A story of dual Das: Citi CEO educational and mortgages

Al Yoon NEW YORK Wed Feb 24, 2010 3:08pm EST < 1 / 2 >

Who wants recommendation from a man who sees himself as a taxi? Sathnam Sanghera

Sathnam Sanghera & , : {}

So what do Ruby Wax and Stephen Byers have in common, apart from both being in the news as a result of their advising activities? Cant think of anything? Well, thats the answer Im looking for. You see, the thing that has struck me most about the former Labour minister, in trouble for offering himself like a sort of cab for hire for up to 5,000 a day, and the one-time comedian and talk-show presenter, who is reportedly working as a leadership and communications adviser to Home Office staff, is that their careers have seen better days.

Lets face it, the only involvement Byers might have had with government policy in recent years is at the Jobcentre. And the last time Wax was regularly gracing our TVs, Byers was a government minister. Yet it seems people are willing to pay thousands for their expert influence and advice.

And herein lies a paradox that Ive struggled with during my years as a business journalist: professional advisers are often in themselves professional failures. Almost all the coaches I have met have become coaches after some sort of career crisis. Therapists and counsellors are too often in need of therapy or counselling themselves.

Journalists in professional distress have a reputation for resorting to public relations consultancy. More general consultancy tends to tempt people when they cant think of anything else to do a tendency satirised by Joel and Ethan Coen in their 2008 comedy Burn After Reading, when the character played by John Malkovich responds to a query about what he will do for cash, now that he has quit the CIA, with the words: Ill do some consulting.

And too often people end up consulting the area in which they have failed the most (inadvertently) amusing example being Kate Hull Rodgers, a Canadian humour consultant and founder of the UK consultancy HumourUs, who, according to Personnel Today, has been spreading the message about having fun at work in the UK for the past 20 years and made the switch to consultancy after having a nervous breakdown brought on by stress.

Im all for rehabilitation, but is someone who failed to have fun at work in the most spectacular way the best person to teach us how to have a laugh in the office?

Moreover, is hiring a failed minister the best way of lobbying the Government? And is employing a fading TV comedian a positive way of enhancing communication skills?

Of course, its also a paradox that afflicts business journalists: if were so good at knowing how things should be run, why arent we running something ourselves? Im still working on an answer for that one.

Another question prompted by a recent news event: is it meow or miaow? Im not referring to the way that kids refer to the drug mephedrone, which, according to the press, includes everything from meow, to miaow miaow and MM-cat.

Frankly, I dont care what they call it and dont believe what newspapers have to say on the issue given that they cant seem to decide on why it has such a daft name, with the Daily Mail claiming recently that it is known as meow meow or just miaow on the club scene because the letters CAT make up the spelling of the chemical [cathinone], and another paper claiming that it is called meow meow or just miaow because the necessary chemical is found naturally in khat, an African shrub.

The more pertinent question for me is the linguistic one: is miaow or meow the better way of conveying the cry of a cat? The Times always opts for miaow, though last week a meow sneaked in. The Financial Times uses both, while the Oxford English Dictionary, cites miaow and meow, but goes for miaow as its headword.

Posing the question on Twitter hasnt helped: I doubt I would have encountered more disagreement if Id canvassed views on how to tackle the public sector borrowing deficit.

One respondent was insistent on miaow because a longer sequence of vowels better represents the complex drawn-out noise a cat makes. Most North Americans sided with meow, while others opted for miau, mew, mrow, and miao. There is, of course, only one way to decide: a cat, a room, a bag of mephedrone and a seven-hour debate with interested parties. Ill report back.

Imperial Commander pulls arrange on Nicholls patrol in Gold Cup

Alan Lee, Racing Correspondent & , : {}

How mostly competition rebels opposite the scripts we harmonise for it. Cheltenham yesterday was ostensible to regard usually the Somerset stablemates and their ultimate in isolation duel but Imperial Commander resented the purpose of stooge. Exploiting the shocking tumble of Kauto Star at the fourth-last fence, he drew transparent of the intrepid Denman to win the totesport Gold Cup by a resounding 7 lengths.

