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Further trouble for Manx2 as plane crash lands

By Pat Flynn

Saturday, March 10, 2012

An airplane operated on behalf of the same company involved in the fatal crash at Cork Airport last year, crash landed on the Isle of Man on Thursday.

Links Air flight NM-309 was arriving at Ronaldsway Airport on the Isle of Man from Leeds when it veered off the runway into the grass after the right main landing gear apparently collapsed.

There were 12 passengers and 2 crew on board the British Aerospace Jetstream 3102 turboprop aircraft, however no-one was injured. The aircraft sustained substantial damage.

It is also understood that it took fire crews almost five minutes to respond the incident, which was not immediately spotted by air traffic controllers.

It has been reported that it was the crew of another aircraft which reported the incident to the tower.

The incident is currently under investigation by British authorities.

Manx2, a virtual commuter airline, sells flights from the Isle of Man to a number of British airports.

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Further trouble for Manx2 as plane crash lands

GEORGE TOWN, GRAND CAYMAN, CAYMAN ISLANDS--(Marketwire -03/09/12)- Consolidated Water Co. Ltd. (NASDAQ: CWCO - News), which develops and operates seawater desalination plants and water distribution systems in areas of the world where naturally occurring supplies of potable water are scarce or nonexistent, today announced that it has scheduled an investor conference call for 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time (EDT) on Friday, March 16, 2012, to review the Company's operating results for the year ended December 31, 2011, along with other relevant topics of interest.

Shareholders and other interested parties may participate in the conference call by dialing 877-317-6789 (international/local participants dial 412-317-6789) and requesting participation in the "Consolidated Water Co. Ltd. Conference Call" a few minutes before 11:00 a.m. EDT on Friday, March 16, 2012.

A replay of the conference call will be available one hour after the call through Monday, March 26, 2012 at 9:00 a.m. EDT by dialing 877-344-7529 (international/local participants dial 412-317-0088) and entering the conference ID# 10011339 and on the Company's website at http://www.cwco.com through March 26, 2012.

CWCO-E

About Consolidated Water Co. Ltd.

Consolidated Water Co. Ltd. develops and operates seawater desalination plants and water distribution systems in areas of the world where naturally occurring supplies of potable water are scarce or nonexistent. The Company operates water production and/or distribution facilities in the Cayman Islands, Belize, the British Virgin Islands, and The Commonwealth of The Bahamas.

Consolidated Water Co. Ltd. is headquartered in George Town, Grand Cayman, in the Cayman Islands. The Company's ordinary (common) shares are traded on the NASDAQ Global Select Market under the symbol "CWCO". Additional information on the Company is available on its website at http://www.cwco.com

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Consolidated Water Co. Ltd. to Host 2011 Operating Results Conference Call on Friday, March 16, 2012

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum's main message to Republican voters in Huntsville Thursday was simple. "Obamacare is, in fact, the death knell for freedom, and that's why it must be repealed," Santorum told a large crowd at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center five days before the state's GOP primary. He referred to the Affordable Care Act passed by Congress and signed into law by Obama in 2010.

Santorum said the law is the "linchpin, if you will, that would tip the scales toward a country that would no longer be free." Mitt Romney, the GOP front-runner who signed a similar health care law while governor of Massachusetts, "is singularly the worst person to make that case," Santorum said.

Praising what he said was the Founders' vision of a country with limited government and maximum freedom, Santorum said, "We have a president who believes in a country that is antithetical to that country.

"He takes more and more freedom from you, takes more and more money from you and believes, as he's doing so, that he's making your life better," Santorum said. Instead, it's "a welfare state he's growing here in America."

Defeating Obama makes the 2012 election the most important "maybe in the history of this country," Santorum said.

Speaking to a friendly crowd about twice as large as the 400-500 drawn by Newt Gingrich two days earlier in the same place, Santorum did touch on one hot social issue. Human rights don't come from the U.S. Constitution, Santorum said, but from "the dignity of being created by a loving God.

