BA strike: British Airways binds talks with Unite kinship to turn aside disharmony

Millions of British Airways passengers were in limbo last night as militant cabin crew refused to say when they will strike.

Up to 2.5million travellers planning holidays or business trips from next week still have no idea when their flights will be disrupted as BA faces crippling industrial action.

And those who book with BA from now on have been warned that they will have no travel insurance cover if their flights are hit by the strike, involving more than 12,000 cabin crew.

Negotiations: BA management is engaged in talks with union leaders to try and avert the upcoming strikes

The Association of British Insurers said that anyone who booked after the vote to walk out by cabin crew members on Monday had a "reasonable expectation" of disruption, meaning they will not be covered.

BA has promised to refund or re-book anyone hit by the strike, but will not cover hotel bookings, car hire or other costs incurred because of the chaos.

More...DAILY MAIL COMMENT: There"s everything to lose if BA cabin crew forge ahead with their strikeHundreds of gallons of fuel leak from Thomas Cook holiday jet seconds after take-off Lufthansa cancels 800 flights bringing travel misery for 10,000 passengers after pilots strikeWhat to do if your airline goes on strike (thisismoney.co.uk)Where planes go to die: Massive 22bn airforce graveyard revealed in high resolution by Google Earth

Strike action could begin as early as next week after the overwhelming vote in favour by members of the giant Unite union following a row with BA over conditions of service and the airline"s plans to reduce the number of cabin crew on a jumbo jet from 15 to 14.

Union leader Len McCluskey (left) stressed the only way to resolve the dispute is through "negotiation, not litigation"

Asked last night why the union had not announced a strikedate, Ken Ablard, spokesman for the British Airlines Stewards andStewardesses Association (BASSA) arm of Unite, said: "We have notissued a date because we don"t want [to strike].

"Hopefully, with the overwhelming majority voting for action, BA will now listen."

But BASSA said that if members did go on strike, they would do so "sooner rather than later."

"Back at the centre of power": Charlie Whelan is Gordon Brown"s former spin doctor and is said to be back as an unofficial advisor to the Prime Minister

By law the union now has four weeks, until March 22, to hold a strike, otherwise it will have to re-ballot.

It must give seven days" notice, so the latest date it can announce a strike date is March 15.

However, provided it holds at least one strike - even for a day - within the four-week deadline, it may then hold further strikes "ad infinitum", say lawyers.

Winter Olympics 2010: Whistler Blackcomb gears up for the main eventuality in stately character

The mountains have been spruced up, the pistes groomed to perfection, the trees have been wrapped in thousands of tiny lights and the cobbled, pedestrian town scrubbed to Disney-esque levels of quaintness.

Even the road from Vancouver has been rebuilt. The air of excitement and anticipation at the Canadian ski resort of Whistler is electric as the Winter Olympics opens for business next week.

Whistle while you work: Whistler offers some truly demanding downhill runs

It"s here - and at the neighbouring mountain of Blackcomb - that the downhill, cross-country and bobsleigh events are being held.

Both mountains boast top-to-bottom runs that total seven miles in length - one, Peak-to-Creek, is such a thigh-burner that there are strategically placed benches on the way down.

For all the incredible skiing (Whistler Blackcomb is consistently voted the world"s No.1 ski area), there"s no escaping the ten-hour flight, followed by the near two-hour drive from Vancouver airport. But there"s none of the queues of Europe, better food than the U.S. and wide-open skiable spaces, with snow almost guaranteed. More...Feature: Is Whistler Blackcomb worth a blast?Feature: A Whistler stop tour of the RockiesMore downhill delights in our skiing section

Just about every lift, even at the summits, has at least one green (beginner) and blue (intermediate) run off it, and every restaurant (don"t miss the fruit waffles at the Crystal Hut on Blackcomb) and mountain lodge is within the reach of novices.

This clever layout makes Whistler Blackcomb perfect for families and groups of different ability levels.

The Olympic run is a great place to start - then it"s just an 11-minute, jaw-dropping gondola ride across the divide to Blackcomb on the highspeed Peak-2-Peak cable car.

This means you don"t need to ski back down to the village that links the mountains to ascend the other peak, saving a good hour of skiing time in a day. Blackcomb has a swathe of wide cruising blues for building confidence, including Jersey Cream, Honeycomb and Rock"n"Roll, many deserted when I skied them last month.

