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Thursday, January 4, 2007

Bicycle sales in Australia have recorded record sales of 1,273,781 units for 2006, exceeding car sales by 32 percent. It is the fifth year in a row that the bicycle industry has sold more than one million units, a figure yet to be realised by car manufacturers.

The Cycling Promotion Fund (CPF) spokesman Ian Christie said Australians were increasingly using bicycles as an alternative to cars. Sales rose nine percent in 2006 while the car market stalled. Mr Christie said people were looking to cut their fuel costs and improve their fitness.

Mr Christie said organisations were beginning to supply bicycles as a company vehicle. “There is an emerging trend towards people using bikes as their official company-supplied vehicle in place of the traditional company car,” he said.

“Some of Australia’s biggest corporations now have bicycle fleets, and when you add in government organisations, we now know of at least 50 organisations which operate fleets of bikes.”

“Although the company bicycle is a long way from taking over from the company car, it’s an important trend when you consider that nearly half of all cars sold are to company fleets.”

The CPF claims most commutes to work are less than 5 kilometres (3 miles) making bicycle travel a viable alternative.

Monday, November 14, 2016

On Wednesday, India demonetised ?500 (about US$7.50) and ?1000 notes, announced as a measure to fight corruption, fake notes, and black money. Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the Indian citizens late Tuesday, and said 500 and 1000 rupee notes would cease to be legal tender at midnight.

To minimise possible difficulties to citizens, transactions using old 500 and 1000 rupee notes were accepted at government hospitals, railway ticket bookings, government buses, and airports. The notes were also accepted at public-sector petrol-pumps, government-authorised consumer co-operative stores, milk booths authorised by State governments, and cremation grounds till Friday midnight. These shops were obliged to have a record of their stocks and sales.

In his announcement, Modi said, “For your immediate needs, you can go to any bank, head post office or sub post office, show your identity proof like Aadhar card, voter’s card, ration card, passport, income tax PAN card number or other approved proofs and exchange your old 500 or thousand rupee notes for new notes.” ^{((hi))Hindi language: ??????? ???????? ?? ??? ???? ?? ?? ?? ???? ?? ?????? ????? ?? ??? ??? ?????? ????? ?? ??? ?? ????? ?? ??? ?????? ?? ?? ???? ?? ???? ?? ?????? ?? ?? ??? ?? ?? ?????? ?? ???? ????? ????, ???? ??, ???? ?????, ?????? ?????, ???? ?????, ????????, ???? ????? ??? ????? ??????? ???? ?? ??? ??? ??? ???? ?? ??? ??? ???? ???}

Modi also announced those who failed to change their currency till December 30 can exchange the notes at Reserve Bank of India (RBI)’s office along with a declaration form till March 31. The notes can be exchanged till December 30 at any branch of any bank across India.

By Saturday, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said demonetised money equivalent to almost US$30 billion was deposited in banks across India. According to estimate, the old notes accounted for 85% of the total money in circulation. New 500 rupee and 2000 rupee notes are to be issued. Modi said RBI would exercise caution from past experience and limit the circulation of large-value notes.

International tourists could purchase up to 5000 rupees using the old notes at airport exchanges till Friday.

A limit was imposed on cash withdrawal; a maximum of 10000 rupees each day, and 20000 rupees each week, can be withdrawn. Moreover, from Thursday (November 10) till November 24, 4000 rupees can be exchanged in the banks and post offices. The amount is credited to the bank account.

Government workers were informed about demonetising when the announcement was made. Modi announced all banks would remain closed for public work on Wednesday.

In the United States, Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election on Tuesday, immediately after which stock markets dropped globally. Following the US election and demonetising the money, the Indian stock market fell by 1700 points on Wednesday. Sensex lost 1,688.69 points and Nifty lost 111.55 points on the same day. Indian technology sector companies experienced loss. TCS suffered 4.93% loss and Infosys lost 2.74%.

The Indian rupee is also used in the neighbouring countries of Bhutan and Nepal. The border area uses Indian currency for day-to-day transactions. The Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan (RMA) has announced the exchange of old notes will be facilitated till December 15. RMA governor Dasho Penjore informed Indian news site The Wire, “We do not know exactly how much Indian currency of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 is in circulation in Bhutan. We will get a better idea after the deadline to deposit their amount”. RMA has 30% of its international exchange reserve in Indian rupees. Nepal Rastra Bank directed all Nepali banks to stop conducting transactions using the Indian rupee.

On Thursday, there were long queues in front of ATMs and banks to exchange the old notes and withdraw money. BBC reported some banks ran out of cash. Police were called to some banks to maintain discipline. Banks were open on Saturday and Sunday for money exchange.

Shops did not accept the old 500 and 1000 rupee notes. Some emphasised cash-less transaction as well. BBC reported some traders and small business owners in Delhi threatened to call a strike as this move affected their business.

eRetail websites like Amazon and Flipkart announced they would not accept the old 500 and 1000 rupee notes on Cash on Delivery orders. Amazon also announced 15% discount on gift cards worth 500 or 1000 rupees.

