text stringlengths 10 78.4k |
|---|
The company, which employs 440 people at the Staffordshire site, said it would consult unions. |
Union GMB said it was "gravely concerning" and staff were "understandably" worried. |
The Wedgwood family said it was "a devastating blow for Staffordshire" and "two thirds of the potters" were set to go. |
The 145 losses will be made up of 130 manufacturing workers and 15 restaurant staff, the company said. |
A consultation period of 45 days has begun, with the exact number of job losses to be confirmed at the end. |
The business is to also undertake a review of product lines. |
"It is expected that the production of some tableware products will be consolidated to other existing manufacturing sites", a statement said, with the firm focussing on "hand crafted, high-end products that are core to the brand". |
"All restaurant operations at Barlaston will also be reviewed," it added. |
Ulla Lettijeff, president at the Fiskars Group, which runs Wedgwood, said: "As the market evolves we must look at how we can manage our business in a sustainable way and strengthen our competitive position." |
She added that though the plans were "right for the long-term...these are very difficult decisions to make". |
Wendy Grieveson, of GMB, said: "This news is gravely concerning and members are today understandably concerned for their future. |
"GMB will be entering urgent discussions with the company to seek the clarity and reassurance Wedgwood's proud workforce need and deserve." |
The Wedgwood family said: "Losing two thirds of the potters at Wedgwood's only production site in the UK is a devastating blow for Staffordshire and for the proud potters of Stoke on Trent." |
Sara Williams, chief executive of Staffordshire Chambers of Commerce, said Wedgwood workers were a "highly skilled workforce" and other ceramic companies in the area were "crying out" for them. |
"We will do our utmost to assist them to find new roles", she added. |
The 256-year-old company is one of the oldest in the world, set up by Josiah Wedgwood, the grandfather of naturalist Charles Darwin, in 1759. |
In 2015, a £34m museum housing the firm's ceramic collection opened to the public at the Barlaston site. |
Enjoy Lake Life in the wonderful lake front community, Winslow Bay! This recently updated home has 5 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, granite counter tops, stainless steel appliances, fresh paint and brand new flooring! The Formal den and dining room have tray ceilings and are perfect for relaxing or entertaining. Enjoy the ... |
I just returned from the 2007 American Assoc of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) annual conference in Long Beach, CA. All in all, a decent meeting this year. |
Although I would argue that publications coming out of AAPG have declined in quality in recent years (too many case studies about oil fields...yawn), the meeting still attracts many great researchers from the broader sedimentary geology community. |
If you've never been....the AAPG meeting is a single meeting for two general types; those who use geology to find oil and those who use the oil industry to do geology. If you can't tell by this blog, I fall into the latter. The amount of data and information about sedimentary geology that this industry produces is phen... |
A highlight for me was seeing Emiliano Mutti speak. This guy is a legend in the sedimentary geology (particularly turbidite researchers) community. He is a short, old, Italian professor and extremely fiesty....quite entertaning. Like many scientific communities, there are always some eccentric characters that stand out... |
The new iPad 2 is likely to be even more popular with enterprise users than the original. But Apple's focus is on consumers. And IT groups struggle with managing and securing the tablets. |
Apple's new iPad 2 tablet computer will only strengthen the company's grip in one market that isn't even a priority for it: the enterprise. And that leaves IT groups still struggling with how to manage and secure a wildly popular mobile device. |
The performance upgrades will likely be important in the months ahead to support deployment of traditional line-of-business applications, says Manoj Prasad, vice president of global applications and testing for Life Technologies. The Carlsbad, Calif., biotech tools company has deployed 600 iPads, and several thousand i... |
"We've so far had no performance challenges with iPad 1," he says. "People are pretty happy with what they're getting. [The new CPU] is a proactive move by Apple, as applications from Oracle, SAP, Seybold become available. Then, you will have a situation where you will need more CPU power." |
But Prasad is disappointed by what's still missing from iPad 2: USB ports, Adobe Flash for video, and the inability to work with the Microsoft Office files and formats that are the lifeblood of so many companies. |
"Managing Microsoft Office products is a big deal," he says. "Being able to gain access to them, edit and share them is missing in the iPad right now, from our perspective. We'd love to replace our laptops with iPads but we can't do that [without Office support]. That's why we've not rolled it out to our 10,000 employe... |
