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New Equality Bill Needed to Grant Men More Leisure

Yesterday to mark International Women’s Day, the OECD published a report comparing the amounts of leisure enjoyed on average per day by men and women in the developed world. The report found that, on average,  women enjoyed less leisure than men, a finding that led it to conclude that ‘governments and firms need to do more to tackle the gender equality gap’.

I wonder how keen the OECD would have been to make such a  call had the methodology it employed to compute the quantities of leisure enjoyed by the two sexes not been quite so obviously flawed.

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A Greek Tragedy

Greece’s financial woes dominated last week’s EU Summit, writes Natalie Hamill. With government debt at 113% of GDP, and a public deficit of 12.7% (more than 4 times that allowed under the EU’s Stability and Growth Pact (SGP). Greece has been spending far beyond her means.

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A touch of democracy for the EU?

The European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) is a little-known Clause in the Lisbon Treaty (the much embattled re-formulation of the failed EU Constitution, which came into force in Dec 2009). Under the ECI, 1million EU citizens from a “significant number” of EU states can submit an “appropriate” proposal to the EU Commission suggesting that it drafts new legislation.

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Txt Spk: bd 4 skls?

Apparently children who are down with the latest literary lingo are bang on with their understanding of the English language. Research published by the University of Coventry earlier this week rather unhelpfully concludes that “children’s use of textisms is far from problematic.”

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No apathy among medical students

A criticism often laid at the medical profession is that they are quick to moan at the state of the NHS or the latest government initiative (and, on many counts, they may well be forgiven), but slow to engage in real debate and come up with meaningful alternatives.  The status quo is much easier.  Not so with medical students, it appears, where the desire to get involved in discussion about health policy and the future direction of the NHS appears insatiable.  Last week, 220 turned up to learn more about the NHS, how it is structured, how it works, and debate the options.  Read more here.

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One Environmental Hazard That Could Easily Be Dealt With

Earlier this year, when a local housing association officer voiced concerns to Merseyside police about the dogs being bred at a terraced house in Wavertree, he was told that it wasn’t a police matter and no further action was taken. In the early hours of yesterday morning, the four year old grandson of the owner of the house was mauled to death by a dog while staying there. This brings to five the number of children who have since 2006 been savaged to death by dogs in England.

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