Legislative Republicans and Democrats issued fiscal 2013 spending targets Thursday that were below the $6.242 billion budget that Gov. Terry Branstad proposed last month, with House Republicans setting funding levels nearly $119 million below Senate Democrats and $182 million below the governor by providing less money to education, human services and economic incentives and requiring state employees to pay nearly $43 million in health insurance costs.
The Arizona Senate has approved a bill creating a tax credit for motion picture production in the state.
Unemployment figures give new impetus to calls for an elected assembly for the north of England
Jobs in the north of England are being lost at four times the rate in the rest of the country, deepening the economic divide and prompting new calls for devolution of powers to an elected assembly for the north. About 98,000 jobs were lost in the north-east, north-west, Yorkshire and Humberside in 2011, according to an analysis by the centre-left thinktank IPPR North. This was an 18% increase on the previous year, dwarfing the 4.5% rise in the rest of England. In the most extreme case, in the north-east, 12% of the working-age population are unemployed compared with 6.5% in the south-west, 6.4% in the south-east and 9.9% in London.
The figures will bolster the growing movement calling for a "voice for the north" through an elected assembly. In the Observer, a letter from six Labour MPs from across the north, supported by parliamentary colleagues from other regions, says that the debate over Scotland's potential move to further devolution or independence should not "ignore the growing political marginalisation of the north of England, with a cabinet dominated by southern politicians who seem to know little, and care even less, of the economic and social problems of the north".
It demands that the north is given a "stronger say in its own destiny" and calls for a debate on the benefits of directly elected regional government. The MPs, who are patrons of a new thinktank, the Hannah Mitchell Foundation, established to campaign for an elected assembly, said: "We need to move on from the pessimism that descended on politicians after the defeat of the referendum for north-east devolution in 2004, and recognise that the UK has changed."
Barry Sheerman, the MP for Huddersfield and a signatory of the letter, said the movement aspired to create an assembly, but in the short term he believed that each region should have a commission made up of business and academic leaders to protect its particular interests.
"I am very passionate about this. The north has a much larger population than Scotland, and look at London, which has an assembly and a powerful mayor to protect its interests. With the scrapping of the regional development agencies, we don't have a body to deal with strategic problems and issues for the north.
"As I keep telling the prime minister and chancellor, the northern regions have been in recession for years."
Linda Riordan, MP for Halifax, said: "The disparities between the north and south are widening and demand action and it is extraordinary that the government is getting rid of the regional development agencies that provided us with some support."
The government is funding 164 projects through a regional growth fund, "creating and safeguarding" more than 330,000 jobs, supported by more than £6bn of private investment. In November, the chancellor announced an additional £1bn for the fund, bringing the total to £2.4bn.
State House Democrats want lawmakers and state officers to be more accountable and open about where they get personal and campaign donations. The package of bills and a resolution to amend the state constitution are aimed primarily at money from corporations.
A legislative effort to restrict tax incentives in enterprise zones would establish long-overdue limits on this bloated program.
South Dakota's efforts to attract new companies and help existing ones expand could be hurt by the public vote scheduled for November on a new business grant program, Gov. Dennis Daugaard said Thursday.
Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster is renewing a call for lawmakers to change a state law related to a 1998 settlement with big tobacco companies.
The administration of Gov. Dannel P. Malloy appears to be cooling on Keno, a game the Connecticut Lottery has endorsed as a way to boost revenues in a lottery market that turns 40 this month.
Kentucky's bourbon industry has undergone its largest expansion since prohibition over the past two years, despite an economic recession that proved bothersome to most other employers in the state, Gov. Steve Beshear said Thursday.
• Thirteen other council members vote in favour
• UK and US react with fury to decision
• Homs death toll more than 200, say activists
Russia and China have vetoed a UN security council resolution calling for the Syrian president to step down, provoking a furious reaction.
All 13 other members of the council, including the US, France and Britain, voted in favour of the resolution, which backed an Arab peace plan aimed at stopping the violence in Syria. Russia and China blocked the resolution because of what they perceived to be a potential violation of Syria's sovereignty, which could allow for military intervention or regime change.
William Hague, the foreign secretary, condemned the decision. "More than 2,000 people have died since Russia and China vetoed the last draft resolution in October 2011," he said after the vote. "How many more need to die before Russia and China allow the UN security council to act?