For experts, both mountains have so many bowls and off-piste terrain that there"s no need to fork out for heliskiing or Snowcat-skiing. If you really want to find fresh powder, get up early and pay the 10.60 to ride the Whistler gondola up the mountain from 7.15am. Eating breakfast on the mountain as the sun rises is an unforgettable experience and worth it for the view alone.

When the mountain is ready to open, a cowbell sounds and you"re free to hit the slopes - 45 minutes before anyone else. This year, it"s a badge of honour to ski the two miles and 33 turns of the men"s downhill Olympic course, the Dave Murray (named after the Canadian racer) Downhill, and pit yourself against the top athletes.

The fastest I managed on the downhill course was 45 miles an hour, and that was terrifying. But when the fearless Olympic skiers, including our very own Chemmy Alcott take it on, they"ll be reaching speeds of between 75 miles and 92 miles an hour.

Downhill damsel: Britain"s Chemmy Alcott will be taking on the challenges of Whistler

The other crucial point that sets Canada apart from the U.S. is the apres ski. Whistler may be a chi-chi resort, but it is also young and fun.

Start at the Garibaldi Lift Company bar in Whistler Village, a raucous venue that draws crowds. Its terrace is a good spot to watch the Sunday night Fire And Ice Show (6.30pm), when freestyle skiers and boarders dazzle the crowds.

For fine dining, try Chateau Whistler"s The Chalet, a romantic fondue restaurant on the edge of the village. In town, Araxi has British Columbian fish, seafood and venison in wow surroundings.

Yes, Whistler is a trek, but if you stay for more than a week, skiing in Canada is more cost-effective than Europe, with more nightlife and a better atmosphere than most U.S. resorts.

And the bragging rights of skiing the Olympic downhill run without falling will make up for the jet lag.

Beware: once you"ve skied Whistler, you"ll be spoiled for ever more.

Travel Facts

Frontier Ski (020 8776 8709, www.frontier ski.co.uk) has seven nights in Whistler staying at Fairmont Chateau Whistler from 1,317pp including flights and transfers, www.whistlerblackcomb.com.

Japan owns up to Cold War understanding that pennyless chief taboo

Richard Lloyd Parry, Tokyo &

, : {}

Japan lied for roughly half a century about tip agreements to concede visits by nuclear-armed American naval ships, according to a supervision report.

The life of the pacts, that violate Japans outspoken antithesis to chief weapons, has been reported for years, after leaks and the announcement in the US of before personal documents. This is the initial time, however, that the Government has owned up to past deception.

The Japanese Government offering prejudiced explanations, together with lies, from commencement to end, pronounced the report, that is piece of an bid by Yukio Hatoyamas statute Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) to put area in between itself and the predecessor, the regressive Liberal Democratic Party.

The Japanese Foreign Minister, Katsuya Okada, said: It is intensely unfortunate that this complaint for such a prolonged time remained underneath cover, to the Japanese, even to parliamentary sessions, even after the finish of the Cold War. Prime ministers and unfamiliar ministers, as leaders, should be blamed.

Times Archive, 1945: Atomic explosve hits Japan

President Truman voiced yesterday that the initial atomic explosve had been forsaken on the Japanese bottom of HiroshimaArchive topic: Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Related LinksGates moves to keep US infantry on Japan soilJapan ready to fall short North Korean rocketJapan flexes the troops musclesMultimediaArchive blog: The H-bomb that went chief

He added: While I dont wish to suppose it, we are in a incident where we cannot quietly contend that no chief weapons were brought in.

Japan stays the usually nation to have suffered atomic bombing and chief weapons are, accordingly, a supportive and romantic subject. Since the better in the Second World War, the nation has thrived underneath the insurance of the US chief powerful but unbroken governments have inspected the supposed 3 non-nuclear principles, that were spoken in 1967 by the Prime Minister at the time, Eisaku Sato. These dedicate Japan not to retain or furnish chief weapons, nor to concede them to be introduced in to the territory.

As the Cold War dragged on, Mr Sato shortly began to courtesy the last element as a mistake, since it compromised the capability of the US to urge Japan. In 1969 he and Richard Nixon, the US President, concluded that US forces could deliver chief weapons in to Japanese ports and American bases personally on the southern island of Okinawa.

The row that constructed the inform scrutinised 4,400 papers but pronounced that most intensity justification had left blank from unfamiliar method archives, as if after being private and broken deliberately. The row additionally reliable the life of alternative deals relating to the make make use of of of US troops bases in Okinawa in the box of an puncture on the Korean peninsula.