The government ceased all transactions using the old 500 and 1000 rupee notes before Saturday. But a Wikinews correspondent noticed a jeweler shop accepting the demonetised notes on Saturday. When questioned, the jeweler said they were accepting the old notes only on purchase. When the correspondent, who did not identify as a reporter to the shop owners, said the old 500 and 1000 rupee notes were not legal money, they said they will exchange the notes in a bank since there were 50 days to exchange with a new and legal tender. They refused to exchange old 500 rupee notes with change, asserting the customer needs to buy merchandise from their shop.

Saturday, July 28, 2007

Paraguayan footballer Roque Santa Cruz has left Bayern Munich for Blackburn Rovers. Roque Santa Cruz signed a four year deal. Roque Santa Cruz became expendable after major signings by Bayern Munich. Santa Cruz became 5^th choice striker after Luca Toni, Miroslav Klose, Lucas Podolski and Jan Schlaudraff. Blackburn Rovers beat Manchester City, Porto and Espanyol for the signature of Roque Santa Cruz. The fee is reported to be around £3.4million.

Santa Cruz experienced an injury-plagued and trophy-laden eight-year career in Munich. Santa Cruz scored 31 goals in 155 league appearances and seven goals in 51 UEFA Champions League games for Bayern Munich. He won five German titles, four German Cups and one UEFA Champions League title with Bayern Munich.

Blackburn coach Mark Hughes was quoted as saying, “Santa Cruz is a young player, an international with a good reputation who is playing at a top European club.” and “The good thing from our point of view is that his fitness levels are fine as he has been playing in the Copa America.”

Saturday, October 4, 2008

Six applicants to join the Alabama Department of Corrections and their driver have been killed after the prison van they were traveling in collided with an 18-wheeled truck. Both vehicles burned at the scene.

Andrew David Carter, who was driving the Lewis Trucking Company truck with a cargo of treated lumber, escaped the wreck without serious injury. He was briefly hospitalised and released. The deceased have been identified as driver Rodney Kelley, and applicants Julius Erving Douier, Lionel Michael Moore, John Henry Foye Jr., Brandon Jamaal Anglin, Henry Louis Simmons, and Derrick Lamar Ivey. The oldest victim was 45 and the youngest nearly 19.

The wreck occurred on Alabama’s Route 82 near Bullock County, having left Bullock Correctional Facility to travel to Draper Correctional Facility in Elmore County for mental and physical fitness tests on the passengers before employment with the state.

The road was closed for eight hours while bodies and wreckage were recovered. As well as the van and the truck cab, part of the trucks cargo and several hundred square feet of nearby timber land were consumed by the fire. An investigation is ongoing, but it appears that the truck crossed the center line and there are no skid marks present.

The relatives of the victims will be offered counseling by the Department of Corrections.

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

According to a NASA status report, the lone toilet on the International Space Station (ISS) has broken, leaving the astronauts on board having to use a rigged-up system of bags to collect any liquid waste.

According to NASA, the collection fan motor broke sometime last week after one of the crew used the Russian-made toilet in the space station. The NASA status report quotes the crew as hearing “a loud noise and the fan stopped working”. Russian officials have yet to solve the cause of the breakage and fix it. The seven-year old toilet has broken once before but not for a long period of time.

The crew had been temporarily using the toilet in the Soyuz capsule, but this has a very limited capacity.

NASA officials are now considering flying in replacement parts for the toilet and putting them on Space Shuttle Discovery, which is due to launch on Saturday and scheduled to arrive at the ISS on Monday.

Sunday, January 21, 2007

In the United Kingdom, an anti-pollution operation is under way after the stricken ship MSC Napoli started to leak dangerous heavy fuel oil.

The heavy fuel oil that is leaking from the beached Italian ship is extremely dangerous for the environment. Fear of pollution increased after the ship was further damaged during storms last Thursday. MSC Napoli was beached by Devon coastguards after it suffered heavy structual damage in the gale force storms of Thursday, 18 January 2007, that wreaked havoc across Northern Europe. The ship, which contains 160 containers of hazardous chemical substances, is listing at 35 degrees.

The entire 26-man crew was rescued by navy helicopters Thursday after severe gales. Cracks were found on both sides of the ship, but the current oil leak was not expected.

Around 2,400 containers were carried by the 62,000 tonne ship, some of which contain potentially dangerous hazardous chemicals.

The Coastguards have reported that up to 200 of the containers carrying materials such as perfume and battery acid are loose from the ship and they are looking for missing containers. South African stainless steel producer Columbus Stainless confirmed on Friday that there was at least 1,000 tonnes of nickel on board MSC Napoli.

A hole in the ship flooded the engine room and there’s now fears that the ship will break up. Saturday MSC Napoli was towed to Portland when a ”structural failure” forced the salvage team to beach it. As the storms have continued MSC Napoli has been further damaged.

The authorities have warned people about the pollution, which already has reached the beaches at Devon, but many want to see it on their own. Police have closed Branscombe Beach as more than 20 containers have broken up scattering their contents along the beach.