"Those opposing UN security council action will have to account to the Syrian people for their actions, which do nothing to help bring an end to the violence that is ravaging the country. The United Kingdom will continue to support the people of Syria and the Arab League to find an end to the violence and allow a Syrian-led political transition."
The draft resolution, tabled by Morocco, did not impose sanctions or authorise military action and contained nothing that warranted opposition, Hague said. Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, reacted angrily to the news at a press conference in Munich on Saturday night: "What more do we need to know to act decisively in the security council? To block this resolution is to bear responsibility for the horrors that are occurring on the ground in Syria."
Responding to the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, who asked "What's the endgame?", Clinton replied: "The endgame in the absence of us acting together as the international community, I fear, is civil war."
Hague accused Russia and China of siding with "the Syrian regime and its brutal suppression of the Syrian people in support of their own national interests. Their approach lets the Syrian people down, and will only encourage President Assad's brutal regime to increase the killing, as it has done in Homs over the past 24 hours."
France's ambasador to the UN, Gerard Araud, said: "It is a sad day for the council. It is a sad day for Syria ... History has compounded our shame."
The defeat came despite concerted efforts by western leaders to get security council backing for the resolution censuring the Damascus regime.
Speaking before the vote, Barack Obama called for Assad to step down following the latest bloodshed. The US president said Assad had lost his legitimacy as a ruler and had "no right" to cling to power. He said the regime's policy of terrorising its people "only indicates its inherent weakness and inevitable collapse".
Britain and France also condemned the violence and called for decisive action by the international community in an apparent rebuke to Russia, which carried out its threat to veto the draft resolution.
Death tolls cited by activists and opposition groups ranged from 217 to 260, making the Homs attack the deadliest so far in Assad's crackdown on protests that erupted 11 months ago in response to uprisings that overthrew three Arab leaders.
Hague said it was time for countries to stop giving "shelter" to the regime after the assault on Homs. "The Syrian regime's actions display President Assad's cold-blooded cynicism in the face of mounting international pressure for the UN security council to do its utmost to end the bloodshed.
"The time is long past for the international community, particularly those that have so far sheltered the Assad regime, to intensify the pressure to end over 10 months of violence."
The French foreign minister, Alain Juppe, said the Homs bloodshed was a crime against humanity and "those who block the adoption of such a resolution are taking a grave historical responsibility".
But the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, criticised the UN resolution, saying it made too few demands of anti-government armed groups, and could prejudge the outcome of a dialogue among political forces in the country.
Russian news agencies reported that Lavrov and Russia's foreign intelligence chief, Mikhail Fradkov, will meet with Assad in Damascus on Tuesday. Syria has been a key Russian ally since Soviet times and Moscow has opposed any UN demands that could be interpreted as advocating military intervention or regime change.
Earlier on Saturday, Tunisia decided to expel Syria's ambassador in response to the "bloody massacre" in Homs and said it no longer recognised the Assad regime. As news of the violence spread, a crowd of Syrians stormed their country's embassy in Cairo and protests broke out outside Syrian missions in Britain, Germany and the US.
Homs residents said pro-Assad forces began shelling the Khaldiya neighbourhood at around 8pm on Friday using artillery and mortars. They said at least 36 houses with families inside were destroyed. "We were sitting inside our house when we started hearing the shelling. We felt shells were falling on our heads," said Waleed, a resident of Khaldiya.
It was not immediately clear what had prompted Syrian forces to launch such an intense bombardment, just as diplomats at the security council were discussing the draft resolution supporting the Arab League demand for Assad to step aside.
Some activists said the violence was triggered by a wave of army defections in Homs, a stronghold of protests and armed insurgents whom Assad has vowed to crush. "The death toll is now at least 217 people killed in Homs, 138 of them killed in the Khaldiya district," Rami Abdulrahman, head of the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told Reuters, citing witnesses.
"Syrian forces are shelling the district with mortars from several locations, some buildings are on fire. There are also buildings which got destroyed."
An activist said forces bombarded Khaldiya to scare other rebel neighbourhoods. "It does not seem that they get it. Even if they kill 10 million of us, the people will not stop until we topple him."
The opposition Syrian National Council said 260 civilians were killed, describing it as "one of the most horrific massacres since the beginning of the uprising in Syria". It said it believed Assad's forces were preparing for similar attacks around Damascus and in the northern town of Jisr al-Shughour.
