London 2012 Olympics venues: Handball Arena - Daily Telegraph
Hosting: Handball, fencing (modern pentathlon), goalball
Schedule:
Handball: July 28 – Aug 7
Modern Pentathlon: Aug 11 – Aug 12
Goalball: Aug 30 - Sep 7
Capacity: 7,000
Fact: rainwater collected from the venue’s roof will be used to flush lavatories and reduce water usage by 40 per cent.
Post games: sports centre for local community
Test event: Nov 23-27, 2011: Handball, International Invitational (women's), Dec 3-4, 2011: Goalball, International Invitational (women's)
Transport: Stratford (National Rail, London Underground, DLR), West Ham (London Underground, National Rail)
'Judgement Day killer thought London imam antichrist' - BBC News
A blind Muslim cleric was strangled by a man who told police he had killed the "antichrist" and that it was Judgement Day, a court has heard.
Hamza Boutouil, 25, attacked Maymoun Zarzour with an ornamental rope at Muslim Welfare House in Finsbury Park, north London, on 2 September last year, the Old Bailey heard.
His defence claims that he was criminally insane at the time and should receive hospital treatment.
He was living in the country illegally.
Picked up pigeonThe imam, known as Sheikh Maymoun, had been blind from a young age from injuries he suffered in his native Lebanon.
After the killing, as witnesses were giving descriptions to the police, Algerian Boutouil returned to the centre and was "raving", the court heard.
Prosecutor Jonathan Turner QC told the court: "Among the things he was saying, which bystanders translated from Arabic so the police could understand, was that he had killed the antichrist, and that by that he meant the imam, and that this was Judgement Day."
It is accepted that Boutouil killed Sheikh Maymoun.
The prosecution argues that he should be found guilty of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
In the hours before the killing, between 02:00 and 04:00 BST, Boutouil was seen behaving strangely on CCTV.
Covered in bruisesHe confronted a man and then two girls in the street before picking up a pigeon and walking off with it.
Later he went to the welfare centre and was heard shouting "Allahu akhbar" (God is great) repeatedly and was behaving strangely during morning prayers.
At about 08:40 BST he spent about an hour alone with the imam and killed him, the jury heard.
The primary cause of death was strangulation. Sheikh Maymoun was also covered in bruises consistent with a struggle.
Mr Turner said: "Whatever else had happened in that room, the imam had not sold his life cheaply. He had fought back, despite his blindness."
Boutouil, who entered the country last July, was living in a squat near Wood Green, north London.
GM's Vauxhall announces new Astra at UK plant - Yahoo Finance
LONDON (AP) -- General Motors' Vauxhall plant in northern England will build the company's top-selling Astra vehicles, the automaker said Thursday — a relief for U.K. politicians who had lobbied its American owner to keep the plant open.
The announcement comes after workers at the Ellesmere Port plant, near Liverpool, overwhelmingly backed a job deal which turned the factory into a 24-hour-a-day operation, a key cost-cutting measure pursued by parent company GM Europe.
GM Europe lost $700 million in 2011 and has been struggling to turn around its Opel and Vauxhall brands. It had been feared the company would close the Ellesmere Port facility in favor of consolidating production elsewhere — such as its headquarters in Ruesselsheim in Germany or Gliwice in Poland.
In a separate announcement, Opel said that the Ruesselsheim plant would switch to producing other models.
GM's announcement — which comes with a 125 million pound (nearly $200 million) investment and 700 extra jobs — is a break for leaders such as British Business Secretary Vince Cable, who fought to keep the British plant open.
Prime Minister David Cameron, speaking from the northern city of Manchester, called the decision "a fantastic vote of confidence."
"The U.K. government gave this its full backing. The unions supported the necessary changes. The workforce has responded magnificently. It is a British success story," he said.
Cable, who at one point traveled to the U.S. to plead the plant's case, told BBC television that no financial inducements were offered to General Motors Corp. to keep the U.K. facility open, saying the move underlined that Britain is "a good business environment for the motor industry."
Production of the new car is due to begin in 2015, with at least 160,000 vehicles scheduled to be produced every year.
Ukraine Olympic official resigns in wake of London 2012 ticket scandal - The Guardian
One of Ukraine's leading Olympic figures has resigned after he was filmed offering London 2012 tickets for sale on the black market.
Volodymyr Gerashchenko, the 66-year-old general secretary of the Ukraine National Olympic Committee (NOC), has quit but said he will co-operate with the independent investigation commission that was launched last week.
