Commons committee says 2.4 million people to be classed as fuel poor rather than 3.2 million under Energy Bill amendments

The government has been accused of "shifting the goalposts" to bring down the number of households classed as in fuel poverty.

Amendments to the Energy Bill would change definitions so that 2.4 million people were classed as fuel poor rather than 3.2 million.


A report from the Commons environmental audit committee pointed out that currently families fall into the category if they spend more than 10% of income on fuel "to maintain an adequate level of warmth".

But the new indicator would mean they were regarded as in hardship only if they have "above average fuel costs" that would leave them with "a residual income below the official poverty line".

Police believe that fictitious invoices were part of a pan-European tax evasion scheme worth $5 billion

Following the "Globes" exposé on Monday that the Israel Police was cooperating with Interpol in an investigation into tax evasion and money laundering by French Jews, which included raiding homes in Herzliya Pituah, "Globes" has obtained exclusive details about the international case, which is apparently large in scale. Sources inform ''Globes'' that, in the past few months, French police officers have been in Israel to monitor wealthy new immigrants from France, recorded conversations at cafes and exclusive restaurants in central Israel, bugged phone calls, and ultimately raided homes in luxury neighborhoods. Israeli police officers participated in the raids, but most of the detective work in Israel was carried out by undercover French police officers.

Last week's raids were not the first carried out as part of the international investigation. The sources said that, in recent months, there have raids on the homes of wealthy immigrants who were suspected of involvement in tax evasion and money laundering, documents were seized, and the French police questioned some of the suspects. One of the officers involved in the raids told "Globes", "French-speaking investigators arrived at the house together with Israeli police officers and turned it upside down. They left total chaos behind them."

The sources added that the worldwide tax evasion and money laundering allegedly was carried out in several European countries, and was not limited to France. The tax evasion is estimated at $5 billion.

It is hard to believe that even though 64% of the American public favors a negotiated settlement with Iran over its nuclear program fully 37% of those polled also believe that the United States actually needs Israel's permission before coming to any kind of agreement. To paraphrase the late great Mitt Romney, is that a percentage that we will never be able to reach no matter how good the arguments are for "taking responsibility" and restoring American sovereignty in the area of foreign affairs? One has to suspect that the percentage consists mostly of the Christian-Zionists, who lately have been conducting a large scale "action alert" email campaign directed at Congress and the White House to force the cancellation of talks. They are perhaps heeding the demand of Harvard Professor and professional Israel apologist Alan Dershowitz that the "entire pro-Israel community must unite" to stop any agreement.

Tea Party Congressman Louie Gohmert of Texas provided his own explanation for why "a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do" to the House of Representatives last Wednesday saying "There are many who have been aware of Scripture, and it has often been a guide in our relations with Israel. Some of us believe that the Bible is accurate. Certainly, so many prophesies have been fulfilled, and if that is true, this administration, unless they can find a verse that accurately says that those who betray Israel will be blessed, then this country is being dug in a deeper hole by this administration, and its betrayals of Israel's trust and Israel's friendship." Gohmert, for all his sublime ignorance, is unfortunately not alone. By virtue of the evangelism and fine example set by the likes of Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin the scripture thumpers have escaped from the Bible Belt and are now to be found everywhere.

A prisoner has received an €80,000 tax bill for the earnings he made while dealing heroin. His lawyer, Samira Boudiba, said the bill included deductions for transport costs and personal consumption for three years of drug dealing.

"They addressed it to my client as a micro-entrepreneur. They're levying on drug trafficking, since 2008 and giving him a turnover - it's completely extraordinary," he told Libération.

The tax office based their calculations on €15 for a gram of heroin, deducting 4g a day for personal consumption and a further €2,000 a year for expenses related to the use of a personal vehicle for business.

"How can you levy taxes on a business that is completely illegal?" he added, saying that he would be taking the matter to France's constitutional council.

The dealer was sentenced to four years in prison earlier this year and is currently being held in Nancy. The authorities have already confiscated €40,000 in cash.

On the last day of a Vilnius summit, Ukraine has confirmed it will delay signing its landmark trade agreement with the EU, saying the West failed to offer enough immediate economic benefits.

After years of planning the Eastern Partnership Summit and long hours of trade talks in the Lithuanian capital, the results at the summit were split: Ukraine and Armenia did not join, while Moldova, and Georgia have signed a trade Association Agreement with the EU on Friday, November 29.

Ukraine's President Viktor Yanukovich said he will reconsider negotiations only after Europe offers more attractive "economic aid to Ukraine."

Ukraine faces debt repayments of more than $60 billion, or a third of the country's GDP, by July 2015, according to July Central Bank Data.

Meanwhile, the EU offered to compensate Ukraine to the tune of 1 billion euros for various losses that would result from a stricter trade regime by Russia that would follow the signing.

Ukraine needs more time to get prepared "to minimalize any negative effects in the initial period, which will definitely be felt by vulnerable parts of Ukrainian society," Yanukovych said, Interfax reported.

Dalia Grybauskaite, President of Lithuania, insisted the trade agreement terms won't be changed.