Another group, the Local Co-ordination Committees, gave a death toll of more than 200. It is not possible to verify activist or state media reports as Syria restricts independent media access. Video footage on the internet showed at least eight bodies assembled in a room, one of them with the top half of its head blown off. A voice on the video said the bombardment was continuing as the video was being filmed.
After talking about it for more than a decade, state legislators have given Gov. Tom Corbett a bill that boosts bingo and other small-games-of-chance jackpots -- and also potentially boosts the fundraising abilities of veterans groups, fire companies, church organizations and social clubs across the state.
The Republican leader of the Alabama Senate said Thursday he helped pay the legal bills of a Democratic senator acquitted of all charges in Alabama's gambling corruption investigation.
The Republican leader of the Alabama Senate said Thursday he helped pay the legal bills of a Democratic senator acquitted of all charges in Alabama's gambling corruption investigation.
Ten protesters and one security officer killed in Cairo and Suez in aftermath of deadly football violence
At least 11 people have been killed in clashes with Egyptian security forces amid ongoing fallout from the 74 deaths at a football match in Port Said earlier this week.
Five people were killed when hundreds of demonstrators in Cairo clashed with police near the interior ministry on Saturday morning. The protesters are demanding an end to military rule and retribution for those killed in the riots after Wednesday's match.
Abdolheliem Mahmoud, a doctor at a field hospital in Tahrir Square, said Saturday's victims died birdshot to the head or chest during overnight clashes. Another protester was in critical condition.
Demonstrators claimed that police fired rounds of teargas into the crowds and field hospitals were set up in streets near the interior ministry to help hundreds of cases of suffocation.
Some protesters chanted for the execution of Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the head of Egypt's ruling military council, who has been accused of mismanaging the country's transition to democracy.
A security official confirmed that an officer died on Friday after an armoured police vehicle ran him over during the protests outside the ministry.
Also on Friday, security forces in the port city of Suez opened fire on a crowd of several thousand outside the police headquarters, killing five people, a police official said. Egypt's state news agency, Mena, reported that the victims were aged between 18 and 21.
About 2,500 people have been injured in clashes between protesters and security forces in the three days since the football deaths, the health ministry said.
The opposition April 6 movement said it was trying to broker a peace deal between security officers and protesters. It called for the Cabinet to resign and denounced the police for failing to protect people after the football match.
"At the least, this shortcoming [in security] can be described as amounting to complicity," the group said.
There have been accusations that plainclothes officers took part in the riot. Some have alleged that riot police intentionally allowed the violence in Port Said to happen to retaliate against fans of the visiting team Al Ahly, known as ultras, who played a key role in clashes with security forces during the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak.
Fears of an internet meltdown during the London Games may lead to web access being rationed for British businesses
British businesses are being warned that they could lose their internet connections during the Olympics due to a surge in the number of people going online at key times. The demand could be such that internet companies might be forced to ration access, according to official advice.
The warning, in the Cabinet Office's official advice, Preparing your Business for the Games, says that the country's telecoms system may be unable to cope with demand to access the internet in certain areas. Businesses are being encouraged to offer staff flexible working arrangements to try to ease the pressure.
The document, shared with government departments, states: "It is possible that internet services may be slower during the Games or, in very severe cases, there may be dropouts due to an increased number of people accessing the internet."
The document says that internet service providers "may introduce data caps during peak times to try to spread the loading and give a more equal service to their entire customer base", leading to concerns that major corporations or those in areas of high usage could experience problems.
Experts said the warning was timely and showed that companies needed to examine whether their IT systems would be capable of allowing staff to work from home.
"A lot of businesses have still not prepared for the enormous risks presented by the London Games," said Kathryn Hurt, head of projects for MWB Business Exchange, which provides office space to businesses. "There's been a lot of discussion about traffic hotspots, but very little about potential internet traffic problems. The risk is that home workers are unable to work effectively due to over-capacity."
The government believes that encouraging businesses to allow staff to work from other offices or home, or at different times, is key to easing congestion in the capital this summer.
The Olympic and Paralympic Games are the largest sporting events in the world, with organisers claiming they are equivalent to holding the FA Cup final, Wimbledon tennis championships and London Marathon on the same day. As many as 800,000 spectators and 55,000 athletes, officials, organisers and press are expected to be travelling to and from Olympic venues every day.
The Games organisers predict that on 3 August 2012, the first day of the track and field events, London's public transport will experience an extra three million trips on top of the 12 million made on an average workday.
