirm to them that they are in the right fighting both for their jobs and the education of Rawmarsh children despite the disparagement of management, the local authority and, sadly, in one case another teacher union. I will keep you informed and if it is necessary for us to take further action I am sure you will renew that support. Send messages of support to secretary@rotherham.nut.org.uk

Bradford City 1 Burton Albion 1

Bradford City 1

Speight 75

Burton Albion 1

McGrath 42

A result that should ensure these sides are again members of the Football League next season. Reduced ticket prices meant there was a healthy 13,814 inside Valley Parade at kick-off and they saw the away side start the brighter. Paul Peschisolido’s side should have taken the lead on 17 minutes but Calvin Zola totally missed the ball when Jacques Maghoma’s pass left the former Crewe man with just keeper Lenny Pidgeley to beat. Jimmy Phillips then fired over from the edge of the area as Burton sought to build on Saturday’s home victory against Cheltenham Town.

The away side though were grateful to Adam Legzdins on 27 minutes, the keeper sticking out a long arm to prevent Steve Williams header opening the scoring although when the ball then ran loose David Syers might have done better than fire narrowly wide.

Phillips then saw his effort blocked by Luke Oliver but on 42 minutes the little winger floated over a cross that cut out the Bradford back four and ended with his captain John McGrath powerfully heading the ball into the net before running off to celebrate with the 164 away fans in the crowd. Gareth Evans was unfortunate not to level the score on the stroke of half time, his shot beating Legzdins but flashing just outside the post.

The second half began with Burton seeking what would surely have proved the decisive second goal. Twice McGrath might have added to his first half effort before the introduction as substitute of Jake Speight changed the direction of the game. Previously impregnable, the former City man Darren Moore was now put on the back foot as the new man began by hitting a shot from the edge of the area narrowly wide. Then on 75 minutes Speight grabbed a precious equaliser, bundling the ball home after James Hanson had headed the ball down.

The scorer might even have won the game when ten minutes later he was again on the end of a Hansen header. That said it was Burton who created the better chances in the final quarter of an hour, and Pidgeley did brilliantly to push a Phillips close range shot onto the bar before the impressive Greg Pearson had his follow up shot blocked by Oliver. As the game moved towards its conclusion Pearson then cut inside to curl a shot just over. Despite the miss Burton ran off four points clear of 23^rd placed Barnet, who with just four games left are favourites to join Stockport County in dropping out of the league in two weeks time.

Major study into incinerator impact on infant mortality rate set to get started

Huddersfield incinerator

It has taken more than eight years but it appears the Health Protection Agency [HPA] is set to make good on a 2003 promise by former chief executive Pat Troop to undertake a study into the long-term health effects of chemical exposure from landfill sites and incinerators.

Asked last year about this for a Big Issue in the North article [see Kirklees Incinerator piece at www.markwrite.co.uk/archive.htm] the HPA were unwilling to comment. All of which made it difficult to see how Dr Michael Clark of the HPA could justify his statement that “provided modern incinerators are well designed and maintained, their contribution to air pollution at ground level is likely to be very small.”

It certainly wasn’t sufficient to reassure Paul Holmes, MP for Chesterfield. In 2009 he was left less than satisfied when the Secretary of State for Health told him that no recent assessments had been undertaken on the presence of a functioning incinerator and the incidence of infant mortality across Britain.

“Given the huge public concern about the possible dangers and the relative lack of a track record then the Government should be doing much more to proactively monitor any effect from these plants,” said Holmes.

A view regularly pressed by Shrewsbury’s Michael Ryan since he lost his only daughter at 14 weeks in 1985, and then suffered further tragedies when his 19 year old son David and his mother both died around the turn of the millennium, and couldn’t help noticing that all three had lived downwind of an incinerator.

The result has been one of the most painstaking pieces of research, covering every part of Britain, that your likely to hear of. It took six months alone for Ryan to get the data for all of London’s 625 wards on live births and infant deaths between 2002 and 2008. In twelve there were zero infant deaths. In comparison the South London borough of Southwark, which has two incinerators on its borders, had the highest rate of 7.2 deaths per 1,000 live births. [With the Newington Ward there recording the highest rate out of the 625 at 14.0 per 1,000].

Critics have argued that its not the microscopic particles emitted by incinerators that kill youngsters in these areas, but poverty. It’s certainly true that inhabitants of many of the areas in which incinerators are sited are at the lower end of the social scale but Ryan’s ‘trick’ is to show that the death rates in ‘middle class’ areas are higher if there’s an incinerator lurking in the background. Chingford Green Ward is an affluent area of Waltham Forest and yet it has the second highest average number of child deaths at in the whole of London. It just happens to be close to Britain’s largest incinerator.

http://www.guardian-series.co.uk/news/wfnews/1592749.Concerns_over_infant_death_rates_in_Chingford_Green/

Also, asks Ryan, if it it’s all about poverty then how come the levels of infant mortality in countryside areas, where wages are below average, aren’t high?

The issue has certainly been of sufficient importance to the Japanese who back in 2004 conducted their own study and reported that there is a “peak-decline in risk with distance from the municipal solid waste incinerators for infant deaths and infant deaths with all congenital malformations combined."

Now, to cries from “at last” by Ryan the HPA Chief Executive Justin McCracken has written to him to say that he is “pleased to say that following discussions” with Professor Elliott, head of the Small Area Health Statistics Unit at Imperial College, it has been “concluded that an epidemiological study of birth outcomes around municipal waste incinerators would have sufficient power to produce reliable results. Work is now progressing in developing a detailed proposal for what will be a complex study.”

Go to - http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/243962/Are-rubbish-incinerators-killing-our-children-