Weighing the additions and omissions, many analysts say iPad 2 is at best an evolutionary improvement for the enterprise. "I don't see any overwhelmingly compelling capabilities that would make people sitting on the tablet fence go out and have to buy one, despite some attractive apps," says Jack Gold, principal of J.G... |
The new iOS release, Version 4.3, also adds nothing to the critical management and security APIs Apple finally introduced in 2010, Gold points out. That means that third-party applications from companies like Boxtone, Good Technology, MobileIron, Sybase (now part of SAP), TrustDigital/McAfee and Zenprise - which all ma... |
For other analysts, the checklists of new or missing items miss the big picture. "The hardware changes ticked all the boxes for most consumers and industry watchers," says Carolina Milanesi, research vice president for consumer technologies & markets at Gartner. "Hardware, however, is only one ingredient of Apple's win... |
But many enterprise customers remain frustrated because they can't fully exploit those capabilities, says Ken Dulaney, a Gartner vice president who focuses on mobile and wireless. "The biggest issue for my customers is ongoing frustration with Apple as a consumer company. What they all wish is that Research in Motion [... |
"[The iPad 2] does enough to keep all the [rival] tablets at bay and to support my contention that this market will look like the iPod market: a lot of sound MP3 players [from competitors] but everyone still wants an iPod," Dulaney says. "It's just that it's going to continue to increase demand so that enterprises have... |
Congress recessed for its August break on Tuesday without extending FAA funds, leaving more than 4,000 FAA employees likely out of work until Congress reconvenes in September. |
The partial shutdown, which began July 22 when the previous extension expired, has the potential to cost the government $1 billion in lost tax revenue. Additionally, according to FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt, the shutdown could be a significant setback to the agency’s Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextG... |
On Wednesday, President Obama and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood urged lawmakers to return to Washington to pass a funding bill, and put thousands back to work. "Congress has decided to play some politics with it and as a consequence they left town without getting this extension done," Obama said. |
In a conference call Tuesday with reporters, Babbitt and LaHood made a last-ditch effort to persuade the Senate to pass the House version of the funding reauthorization bill before it began its August recess. However, the Senate recessed without passing the extension; the House recessed Monday. FAA employees are facing... |
The House passed its version of the funding extension last month. Debate on the reauthorization has centered on funding levels for rural airports and a provision that would allow airline employees to unionize more easily. |
Since the shutdown began, about 40 FAA safety inspectors have been working without pay, using their personal credit cards to travel, stay in hotels and eat in order to continue inspections in hopes that the agency can reimburse them when Congress takes action on the bill. |
The partial FAA shutdown has halted work on more than 200 airport infrastructure construction projects around the country, which employ an additional 70,000 people. |
The FAA Managers Association (FAAMA) today announced the establishment of a nation-wide Furlough Relief Fund that will provide critical assistance to furloughed FAA employees. “The creation of this fund is actually in response to appeals for our members who want to help their colleagues through this difficult time,” sa... |
FAA has not had a permanent funding structure in place since 2007. Since then the agency has operated under a series of 21 funding extensions. |
Will ATC be Separated From FAA in 2021? |
By the age of 65, at least half of us will suffer from two or more long-term diseases. And the chance of having multi-morbidity, as it is known, increases with age. |
Only 9 per cent of people with coronary heart disease have no other condition. The other 91 per cent have various combinations of hypertension (high blood pressure), heart failure, stroke, diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, depression, dementia, chronic kidney disease and so on. |
And it’s not just the elderly who suffer from several long-term conditions – young people do too. In poor areas, the occurrence of two or more diseases in the young can occur ten to 15 years earlier compared with those in wealthier regions. |
People with multi-morbidities have to take a range of drugs: one or more for each disease. But whether drugs developed to treat single diseases are effective in patients with multi-morbidity is a matter of debate. In some patients, their body attacks the drug as though it were a pathogen. In other patients, the treatme... |
A new class of drugs, so-called disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs, are being used to treat rheumatoid arthritis. These drugs treat the underlying disease rather than just ease the symptoms. This is a major advance, but at least 40 per cent of the people taking them won’t see an improvement in their symptoms. This ... |