The rest of the 11-strong margin were roughly in an additional county as an sparkling new champion, paid for for usually 30,000 and lerned locally by Nigel Twiston-Davies, was crowned. Paddy Brennan, an romantic winning jockey, copied the Barclays Premier League footballers he watches avidly by putting his finger to his lips as he crossed the line. All I"d listened for months was Denman and Kauto Star, he explained. But the equine is an comprehensive appurtenance and this is the majority appropriate day of my life.

The deflation of 3 days but a leader had been all as well majority for Twiston-Davies on Thursday dusk and he went grumpily to bed at 8pm. Such calm control would not be steady last night, as the fast won 3 of the Festival"s last 4 races. Their encampment beer hall in Guiting Power, the Hollow Bottom, rebuilt for an additional turning point racing party.

We regularly longed for a Grand National on top of all else but we have finished that twice and it"s tedious now, Twiston-Davies joked. It"s everybody"s aspiration to win a Gold Cup and my CV would be scarcely full by right away if we hadn"t been usually second in the Champion Hurdle on Tuesday.

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That better for Khyber Kim strike his tutor hard. In the event, it prevented him apropos the initial given his crony and next door neighbour Kim Bailey, in 1995, to win the Gold Cup and Champion Hurdle in the same year.

Still, he could applaud a some-more present double. Before the Gold Cup debriefings were done, Twiston-Davies was behaving whoops of happiness as he watched his elder son Sam, 17, float Baby Run to feat in the Christie"s Foxhunter Chase. One some-more leader will validate him to float in the Grand National - and his father will not cruise that boring.

Always the majority enchanting of racing"s eccentrics, Twiston-Davies arrived yesterday in a cosmetic mac, a movement on his dear duffel coat. In the drizzle after the big race, though, he had rejected it along with his inhibitions. We don"t similar to cheering the mouths off but Denman had let himself down last time and Kauto can"t win each year, so I was regularly hopeful, he declared.

This lovely shift of an determined ensure was not the outcome that majority of the genius 70,000 throng had hoped to witness. Pent-up expectation was discernible in the vanquish of vehement bodies and the scarves, rosettes and banners that gave Cheltenham the sort of narrow-minded ambience some-more same to group sports.

This, after all, was how the Gold Cup had been sold. You were possibly in the Kauto Star stay or the Denman camp, and changed couple of dared to step outward the conflict lines. Perhaps such a prescribed competition was cursed to disillusion. Certainly, Paul Nicholls, who trains both horses, feared as majority as he approached the competition by the waste of unconstrained knocked about favourites.

Later, beholden for the protected lapse of Kauto Star, Nicholls smiled philosophically. The approach this week has gone, I usually thought something similar to that competence happen, he said. We"ve won 3 in a row and we can"t design to win them all - that"s the inlet of sport.

Ruby Walsh, roving the odds-on favourite, had well known his predestine after a fumble at the eighth blockade put Kauto Star on his nose. I was never going so well after that. You can"t have those mistakes in a Gold Cup, Walsh said. The examination Twiston-Davies concurred. Kauto was in difficulty a prolonged approach out. As shortly as he fell, I thought we"d got it.

There was still the small make a difference of Tony McCoy"s wicked will to win. Denman responded to him some-more frankly than on their initial date at Newbury but the charge was hopeless, Imperial Commander simply too

good.

I knew Ruby had longed for one and the beating is in removing kick by something else, McCoy said.

This, though, was a day for new characters on the biggest stage, for a group that came together in grief - Twiston-Davies had never utterly transposed Carl Llewellyn as fast manoeuvre and Brennan had usually lost his pursuit with Howard Johnson. Like all great birds, he approached me, the tutor pronounced irreverently.

Brennan"s is a flighty temperament, disposed to black moods. I"m not the easiest chairman to work with, he admitted, but Nigel creates me content. All the some-more so in the entertainment dusk, when he paid in instalments his celebrations to finish a fast treble, pushing Pigeon Island home in the Johnny Henderson Grand Annual Chase. Dreams are done of such days.

hair wig

Top ubiquitous says Afghanistan armed forces in spirit crisis

David Leppard & , : {}

THE head of the armed forces has warned that British infantry are confronting a predicament of deteriorating spirit on the home front that risks undermining the fight in Afghanistan.

