One of the world’s oldest football leagues is to introduce secret shoppers to spy on officials and players who swear during games, its chairman said.
The Northern League, formed in 1889, could then name and shame the worst offending clubs and provide financial bonuses for those who keep it clean.
The league, which has 46 clubs from Alnwick, Northumberland, to Northallerton, has led a number of high-profile campaigns against swearing, which is contrary to the laws of the game, and which puts off families from watching.
Next season the league will send secret shoppers to monitor games – despite the opposition of certain members opposed to snooping.
League chairman Mike Amos said: “If you go to a Premier League game with 50,000 people there and the players and management are effing and blinding, you can’t hear it, and so in a sense, it doesn’t matter. But if you are at a game with 100 people in the ground, you can hear.
“People say to me ‘it’s a passionate game’ and it is, but it is also a disciplined game.”
Mr Amos said the laws of football allow a referee to send off a player or manager who uses offensive language, but few do.
Match officials may be wary of being marked down by clubs if they tackle the issue – meaning referees would struggle to get promotion through the leagues.
Mr Amos, who has been league chairman for 16 years, said the FA could stamp out the issue if they took a stand, but it seemed reluctant to do so.
A previous attempt to tackle swearing by introducing a zero tolerance policy failed to win the governing body’s backing, after it was initially praised by the FA.
“We are not going to persuade the referees to act without the FA’s backing, so we have to persuade the clubs and their personnel not to do it,” he said.
League chiefs know the worst offending clubs and the chairman said those with managers who swear from the technical area also had a problem with players using bad language. “If the managers are disciplined, then the players tend to be,” he said.
Texas Wholesale Power Prices Could Increase - KCEN TV NBC 6
UK Business Confidence Plunges In May - huffingtonpost.co.uk
Business confidence in the wider economy plunged in May as companies were shaken by developments in the crisis-hit eurozone, a survey showed on Wednesday.
The Lloyds Bank Wholesale Banking and Markets Business Barometer fell to minus 21% from 26% last month, meaning most respondents are negative on the view of the economy.
The eurozone crisis continued to escalate throughout May as fears grew over the health of the Spanish economy and the possibility of Greece exiting the euro.
Trevor Williams, chief economist at Lloyds Bank Wholesale Banking & Markets, said: "The renewed concern around the eurozone is clearly having an impact on businesses' sentiment towards prospects for the UK economy and, to a lesser extent, to their own prospects."
Companies also became less confident about their own prospects, although the decline was not as severe as the sentiment towards the broader economic outlook.
Businesses' confidence in relation to their own prospects currently stands at 35%, down eight points on April's 43%, Lloyds said, which still remains higher than during the worst of the financial crisis in 2008/09.
The survey data suggest an underlying 0.2% growth in gross domestic product (GDP) between April and June, Lloyds said, but only once the impact of the Diamond Jubilee is taken into account, which is likely to have reduced growth by 0.5 percentage points.
The most notable declines in confidence in May came in the North and Midlands and in the retail and distribution sector.
The survey comes after accountants Ernst & Young said the recovery was being undermined by "zombie" companies. They claimed "financially undead" companies were holding back the economy and should be allowed to fail.
The deepening troubles in the eurozone have also hit confidence on stock markets.
Debt-ridden Greece, which is in its fifth year of recession, faces a crucial election later this month, which has been branded a referendum on whether it will stay in the eurozone and stomach more painful austerity measures.
Meanwhile, there are fears over the health of Spain's banking sector, after its fourth biggest lender, Bankia, said it needed a 19 billion euro (£15.2 billion) bail-out. In the UK, banking stocks have been among the worst hit.
Galloway calls off meeting over Bradford shopping mall protest - yorkshirepost
BRADFORD West MP George Galloway has cancelled a meeting with the city’s Chamber of Commerce after its president criticised the Occupy Westfield protests as being “damaging” to the city’s reputation.
The Respect politician pulled out of the scheduled meeting later this month with Stephen Wright saying that “clearly Mr Wright and I have nothing polite to say to each other”.