The root of the problem in developing all new medicines lies in the tendency to research, diagnose and treat diseases as a single entity. The single disease approach goes right back to the way biology is taught at school and university. |
A growing number of medical researchers think we should learn from disease combinations. This may seem like an impossible task, given the number of possible combinations, but some combinations are very common, such as heart disease and high blood pressure. And not taking multi-morbidities into account affects every sta... |
The decision to develop a new drug is based on the careful analysis of thousands of patient groups. But these groups are not divided based on the presence of other existing diseases. By not grouping patients based on pre-existing conditions, many relevant new drugs specific for particular disease combinations may be mi... |
Once new drugs have been developed, they are first tested in animal models of a particular disease or in tissue culture, containing an individual cell type. There is no guarantee that this type of test is relevant for human disease, and there is also no guarantee that relevant drugs won’t be missed that might have work... |
Multi-morbidities are also not taken into account when new drugs are tested in patients. Remarkably, the patients who have the most severe disease combinations, and are the most problematic to treat, are mostly excluded from clinical trials. In coronary heart disease, for example, on average, 69 per cent of patients wi... |
The situation is even worse for dementia patients where 95 per cent have other diseases, yet in 86 per cent of trials, patients with other conditions are excluded. Instead, recruitment for clinical trials picks those patients who are potentially less affected by the disease in question, as they do not have any of the c... |
Is it any wonder that little progress has been made in the treatment of the most debilitating conditions affecting the human race? New targets for drugs should not be chosen irrespective of what else is wrong with the patient. Rather patients with a particular disease should be sub-categorised and studied based on the ... |
Also, science funding bodies and the pharmaceutical industry should drive the development of new animal and tissue culture models in which to test new drugs that encompass patient disease complexity. There is an appetite among researchers for this approach, but the momentum needs to increase. |
Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colorado), who introduced a bill to end federal marijuana prohibition. |
Two progressive Democrats introduced bills this week to treat marijuana like alcohol under federal law. |
Seeking to take his state’s pot law national, Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colorado) introduced the End Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2013, which would remove marijuana from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act and from the jurisdiction of the DEA. Its regulation would become the responsibility of a revamped Burea... |
Diep’s mailer is similar to one sent by Republican Connecticut state representative candidate Ed Charamut’s campaign — which shows his Jewish Democratic opponent, Rep. Matthew Lesser, “with a wide-eyed grin, clutching a wad of $100 bills,” according to CNN. |
“We know the impact (these ads) have, particularly in the Jewish community,” Levi said. |
“In this week when decent people throughout our nation are mourning the murders of Jews in their synagogue, a piece of campaign literature that depicts a Jewish candidate as an individual with a long nose and implying he is a habitual liar is utilizing historically anti-Semitic tropes,” said Rabbi Stephen J. Einstein i... |
In the aftermath of a shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue that killed 11 people Saturday, a vigil was held Sunday at Congregation Beth Shalom in Modesto. |
That statement also noted that Huntington Beach, in Orange County, is home to both the anti-Semitic “Rise Above Movement,” described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as “a racist, violent right-wing fight club” and the Institute for Historical Review, a prominent Holocaust denying organization. |
It also comes as police investigate recent anti-Semitic vandalism at an Orange County synagogue. |
“This is not a neutral district. Diep’s coded language is carefully calibrated to appeal to anti-Semites and racists in a last-ditch effort to save his campaign,” the Lowenthal campaign statement read. |
The Diep campaign, in a statement to the Los Angeles Times, denied that the mailer was an anti-Semitic attack. |
“Allegations to the contrary are despicable and incorrect. Tyler is Vietnamese and fled Communist persecution — he is highly sensitive to attempts at exploiting stereotypes to score political points,” the Diep campaign said. |
PHOENIX — A 79-year-old man is dead after being struck by a vehicle at 51st Avenue and Indian School Road late Saturday night. |