In a trusted breeze memo rebuilt for ministers, General Sir David Richards, arch of the ubiquitous staff (CGS), pronounced that new cuts to the counterclaim bill are carrying a accumulative and erosive outcome on the soldiers and their families.

Cuts to housing, shortages of precision apparatus and even the termination of sports events in in in in in in between soldiers tours of avocation were creation them and their family groups feel undervalued, the armed forces arch wrote.

The leaked memo will be seized on by the Tories as opening a new front in the scuffle in in in in in in between armed forces chiefs and ministers over the politically supportive issue of counterclaim cuts.

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It echoes the row last year when Richardss predecessor, General Sir Richard Dannatt, stepped down after vocalization out about apparatus shortages as well as bad compensate and conditions. It after emerged that supervision total had attempted to allegation him over his expenses.

A comparison infantry commander in chief emphasised yesterday that it was not Richardss goal to criticize ministers: Hes not whingeing. Hes simply perplexing to dwindle up what he believes is a critical issue that needs their obligatory attention.

In the memo to the counterclaim board, that comprises ministers and use chiefs, Richards shifts the concentration of critique from the fight bid in Afghanistan to the diagnosis of infantry on their lapse home.

While there had been poignant swell on the front line, Richards said, the diagnosis of soldiers when they returned for twenty-four months in in in in in in between tours is so bad that it is melancholy to criticise the fight effort.

Marked restricted, the memo reports a outline of an inner check of 5,000 soldiers and their family groups at units in Britain, Germany and Cyprus over the past 4 months.

The consult was discussed at the senior manager cabinet of the armed forces house this month. Its formula crop up to be so shocking that Richards motionless to rapt ministers to the key findings.

My biggest regard ... is the deteriorating experience of soldiers and their family groups ... in in in in in in between tours which, the [survey] group reports, is disaffecting attitudes, deleterious spirit and risks undermining the capability to means the debate . . . he wrote.

We need the soldiers to be ready, mentally and physically, to continue steady tours in Afghanistan, in a oppressive environment, with the genuine awaiting of poignant casualties each time.

To say the required spirit and cohesion, they contingency see discernible signs in in in in in in between tours that they and their family groups are valued.

Last Jul the armed forces was forced to have assets of 43m to assistance the Ministry of Defenc keep inside of budget. In Oct a serve 54m cut was voiced so resources could be focused on the fight in Afghanistan. About 14m of those cuts meant delays to upgrades to vital buliding for some-more than 4,000 troops.

The memo says: The group reports the accumulative and erosive outcome that [such cuts] are carrying on the soldiers and their families.

As CGS, I register an early regard about the stroke on morale, the potentially serious downstream stroke on influence and the capability to means the debate in the longer term.

An armed forces orator said: The inform records that soldiers feel increasingly well upheld and resourced on operations and praises healing caring in-theatre and in the UK.

It additionally relays concerns about the outcome of monetary vigour on wake up in in in in in in in between operational tours and provides early notice of the ensuing stroke on morale. Resources are parsimonious at the impulse and Afghanistan is the main effort.

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Lord Ashcroft: 5 unanswered questions

Dominic Kennedy & , : {}

Five questions that Lord Ashcroft and the Conservative Party still need to answer

1 When, if ever, did Lord Ashcroft discuss it

a) William Hague

b) Iain Duncan Smith

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c) Michael Howard

d) David Cameron

that he paid no UK taxes on any of his estimated �1.1 billion abroad fortune?

2 Why has Lord Ashcroft one after another to lay in the House of Lords even after Mr Cameron pronounced such non-taxpayers should be released from Parliament?

3 Why did Lord Ashcroft and Mr Hague furnish a signed, witnessed, transparent and undeniable . . . honest and contracting declaration that he would turn henceforth proprietor in Britain usually prior to he was since a nobility usually for the newly ennobled office worker to outlay ten years avoiding full UK taxes?