"We believe ... in the dignity of all human life, the ability of every person in America, as imperfect as we are, to continue to refine and perfect ourselves to recognize the dignity of all human life," Santorum continued, "although we still fall short in a very critical area, and that is life in the womb."

The crowd applauded loudly when he mentioned that his family home-schooled their seven children and also when he promised to balance the budget in five years, but not cut defense spending and to "invest in the technology we see in Huntsville."

"I support Paul Ryan's budget," Santorum said, referring to the Republican congressman's plan that would, among other things, repeal the health care law, cut taxes on the highest-income individuals and corporations while closing tax loopholes, turn Medicaid into a federal block-grant program, and replace Medicare with private insurance subsidized by the government.

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Santorum says health care law 'death knell for freedom'

OPINION:Media freedoms are absolutely essential to the long-term health of any democracy. New Zealand is no exception.

The production order used by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) against the National Business Review demanded that NBR give up their records, including sources, of the NBR inquiry into the South Canterbury collapse.

That collapse caused hundreds of millions of dollars of cost to tax payers. The huge losses led to allegations of improper behaviour by South Canterbury Finance.

Serious questions were also raised about incompetence of the Government and its Ministry (the Treasury).

They allowed the size of that risk to grow by hundreds of millions after the Crown guarantee was granted, and rejected alternative ways of solving the problem which may have saved tens if not hundreds of millions.

NBR was right to inquire into what had gone wrong. The SFO interference in the NBR proved beyond doubt that the SFO powers are excessive and undermine the important role of a free media.

The SFO issued that order against the NBR with no outside oversight.

The excessive powers of the SFO mean that they do not have to get a warrant from a judge. Records they take are kept by the SFO. Refusal by the media to comply with an order from the SFO put the journalist and the NBR automatically in breach of the law, and at risk of criminal prosecution and fines. Just for protecting their source!

In contrast the similar power proposed for police investigating of even more pernicious organised crime requires the police to get a warrant from a Judge, which may be declined.

For the police any disputed records taken are to be secured and held by the High Court (not the SFO or the police). A High Court judge then decides whether the protection of media freedom provided for in the Evidence Act means the medias records and sources should remain confidential.

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Media freedom and independence under threat

UPDATE: The Senate passed the bill 39-1. It now heads to Gov. Rick Scott.

Tax changes designed to help Verizon Communications and other telecom companies suddenly seem poised to pass on the final day of session, just two weeks after the measure appeared to stall.

At 7:42 p.m. last night, an amendment was filed to SB 1060 that would restore a controversial provision to the legislation, which deals with the states communications services tax.

Specifically, the language would give telecom companies more freedom to bundle together items that are subject to the CST (such as phone service) with items that they are not (such as home-security monitoring) into a combined package with one price for consumers. But they would only have to calculate taxes based on the hidden prices of the items that are subject to the tax.

Telecom companies say the legislation would ensure that they and their customers dont wind up being unfairly taxed on products that were never meant to be included under communications services and they say allowing them to package it all for a single price is a convenience for customers. But some tax-policy experts say the legislation creates a loophole through which companies will be able to deflate their tax bills, by minimizing the price of anything that is subject to the CST and maximizing the price of anything that is not.

State economists have struggled to understand the magnitude of the bundling provision, estimating it would cost the state and local governments a minimum of $35 million a year. A separate analysis by the Department of Revenue estimated the hit could be more than $300 million a year. The telecom industry disputes the estimates.

In addition to Verizon, Comcast Corp., AT&T and CenturyLink, among others, have been lobbying for the bill.

Two weeks ago, Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff, a Fort Lauderdale Republican who is sponsoring the bill, rewrote the legislation to take out all substantive changes and instead order only a study committee to evaluate the CST and recommend ways to modernize it before next years session. The amendment she filed last night would keep that committee, but also restore the bundling language.

The House bill (HB 809) is sponsored by Rep. Jamie Grant, a Tampa Republican, and it passed that chamber last month. The telecom industry has also worked on the issue with Rep. Chris Dorworth, the Lake Mary Republican tentatively in line to become House speaker after the 2014 elections.

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UPDATED: Tax changes for telecoms look pass Senate, head to governor