His comments came after Mr Wright issued a statement in which he claimed that the sit-in protesters at the stalled-shopping development were “doing more harm than good” and were only serving to “undermine the activity being done to paint Bradford as a worthwhile place to invest”.
However Mr Galloway said that it was “rampant unemployment, a massive hole in the heart of the city and an iconic building done up in bubble wrap which are harming the image of Bradford”.
The Occupy Westfield protest – designed to bring attention to the lack of progress on the city’s shopping centre – has had the backing of the Respect Party, with several members having taken part in it.
Mr Galloway said: “Just ask businesses surrounding the Westfield hole how business has suffered since it was dug.
“I wholeheartedly support the occupation of the site as a way of drawing attention to the failure of this council and the developers to even lay one brick there, and as a way of putting pressure on both of them either to start the development or get out of the way and allow others with fresh ideas to take over.”
The Occupy Westfield protest is now in its second week, with around 40 Bradford residents having set up camp in the middle of the 10 acre hole where the shopping centre is planned to be built.
Protesters, displeased with the lack of progress on the construction, have been demanding meetings with politicians and are calling for a public inquiry. They also plan to meet city centre businesses today to see how they feel about the protest group’s actions.
Westfield took control of the site in 2004 and demolished large swathes of the city centre to make way for the £300m mixed use shopping centre and leisure development. It mothballed this scheme in 2009 and now has plans for a smaller shopping mall.
Although work has yet to begin on construction Westfield has consistently maintained it is committed to the scheme, a view supported by the Bradford Chamber and Bradford Council.
Is there still a place for the high street as online shopping continues to grow? - femalefirst.co.uk
Online shopping has plenty of perks, the most important being that you can avoid cues and angry people, but then so does shopping on the high street. Which do you prefer?
The question constantly uprises about whether the British high street can survive when online shopping continues to rise. What do you think?
The instant buzz of shopping online has reached a new high for clothes shopping, with 44 per cent of Brits now hitting the net at least once a month or more for their clothing purchases, with a committed 3 per cent doing this daily. This is second only to groceries in terms of the nation’s buying habits, according to new research from Cotton Council International, published today.
Clothes shopping online has risen to 13 per cent - up from only 3 per cent two years ago, with consumers moving away from chain and speciality stores.
New research reveals 42 per cent of consumers now use the internet to compare products and prices across stores; a third go online to browse the latest styles.
Stephanie Thiers-Ratcliffe, International Marketing Manager, Cotton Council International comments: “Our research reveals that there has been a marked uplift for people going online to research and buy clothing, but not at the expense of quality. This trend has seen retailers across the board take more of an interest in their online clothing offering – ensuring the customer experience, delivered both on and offline, is second to none.”
This year’s findings also shows that when shopping, Brits are choosing natural fibres, with over a third feeling that better quality clothing comes from natural fibres. And when shopping it’s cotton that comes out in front as the fabric of choice, with over a half of consumers heralding it as their preferred fibre for the clothes they like to wear the most.
Mirroring the economic climate, only 10% of us bought more than £500 on clothes last year, with the average amount spent being only £230. Over half of Brits fear they have less money to spend on clothing compared to last year, making spotting a bargain more important than ever as 40% of us now admit we buy clothes with at least a 20% discount all or most of the time. We’re also shopping less for ourselves than two years ago, as the figures indicate a 9 per cent drop, which leaves just 40 per cent of us now shopping once a month or more for clothes.
Nonetheless, a prevailing trait for British shoppers remains the desire for quality – with almost 60 per cent of us preferring to spend more on better quality items, with 61 per cent of consumers viewing ‘good quality’ clothes as those that are durable and long-lasting.
Cotton Council International’s biennial research – The Global Lifestyle Monitor Survey (GLM) investigates a wide range of lifestyle issues related to clothing, shopping and textiles among UK residents.
Stephanie Thiers-Ratcliffe, continues: “Today’s shoppers are more vigilant than ever – thinking harder about their clothing purchases and examining what and how much they need to buy. When shoppers are spending their cash they are ensuring that they get the best value by choosing quality items. Our COTTON USA ‘Naturally’ Mark is a symbol of purity, strength, comfort and quality and helps shoppers to identify premium cotton items that are made to last.”
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