4 Why did the Conservative Party accept some-more than �5 million from Lord Ashcroft after nominating him for a chair in the Lords whilst his abroad gain stayed free from British tax?

5 Why has Lord Ashcroft right away certified he is a non-dom after insisting for years, to the annoyance of Tory politicians, that his taxation standing is private?

Widow of assassinated Rwandan boss arrested World headlines The Guardian

Agathe Habyarimana, graphic in 1977 in Paris. Photograph: STF/AFP/Getty Images

The widow of the Rwandan boss whose gangland slaying noted the commencement of the 1994 violent violent death has been arrested in France on charges of organising the mass killings. Agathe Habyarimana, who has been vital underneath French insurance for fifteen years notwithstanding clever of justification that she played a heading purpose in the nonconformist organisations at the back of the genocide, was incarcerated days after President Nicolas Sarkozy visited Rwanda and betrothed a new epoch of co-operation in in in between the dual countries.

Habyarimana, 67, was taken from her home in Courcouronnes, south of Paris, by French officials behaving on a Rwandan detain aver released late last year. The authorities in the capital, Kigali, credit her of personification a key purpose in formulation the violent violent death prior to and after the violent death of her husband, Juvénal Habyarimana, whose craft was shot down.

The former initial woman was at the heart of a class of chosen Hutus well known as the Akazu ("little house"), that was executive to the organization of the violent violent death in that about 800,000 people, often Tutsis, were murdered. The organisation is additionally is believed by a little to have assassinated the president.

The head of Rwanda"s inhabitant commission for the quarrel opposite genocide, Jean de Dieu Mucyo, claimed currently that Mrs Habyarimana was the "main architect" of the genocide.

But whilst he welcomed her arrest, he pronounced "we don"t design France to recover her" for extradition.

After her arrest, Habyarimana was available to lapse to her home underneath legal supervision. She is approaching to crop up prior to a Paris probity inside of 10 days to listen to possibly she will be extradited to Kigali or potentially face hearing in France.

Courts in France and Britain have formerly ruled that Rwandans indicted of violent violent death might not get a satisfactory hearing in their home country.

The Rwandan supervision praised France"s preference to detain Habyarimana.

"We are speedy by these new developments and the actuality that the prolonged arm of the law has eventually taken the course," the probity minister, Tharcisse Karugarama, said.

Habyarimana, who was flown out of Rwanda by the French during the violent violent death and lived in Kenya for multiform years prior to settling in France in 1998, has denied any impasse in the mass killings.

Her detain comes five days after Sarkozy became the initial French boss to revisit Rwanda in twenty-five years. In a press discussion with his counterpart, Paul Kagame, last week, he vowed to "turn an intensely unpleasant page" on new history, observant those obliged for the violent violent death contingency be found and punished.

"Are there any in France? The probity complement contingency decide," he said.

Diplomatic family in in in between the dual countries were cut in 2006 after a French decider released detain warrants for 9 people close to Kagame over the gangland slaying of President Habyarimana.

The aver was released on the jurisdictional drift that the dual pilots of the broken craft were French. But that review has mostly been discredited after key witnesses withdrew their sworn statement and it was shown that the decider relied heavily on the accounts of men indicted of genocide.

Kigali, in turn, indicted Paris of on condition that domestic and troops await to the Habyarimana regime, together with the precision of nonconformist militias who led the mass killings of Tutsis.

Diplomatic ties in in in between the countries were easy usually in November.

Habyarimana was for a little years stable by ties to the former French president, François Mitterrand, and his family. But the authorities in France, that violent violent death survivors have described as a breakwater for instigators of the 100 days of killing, had in new years shown signs of cooling towards her.

Her ask for domestic asylum, primarily deserted in 2004, was definitively quashed in Oct last year when the French legislature of state refused her the right to appeal, observant she had been "at the heart" of a genocidal regime.

Others concerned in the violent violent death additionally found insurance in France, together with a priest, Wenceslas Munyeshyaka, who became scandalous for wearing a cranky around his neck and a gun on his hip as he comparison who would live and who would die at his church in Kigali. He was convicted of violent violent death and rape in absentia by a Rwandan troops court.