Japan additionally lied about an agreement for returning to municipal make make use of of the former US bases in Okinawa. Restoring the land to the former state cost $4 million, that the US concluded to compensate but the total was personally paid by Tokyo from open funds.

The headlines of the pacts caused annoy in Nagasaki, the second city to be broken by an atomic bomb. Its indeed unfortunate that tip pacts have existed for so prolonged outward the open eye, Tomihisa Taue, the citys Mayor, said. And the abominable has tricked the certainty of atomic-bomb survivors over the 3 non-nuclear principles.

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British Gas business fleeced for jot down profits

Robin Pagnamenta, Energy Editor & , : {}

British Gas was indicted last night of fleecing millions of bad and exposed commercial operation as the association voiced record-breaking increase of 595 million last year some-more than 1.6 million a day.

The proclamation from Britains greatest application company, that reserve 15.7 million homes, stirred calls for a foe exploration among accusations that it had unsuccessful to pass on falls in indiscriminate gas and physical phenomenon prices to consumers last year.

As British Gas fat cats applaud outrageous profits, the majority exposed people in multitude are being left out in the cold, pronounced Steve Bloomfield, inhabitant military officer for commercial operation and sourroundings at Unison, the traffic union.

Raw gas prices have depressed massively, so appetite companies are pier on the profits, whilst fleecing customers. Fuel misery is rising in the UK and those in majority need should be on reduce prices.

Related LinksBritish Gas increase surge on low gas pricesBritish Gas to cut bills by 9% for 7.5m homes

As Scotland perceived serve complicated snowfalls yesterday in Britains coldest winter in decades, Centrica, the owners of British Gas, pronounced that increase generated by the multiplication increasing by 58 per cent last year to 595 million from 376 million in 2008.

But Sam Laidlaw, Centricas arch executive, deserted the allegations of profiteering. He pronounced that at 7.6 per cent, distinction margins at British Gas were reduce than at alternative obvious British companies, such as fifteen per cent at BT and eighteen per cent at Vodafone.

You pull your own conclusions, he said. We done 38 per normal patron last year after taxation . . . I think the marketplace is operative fine. Mr Laidlaw additionally pronounced that British Gas had cut the prices progressing this month by 7 per cent and was formulation to deposit fifteen billion in new appetite generating equipment, together with breeze turbines and arch appetite stations, over the subsequent ten years.

The proclamation is unlikely, however, to tame consumer annoy at Britains Big Six appetite companies. Earlier this week Ofgem, the industry regulator, pronounced that British Gas, EON, Npower, EDF, Scottish Power and Scottish Southern Energy were earning their top increase for five years since of a widening opening in between indiscriminate and consumer prices.

Since summer 2008 indiscriminate gas prices have depressed from a rise of some-more than 1 per therm to about 38p, whilst physical phenomenon has forsaken from 90 per megawatt hour to around 37.

In contrast, domicile appetite bills are as most as 35-40 per cent higher for gas and 10-15 per cent some-more for physical phenomenon than prior to the cost rises in 2008.

Centrica pronounced that such total were dubious since it paid for usually a small volume of gas at mark prices. Most of the gas and physical phenomenon is purchased on long-term contracts a little lasting twenty years at a range of opposite prices.

Philip Cullum, emissary arch senior manager of Consumer Focus, the patron group, pronounced that the formula offering new justification that Britains appetite markets should be investigated by foe authorities.

For consumers, a multiple of high prices and cold continue has exacted a complicated cost. Energy companies have taken value this winter, whilst some-more than 6 million UK households live in fuel misery and face a unfortunate onslaught to keep warm.

Although increase at British Gas were clever last year, they were modestly reduce opposite the Centrica organisation as the association suffered big falls in gain from the indiscriminate appetite businesses.

Profits opposite the group, that additionally includes a gas prolongation commercial operation in the North and Irish seas, indiscriminate physical phenomenon era and gas storage operations, were down 7 per cent last year at 1.86 billion, compared with some-more than 2 billion in 2008.

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Getting in to schools should be a genuine lottery Philip Collins

Philip Collins & , : {}

Imagine a universe in that each propagandize was great, detached from those that were magnificent. It would frequency have a difference if young kids did not get a place in their preferred, magnificent, school. They would usually have to have do with the propagandize that was merely great.

But, this morning, here in the genuine world, roughly 100,000 relatives will receive, by letter, e-mail or text, the headlines that they have not got the propagandize they wanted. Everyone will broadcast that new Labours mania with preference is purposeless and what counts is a great internal school. They are wrong.