"The EU isn't going to bargain further. All the key terms are known. There will be no new ones," Grybauskaite, who presided over Friday's conference, said.

"I think that today's [Friday] Ukrainian leadership is choosing the way which is going nowhere," Grybauskaite added.

Both Moscow and Brussels have said they respect Ukraine's sovereign decision, but that doesn't mean the battle is over for Europe's second-largest country by landmass, with a $176-billion economy and a population of 45 million.

The following presents both roads that Ukraine faces, in facts and numbers.

British officials burned and dumped at sea documents from colonies that were about to become independent in a systematic effort to hide their "dirty" secrets, newly released files showed on Friday.

Under Operation Legacy, officials in Kenya, Uganda, Malaysia, Tanzania, Jamaica and other former British colonial territories were briefed on how to dispose of documents that "might embarrass Her Majesty's Government".

Newly declassified Foreign Office files reveal how the "splendid incinerator" at the Royal Navy base in Singapore was used to destroy lorry loads of files from the region.

Other officials wrote of documents being dumped "in deep and current-free water at the maximum practicable distance from shore", according to the documents in the National Archives.

One dispatch from Kenya in 1961 mentions the formation of a committee dealing with "'dirty' aspects of protective security" which would "clean" Kenyan intelligence files, according to The Times newspaper.

Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has rejected protesters' demands that she step down, amid ongoing clashes in Bangkok.

Ms Yingluck said the demands were not possible under the constitution, but that she remained open to talks.

More clashes broke out on Monday as protesters tried to storm the prime minister's office, Government House.

Four people have died in Thailand's worst political turmoil since the 2010 rallies that ended in violence.

"Anything I can do to make people happy, I am willing to do... but as prime minister, what I can do must be under the constitution," Ms Yingluck said in a televised address.

Anti-government demonstrators have been calling on Ms Yingluck to step down, with protest leader and former opposition politician Suthep Thaugsuban saying on Sunday that Ms Yingluck should resign within the next "two days".

Akron, Ohio - An Amish girl fighting leukemia recently fled the United States with her parents to escape the forced administration of chemotherapy, despite an earlier ruling by an Ohio judge supporting her family's decision to halt conventional treatment.

An appeals court issued a ruling granting an attorney for Akron Children's Hospital, Maria Schimer, temporary guardianship over 11-year-old Sarah Hershberger after she begged her parents to discontinue the toxic drugs being administered to fight cancer.

"Parental rights, even if based upon firm belief and honest convictions can be limited in order to protect the 'best interests' of the child," the court ruled.

"We've seen how sick [chemotherapy] makes her," the girl's father, Andy Hershberger, said before the appeals court handed down its decision on October 1st. "She would have more suffering doing chemo than not."

"Sarah says her doctor should be put in jail," wrote Judge John Lohn in the original ruling. "Even if the treatments are successful, there is a very good chance Sarah will become infertile and have other serious health risks for the rest of her life."

Sarah is battling Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL), a malignancy of the blood and bone marrow, which is sometimes treated systemically with a combination of powerful toxic drugs. Among these agents is Cytoxan, a derivative of the chemical weapon mustard gas, which was used extensively to shell entrenched troops during World War I and purportedly used by the Saddam Hussein regime against masses of Iranian soldiers during the First Persian Gulf War.

Cytoxan treatments are designed to damage the DNA of cancerous cells. It also destroys healthy, fast-growing tissues in the mouth, gastrointestinal tract, reproductive system, hair follicles and blood stream. It has a marked effect on the body's immune system, stripping away patients' natural defenses against life-threatening infections. The drug can even induce a secondary leukemia.

The greatest danger to Israel is not the putative Iranian nuclear bomb. The greatest danger is the stupidity of our leaders.

This is not a uniquely Israeli phenomenon. A great many of the world's leaders are plain stupid, and always have been. Enough to look at what happened in Europe in July 1914, when an incredible accumulation of stupid politicians and incompetent generals plunged humanity into World War I.

But lately, Binyamin Netanyahu and almost the entire Israeli political establishment have achieved a new record in foolishness.

Let us start from the end.

Iran is the great victor. It has been warmly welcomed back into the family of civilized nations. Its currency, the rial, is jumping. Its prestige and influence in the region has become paramount. Its enemies in the Muslim world, Saudi Arabia and its gulf satellites, have been humiliated. Any military strike against it by anyone, including Israel, has become unthinkable.

The image of Iran as a nation of crazy ayatollahs, fostered by Netanyahu and Ahmadinejad, has disappeared. Iran now looks like a responsible country, led by sober and shrewd leaders.

Israel is the great loser. It has maneuvered itself into a position of total isolation. Its demands have been ignored, its traditional friends have distanced themselves. But above everything else, its relations with the US have been seriously damaged.

What Netanyahu and Co. are doing is almost unbelievable. Sitting on a very high branch, they are diligently sawing through it.

Jesse Ventura talks running for U.S. President independently, may run as George Washington Independent ending 2 party dominance in United States.

A man of many titles, Jesse Ventura is a politician, actor, author, US navy veteran and a former professional wrestler. He does not associate himself with either side of the political establishment.