The Ukrainian NOC president, Sergey Bubka, said: "The Ukraine National Olympic Committee takes accusations very seriously and that is why we have acted so swiftly to address the recent BBC reports."
Gerashchenko, the head of Ukraine's NOC since 1997, was filmed by BBC London News offering to sell 100 tickets worth several thousand pounds to an undercover reporter posing as a ticket tout. Legislation brought in since London won the vote to host the Games in 2005 makes it a criminal offence to sell Olympics tickets on the black market, with a fine of up to £20,000 for each offence.
Gerashchenko was filmed telling the undercover reporter: "I understand you're a dealer – that's why for me, you are priority number one, the top, the person, in case we have extra tickets to contact you, we contact you." The official also asked to be paid in cash for the tickets.
Walsall? No thanks! One London borough fails in attempt at 'social cleansing' to solve housing crisis - Daily Mail
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A London council pledged yesterday to stop moving its tenants out of the area to towns offering cheaper housing.
Labour-controlled Waltham Forest said few people wanted to leave for a new life in Walsall.
London boroughs, under severe pressure to find housing, have been encouraging residents to move out of the capital.
Waltham Forest council has been unsuccessful in moving council tenants from homes like this tower block in E11, to areas such as Walsall in the Midlands
But Waltham Forest housing chief Marie Pye told the BBC: ‘The majority of people we offered this to just turned it down.
‘Most say they would rather stay on their mum’s floor so their kids could go to the same school. We need to redouble efforts to find accommodation in east London.’
The search for suitable state-subsidised housing has been made trickier because of the Coalition’s cap on housing benefit.
Jobless tenants cannot claim more than 250 to pay rent on a one-bedroom flat or 400 for a four-bedroom house. Critics claim the curbs will lead to ‘social cleansing’ of poor families.
Boroughs have been trying to persuade residents of the advantages of a move to cheaper areas.
Labour Newham has approached a housing association in Stoke-on-Trent about finding accommodation for its homeless people.
The lack of affordable housing in the borough, like this shared ownership scheme in Waltham Forest, has forced the council to try and rehouse tenants in another part of the country
But Waltham Forest said people were unenthusiastic about moving to various destinations including Luton, Margate and Walsall.
Instead it pledged to look more closely at where tenants worked, where their children go to school and where family ties are when allocating housing.
Ministers have warned councils that relocation is unnecessary and may be illegal if applied to people with strong local links.
However one mother said she was happy with her move from Waltham Forest to Walsall.
‘I was living in temporary accommodation and the condition was very bad,’ she told the BBC. ‘I prefer it here. In London everything is too expensive.’
London firefighters 'used as locksmiths' - BBC News
Firefighters in London are being called out nearly every hour to rescue people who have locked themselves in or out of a building or vehicle.
London Fire Brigade (LFB) said in the last three years, it has been called out to nearly 22,000 incidents of this type each day.
The brigade said it has been called out to people trapped in cemeteries, toilets and cupboards.
It estimated this costs taxpayers more than £500,000.
In the period 2009-11, the brigade was called to:
- 2,287 incidents where people were locked in
- 1,613 incidents where people were locked out
- 1,409 incidents involving babies or children being locked in cars or homes
- 276 adults and 176 children locked in toilets
- 12 people locked in cemeteries
- 14 people locked in cupboards
- A woman stuck in a fridge and a man shut in a freezer
- A person locked in the luggage area of a coach
- A person locked in a crematorium with a child
- A person stuck in a recycling bin
LFB said it wanted to reduce these types of callouts, saying locksmiths should be called instead unless somebody's life is at risk.
On Tuesday, the force will tweet about every locked in or out incident that its crews are sent to.
'Finished at pub'Dave Brown, head of operations, prevention and response, said: "We get called to an absurd number of non-emergency incidents involving people who have locked themselves in or out of their homes.
"We've even had people call 999 to ask if we can come round and let them into their homes, but then ask for the fire engine to arrive at 11.30 once they've finished at the pub."
He added: "If it's obvious to our crews that it's not an emergency, we won't help and people may well find themselves left out in the cold."
Steffan George, from the Master Locksmiths Association (MLA), said: "In most situations, a locksmith should be with you within an hour.
"It's always advisable to contact a qualified and inspected locksmith, such as those vetted by the MLA.
"I'd even suggest storing the phone number of a local locksmith in your mobile in case you ever need it."
If the government is paying for you to live then basically I don't think you have much rights to say which town you want to live in. People are greedy. Accept the houses in Walsall or Luton and be glad you've got somewhere to live
- Me, reading this, Uk, 29/5/2012 03:43
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