Of march it is hugely unsatisfactory when a kid fails to get a place in the propagandize of their choice. So most silent hours and so most school-gate knowledge wasted. But we need to ease down and stop carrying the wrong argument. Its not essentially the series of successful initial choices that counts; the the low peculiarity of the second choices that matters.

We need to recollect that a small relatives fool around the complement similar to a game. An Institute of Education investigate last month reported that 7 per cent of relatives who did embrace their initial preference would, ideally, have elite to send their young kids somewhere else. But rather than risk a decaying propagandize by posterior a place in the best, they opted for a intermediate propagandize they were assured of removing into.

BACKGROUNDSchools onslaught to place ex-private pupilsSecret downgrading of GCSE examination resultsShould relatives set up state schools?Related LinksRise in relatives rejecting internal schoolsMultimediaBlog: does it have a difference if your kid doesn"t get in to his initial preference of school?

We need to remember, too, that a entertain of all relatives select the internal propagandize since they can travel there. They get their initial preference but a small of them find after that the not unequivocally good.

Then there is the small minority of relatives who are confident with the preparation their young kids are removing but probably shouldnt be. In alternative words, not all initial choices are good.

The difficulty is that unequivocally couple of second choices are. The annual recrimination about parental preference teaches us that there are still not sufficient great schools. That is, in part, since internal bureaucracies refuse, for ideally great monetary reasons, to account over-abundance places. Hence the supply hardly alters from year to year.

There is small or no possibility of this becoming different underneath the stream management. Labour has a improved jot down on preparation than it is since credit for but Ed Ballss time at what is no longer the Department of Education has been dominated by kid insurance issues. In the process, Labour has, foolishly, deserted propagandize remodel to the Conservatives.

If Michael Gove succeeds Mr Balls he has affianced to concede relatives to set up their own schools with state appropriation to the worth of about �5,000 a child. Existing schools as well will be equates to to enhance if they wish. It would assistance if the Tories called for propagandize admissions to be voiced in Oct rather than in March. That would concede the ruling physique to reconfigure their space to suggest some-more places if they were equates to to do s , as copiousness are.

However, this is not a remodel that comes free of charge. If the state stumps up the capital, afterwards the some-more succesful it is at enlivening new schools, the some-more it costs. The unequivocally confidant decision, from that the Tories are shying afar usually as Labour regularly has, would be to entice tutorial companies to have a distinction in lapse for them on condition that the start-up capital. This will have to occur shortly sufficient because, even if there are sufficient intentional zone providers out there, that is doubtful, there is no money.

Ten some-more years of remodel would positively meant that the second most appropriate schools would be a lot improved than they are. But even that wouldnt compromise the complaint entirely. There is no admissions complement inside of the quick mind of man that will equivocate the most appropriate schools being over-subscribed. Even in the paradise of concept mass it will still be receptive for relatives to select the most appropriate propagandize they can.

Therefore, it is consequential to find a satisfactory approach of specifying in in between applicants. At the moment, the closer you live to the school, the improved your possibility of removing in. Formal catchment areas for the most appropriate schools have right away shrunk to a little radius. The marketplace afterwards functions the fit magic. A 10 per cent alleviation in Key Stage 2 formula in initial schools brings with it a 7 per cent enlarge in residence prices. The center category select either to compensate termly fees or a monthly debt supplement. Meanwhile, admissions officers can be speckled on foot the streets with a fasten measure, as if propagandize admissions were similar to operative out who has won a diversion of bowls.

There is a old approach of specifying in in between people who all wish the same thing. It allocates next to weight to each child, in any case of the resources of their parents. It is indisputably even-handed. It is a lottery. This is how it works.

Catchment areas are abolished and all relatives practice their choice. If their elite propagandize is not over-subscribed they get it. But if it is, each childs name should go in to a hat. The initial names out get the places and there is a right to interest usually on the drift that the lottery had been administered wrongly.

There is one wilful domestic conflict to the lottery scheme: it equates to that, all of a sudden, entrance to a great propagandize cannot be purchased around the housing market. In politics, the complaints of those who lose will regularly drown out the pale interjection of those who gain. It will be tough to do but it is usually when we have sufficient great schools and a satisfactory approach of selecting young kids that parental preference will turn unequivocally meaningful.

Sexually provocative song videos should be criminialized until after 9pm

Richard Ford, Home Correspondent & , : {}

Music videos featuring intimately provocative images or lyrics should be criminialized until after the 9pm watershed, a Home Office commissioned inform recommends today.