The Department for Transport (DfT)will launch Operation StepChange, a week-long pilot across Whitehall departments, in which many staff will work from home. Ministers believe the project could result in a "permanent revolution" in which home-working becomes common practice for civil servants, who are expected to use technology such as video conferencing to communicate with colleagues.
However, the initiative is not without its setbacks. The DfT conducted Operation Footfall, a pilot, last August, that resulted in participating staff experiencing internet connection problems, according to those familiar with the project.
"To make sure our plans are robust, we are running a test week," a DfT spokesman said. "This is about encouraging staff to reduce the impact of their travel by either walking or cycling."
Flawed policies at Delaware State University led to millions of dollars in no-bid building contracts and the risk of collusion with vendors, an investigation by the state's Auditor of Accounts has found.
The effort to erect giant wind turbines off of Maryland's Atlantic Coast got a boost today. Federal officials announced the completion of an environmental review that found no negative effects of building wind farms over 80,000 acres of the Atlantic near Maryland.
Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley's quest for offshore wind energy got a boost Thursday from the Obama administration, but state lawmakers still have concerns about its cost and whether there is corporate demand and congressional support for the technology.
The state moved closer this week to providing companies such as Facebook assurance they won't face higher property taxes in enterprise zones.
Demand for £400m subsidies to be slashed threatens claim to be the 'greenest government ever'
The challenge facing the new Liberal Democrat energy secretary, Ed Davey, has been laid bare by the revelation that 101 Tory MPs are demanding drastic cuts to the £400m-a-year government subsidies for wind farms.
The demands from Conservative MPs, made in a letter to David Cameron, came as a former Liberal Democrat leader, Menzies Campbell, warned that there would be serious trouble from his party's activists if there was any rowing back from the coalition's commitment to run the "greenest government ever".
Policy on wind farms threatens to become a major fault line between the Tories, many of whom say they are expensive and inefficient, and the Lib Dems, who see the building of 4,500 more turbines as an essential part of the drive to cut carbon emissions.
In the letter, the Tory MPs tell the prime minister they are becoming "more and more concerned" about the commitment to "support for onshore wind energy production".
The letter is evidence of growing pressure from Conservatives to resist Liberal Democrat pressure to promote green policies which many Tories believe have no proved economic or environmental benefit. The warning came as Campbell said the Lib Dem grassroots would tolerate no rowing back from the green agenda that is central to their purpose in government following the resignation of Chris Huhne.
Huhne, one of the Lib Dems' toughest operators, resigned as energy secretary to mount a "robust defence" of claims that he persuaded his ex-wife, Vicky Pryce, to take his penalty points for a speeding offence in 2003. The MP for Eastleigh, Hampshire, and his ex-wife, who faces a related charge, will appear before Westminster magistrates on 16 February. The charge carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
Campbell told the Observer that the Lib Dems' credibility rested on the new energy secretary taking as tough a line on green issues as Huhne and not giving in to the demands of the Tory right.
"Liberal Democrat voters, and in particular Lib Dem activists, will not be content if there is any rowing back on the green agenda," he said. "Commitment to the environment has an iconic place in the Lib Dem approach and if we were seen to water that down, publicly and privately, things could get very tough."
Environmentalists expressed dismay at the loss of Huhne from the heart of government. Greenpeace said he had been "a vocal advocate for the green agenda in a government whose green credentials are looking more than a little tarnished".
Huhne was furious when the chancellor, George Osborne, suggested in his autumn statement last November that the government could not put green policies before the need to create jobs.
"We are not going to save the planet by shutting down our steel mills, aluminium smelters and paper manufacturers," the chancellor said. "All we will be doing is exporting valuable jobs out of Britain."
Davey, 46, the former consumer affairs minister, , who has had a relatively low-profile career in the party until now, will join Nick Clegg at an event which officials insist will demonstrate the party's determination to keep green policies at the top of the government's agenda.
Clegg is due to give a major speech on the environment within weeks, before Osborne's budget next month. Lib Dem sources said Davey, Clegg and others would be working on ideas on how to raise money to pay for more tax cuts for low earners through pollution taxes, most probably on aviation.
On his promotion to the Cabinet, Davey said he was "particularly conscious of the impact on consumers' households across the country of high energy bills". He made clear he would continue with Huhne's plans to increase the number of wind farms and "a green economy where there's lots of green jobs to help growth in our economy".
He added: "I am determined to work to follow on Chris's priorities, the Liberal Democrats' priorities, the coalition government's priorities and make them my priorities."
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