Sky News reported Sunday that the costs of the accident might be very high as thousands of pounds worth of BMW motorbikes, car parts, empty oak barrels and perfume might get lost in flooding containers.

Friday, January 5, 2007

Former U.S. Chief Justice William Rehnquist suffered paranoid delusions in 1981 during withdrawal from a dependence on prescription painkillers, according to his recently-released FBI file.

The late head of the U.S.’s top court began taking the drug Placidyl in the early 1970s for insomnia and back pain while he was an associate Supreme Court justice. His dependence on the drug was first made public when he was hospitalized for symptoms related to it in 1981, but the delusions were only revealed in the release of the file this week.

A doctor who treated Rehnquist told an FBI investigator the justice had “bizarre ideas and outrageous thoughts. He imagined, for example, that there was a CIA plot against him.” Another doctor said Rehnquist “had also gone to the lobby in his pajamas in order to try to escape.”

Rehnquist had been taking nearly three times the recommended maximum daily dosage of the drug. His delusions came when doctors at George Washington University Hospital took him off it. Eventually, they put him back on Placidyl and weaned him off slowly until he was cured of his dependence.

The FBI conducted an extensive investigation into Rehnquist’s drug dependence at the request of the Senate Judiciary Committee during his 1986 confirmation hearings to become chief justice.

Rehnquist’s file was released to media and lawyers this week as part of a public records request. Rehnquist died in September 2005 and because his privacy could no longer be violated, the FBI OK’d its release.

The FBI was also asked to investigate Democrats who were set to testify against Rehnquist at the 1986 hearing, the file showed. The Democrats were set to testify Rehnquist intimidated minority voters in the early 1960s as a Republican Party official in Arizona.

It’s not clear if the bureau ever did investigate the Democrats, however a memo in the file shows then-Assistant Attorney General John Bolton, the most-recent United Nations Ambassador for the U.S., approved the investigation and said he would “accept responsibility should concerns be raised about the role of the FBI.”

Rehnquist first took his seat as associate justice in 1972 and served on the court until his death.

Tuesday, August 16, 2016

Yesterday, Poland-born German football player and Galatasaray S.K. forward Lukas Podolski announced retirement from international football.

Debuting internationally in 2004, Podolski has won 129 international caps, Germany’s third all time most capped player after Lothar Matthäus and Miroslav Klose. 31-year-old Lukas Podolski is the third top-scorer for Germany, netting 48 goals.

Four years ago, Podolski became the youngest player to make 100 international appearances for Germany aged 27 years 13 days. He was part of the German squad for the UEFA Euro 2016 tournament in France making his final appearance for Germany against Slovakia which was his seventh major tournament.

Podolski won the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil. Podolski was awarded Best Young Player in the 2006 FIFA World Cup, hosted in Germany. Podolski said, “I feel like my focus has shifted […] My time is over […] I arrived in Germany as a two-year-old boy with basically only a football under my arm and am now a world champion. That is more than I could ever have dreamt of.”

German football manager Joachim Löw said, “Just like Basti [Bastian Schweinsteiger], Lukas was always a constant for me. We have always relied on him and still do to this day. He is a role model in terms of his professionalism and attitude, and he always puts the team’s success ahead of anything else.” ^{((de))German language: ?Lukas war genauso wie Basti [Bastian Schweinsteiger] immer eine feste Größe für mich. Auf ihn war und ist Verlass, bei aller Lockerheit und Leichtigkeit, für die er steht, ist er ein Vorbild an Professionalität und Einstellung, dem Erfolg hat er immer alles untergeordnet, auch sich selbst.}.

Podolski was the fifth player to retire from Germany’s 2014 World Cup squad. Last month, German captain Bastian Schweinsteiger announced retirement from international football. Other players who left the German national squad after winning the World Cup are Philipp Lahm, Miroslav Klose, and Per Mertesacker.

Thursday, July 3, 2014

Ian Narev, the CEO of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, this morning “unreservedly” apologised to clients who lost money in a scandal involving the bank’s financial planning services arm.

Last week, a Senate enquiry found financial advisers from the Commonwealth Bank had made high-risk investments of clients’ money without the clients’ permission, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars lost. The Senate enquiry called for a Royal Commission into the bank, and the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).

Mr Narev stated the bank’s performance in providing financial advice was “unacceptable”, and the bank was launching a scheme to compensate clients who lost money due to the planners’ actions.

In a statement Mr Narev said, “Poor advice provided by some of our advisers between 2003 and 2012 caused financial loss and distress and I am truly sorry for that. […] There have been changes in management, structure and culture. We have also invested in new systems, implemented new processes, enhanced adviser supervision and improved training.”

An investigation by Fairfax Media instigated the Senate inquiry into the Commonwealth Bank’s financial planning division and ASIC.

Whistleblower Jeff Morris, who reported the misconduct of the bank to ASIC six years ago, said in an article for The Sydney Morning Herald that neither the bank nor ASIC should be in control of the compensation program.