Children are being shop-worn by bearing to passionate and aroused images as well as intimately divulgence lyrics on television, the inform said.

Dr Linda Papadopoulos, a psychologist, warned that song videos were sexualising girls at a immature age and enlivening them to make an effort to an diseased ideal.

The inform said: Music channels and videos opposite all genres have been found to sexualise and make objective women.

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Women are mostly shown in provocative and divulgence wardrobe and are decorated as being in a state of passionate readiness.

Males, on the alternative hand, are shown as hyper-masculine and intimately dominant.

It added: A Pussycat Dolls video, say, will meant really opposite things to a three-year-old, an eight-year-old and a 14-year-old.

The inform additionally calls for a anathema on supervision Jobcentres promotion practice in lap-dancing clubs, rub the body parlours and alternative tools of the sex industry.

It additionally recommends a ratings complement for cinema of models in magazines so that readers can discuss it if they have been airbrushed, and video diversion consoles to be sole with the parental restrictions switched on by default.

Lads magazines such as Nuts and Zoo should be limited to the over 18s, creation them titles placed at the tip of shelves and out of reach and steer of youngsters.

The inform additionally suggests environment up a website where endangered relatives can inform insane selling that sexualises immature children.

It pronounced that bearing to sex and assault at a immature age could lead to low self-esteem, melancholy with their looks and diseased passionate aspirations between immature girls, the inform said.

Boys are speedy to make an effort to a fake hyper-masculine ideal, it found.

Alan Johnson, Home Secretary, said: We know that relatives are endangered about the pressures their immature kids are underneath at a most younger age, that is because we have already committed to a series of the recommendations in this report.

Changing attitudes will take time but it is necessary if we are going to stop the sexualisation that contributes to assault opposite women and girls.

Climate scientists repel biography claims of rising sea levels Environment

The Maldives is expected to turn submerged if the stream gait of meridian shift continues to lift sea levels. Photograph: Reinhard Krause/Reuters

Scientists have been forced to repel a investigate on projected sea turn climb due to tellurian warming after anticipating mistakes that undermined the findings.

The study, published in 2009 in Nature Geoscience, one of the tip journals in the field, reliable the conclusions of the 2007 inform from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It used interpretation over the last 22,000 years to envision that sea turn would climb by in between 7cm and 82cm by the finish of the century.

At the time, Mark Siddall, from the Earth Sciences Department at the University of Bristol, pronounced the investigate "strengthens the certainty with that one might appreciate the IPCC results". The IPCC pronounced that sea turn would probably climb by 18cm-59cm by 2100, though stressed this was formed on deficient report about ice piece melting and that the loyal climb could be higher.

Many scientists criticised the IPCC proceed as as well conservative, and multiform writings given have referred to that sea turn could climb more. Martin Vermeer of the Helsinki University of Technology, Finland and Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany published a investigate in Dec that projected a climb of 0.75m to 1.9m by 2100.

Siddall pronounced that he did not know either the retracted paper"s guess of sea turn climb was an overreach or an underestimate.

Announcing the grave nullification of the paper from the journal, Siddall said: "It"s one of those things that happens. People have mistakes and mistakes occur in science." He pronounced there were dual apart technical mistakes in the paper, that were forked out by alternative scientists after it was published. A grave nullification was required, rather than a correction, given the errors undermined the study"s conclusion.

"Retraction is a unchanging piece of the announcement process," he said. "Science is a difficult diversion and there are set procedures in place that action as checks and balances."

Nature Publishing Group, that publishes Nature Geoscience, pronounced this was the initial paper retracted from the biography given it was launched in 2007.

The paper – entitled "Constraints on destiny sea-level climb from past sea-level change" – used hoary coral interpretation and heat annals subsequent from ice-core measurements to refurbish how sea turn has fluctuated with heat given the climb of the last ice age, and to plan how it would climb with warming over the subsequent couple of decades.

In a matter the authors of the paper said: "Since announcement of the paper we have turn wakeful of dual mistakes that stroke the minute determination of destiny sea turn rise. This equates to that we can no longer pull organisation conclusions per 21st century sea turn climb from this investigate but serve work.

"One inapplicable designation was a miscalculation; the alternative was not to concede entirely for heat shift over the past 2,000 years. Because of these issues we have retracted the paper and will right away deposit in the serve work indispensable to scold these mistakes."

In the Nature Geoscience retraction, in that Siddall and his colleagues insist their errors, Vermeer and Rahmstorf are thanked for "bringing these issues to the attention".