Munyeshyaka was arrested in France in 2008 underneath vigour from the general judiciary for Rwanda but he has nonetheless to be brought to trial.

It was not rught away transparent what would occur to Habyarimana. Her lawyer, Philippe Meilhac, pronounced his customer would exclude to agree to extradition. He said: "If she contingency be questioned, she would similar to to verbalise prior to possibly a French or an general court. But she does not cruise the Rwandan rapist probity complement to be amply eccentric or impartial."

Baby P legislature improving, says Ofsted Society

Haringey children"s services was plunged in to predicament by the cheer of the genocide of seventeen month old Peter Connelly. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

The legislature kid insurance use heavily criticised for the purpose in the Baby Peter tragedy is display signs of "progress" after spending millions on improvements, together with employing amicable workers from the US, according to an central report

An inspectors inform published currently says that accordant attempts by Haringey legislature in north London to revoke frontline staff workloads, facilitate official IT systems, and get absolved of poorly-performing employees are commencement to bear fruit, a year after the children"s services dialect was plunged in to predicament by the cheer over the genocide of seventeen month-old Peter Connelly.

The in all certain Ofsted inform says that after primary difficulties - a prior investigation published 6 months ago identified critical problems - children"s services in the precinct are commencement to have "good swell overall."

The legislature has pumped over £4m in to the discouraged defence services in the past twelve months, borrowed staff from alternative internal authorities, hired some-more managers and taken on 35 additional defence professionals, together with seventeen amicable workers alien from the USA. The NHS in Haringey outlayed £1.7m to swell health caller numbers, and sinecure an additional expert paediatrician.

Ofsted says there is right away "consistent justification of mostly acceptable standards" being completed via most of the service. The drawn out "disaffection" in between kid insurance staff clear the last time inspectors visited the legislature "has mostly dissipated", it says, whilst increasing spirit is reflected in "near zero" cavity levels, and low staff turnover. Partnership operative in between legislature staff, NHS workers, military and alternative agencies is most improved.

It says: "The legislature and the partners have taken strong and well-targeted movement to plunge in to shortfalls in practice. Many young kids and family groups are right away commencement to embrace a some-more timely and efficient service."

But it warns that "much stays to be done" if Haringey is to consistently grasp improved outcomes for at-risk young kids and grasp the desirous alleviation targets. It says assessments of at-risk young kids are still not rapid enough, box annals mostly miss critical details, and key messages about the significance of great kid insurance use are not removing though to kid minders and nurseries in the borough.

"Members, managers and staff are picturesque that their perceptions of great swell do not proportion simplistically to the feat of great standards of government and practice, says the report."

Claire Kober, the personality of labour-run Haringey legislature said: "The Ofsted inform is great news. It shows that a lot of the work we have finished over the last twelve months is starting to bear fruit. But it"s a swell report. There"s no relief here, and no idea that the pursuit is done. We are usually one year in to a 3 year programme."

Baby Peter, a toddler who was on Haringey"s kid insurance register, died brutally at the hands of his mother"s partner in Aug 2007. After the self-assurance of his killers in Nov 2008, the successive media and open cheer resulted in the argumentative removal of Sharon Shoesmith, Haringey"s former executive of children"s services, by the children"s cabinet member Ed Balls and the abdication of the legislature leader, George Meehan. A legal examination of Ball"s decision, brought by Shoesmith, is approaching in the successive couple of weeks.

The debate - and the successive sackings of 4 amicable workers concerned in the Baby P box - caused spirit to fall at the council, and forced it to interest to beside authorities to "lend" it staff to cope with an mass departure of experienced defence professionals. Haringey was forced to obstruct £2.5m in to the children"s services budget, whilst Balls"s dialect stumped up a serve £1.7m, as referrals to amicable services of suspected cases of kid abuse or slight soared by 50%.

Last year Haringey pronounced it directed to have an "outstanding" children"s services dialect inside of 3 years, and that by 2012 "there will be no disbelief that what we do in Haringey is as great as it gets."