Phoenix police say the man, whose identity was not immediately available, was crossing the roadway mid-block near 51st Avenue and Indian School Road when he was hit by a 25-year-old woman driving a BMW. |
The man was transported to an area hospital, where he was later pronounced deceased. |
The driver of the BMW and her two passengers, a 4 and 6-year-old boy, were uninjured. |
Police say speed and impairment were not factors of the crash. |
After several frustrating years of on-again-off-again crab catching operations along the California coast, fisherman were optimistic about hauling in a good catch as the 2018 commercial Dungeness crab season opened Thursday. It was three years ago that the highly anticipated season had to be delayed until March after s... |
This year, things are looking good: today’s weather is supposed to be cooperate with mild temperatures and gentle winds. And while domoic acid, a byproduct of algal blooms, was found recently off the North Coast, prompting the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to delay the start of the recreational crab fishin... |
“The fishermen are out there now,” said Noah Oppenheim, director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations, after the crews had placed their crab pots in the water before the season’s formal opening at 12:01 a.m. Thursday. The fishermen were expected to be “pulling in their gear and bringing the crab”... |
But not everyone was sure of that. Pillar Point deputy harbormaster Jacob Walding said Thursday morning that it’s too early to tell what sort of season is in the offing. |
While the crab-fishing area extends far to the southern part of California, Oppenheim says most of the crab is fished off Monterey and other harbors including Half Moon Bay. |
“There are plenty of fishermen out there right now with others as far south as Avila,” a small seaside community just north of Pismo Beach. “This is one of the most important and lucrative small-scale fisheries left in California,” he said, with a total of 550 fishermen looking for crab this week, including dozens goin... |
And it’s along those docks that the first fishermen were tying up Thursday, off-loading their bounty into holding tanks before the crab are delivered to fish markets and restaurants in the Bay Area and beyond. |
The all-clear call for fishermen this year was a welcome relief after unhealthy levels domoic acid were found in different parts of the state’s coastal waters. The acid, which can cause amnesic shellfish poisoning, is a byproduct of algae and accumulates in different kinds of shellfish as well as sardines and anchovies... |
This season, local fishermen aren’t too concerned about the toxin, since levels are currently below the 30-parts-per-million threshold in which the fish is considered unsafe to eat. The other key question: How many crab are out there waiting to be caught? Commercial fishermen are allowed to take crabs that are at least... |
While the recreational season was delayed last month for one portion of Northern California, from Patrick’s Point, Humboldt County, north to the California/Oregon state line, the waters south of there have been open to fisherman. State officials declared the commercial crab season could begin on its traditional start d... |
As dock workers awaited the arrival of the first commercial fisherman in Pillar Point, the anticipation levels up and down the supply chain were high. Kaleb Klee, a fishmonger at Princeton Seafoods at Pillar Point, said everything seemed to be lining up for a decent — and healthy — Dungeness crab season. |
This week, the federation of crab fishermen in California and Oregon filed a lawsuit that seeks to hold 30 fossil fuel companies responsible for contributing to climate change that has warmed oceans, leading to the crab-season delays in recent years and the resulting economic hit to the industry. Oppenheim said the 201... |
DOVER — There was a time in the early 1980s when Ken Osbon was keeping his options open, and he nearly followed a path as an athletic trainer. |
But coaching was also on his radar as he was finishing his degree at Plymouth State University. He did his student teaching at Dover High School where he ended up taking the job as freshman football coach in 1984. |
“I fell in love with football as more exciting than waiting around for someone to get hurt in the athletic training profession,” recalled Osbon, a 1980 graduate of St. Thomas Aquinas High School. |
Thus began a 35-year coaching odyssey with the Dover football program, the last 27 as the Green Wave’s head coach. |
On Tuesday, Osbon, 57, announced he was stepping down. |
When he came aboard in 1984, he worked under a couple of coaching legends in Bob Weeks and then Bill Busching. Weeks was the head coach when Osbon first joined the staff. Busching, who coached Dover to an undefeated title in 1968, returned to coach in 1991 after Weeks stepped aside, but left after that season. |
His teams were regular playoff contenders in Division II. The Green Wave won the 1996 title over Exeter, 21-3; lost to the Blue Hawks on a 47-yard field goal in 2002, 24-21; and fell to Bishop Guertin, 16-7, in the 2011 championship. |
Osbon collected his 100th career win on Thanksgiving Day in 2007, a 15-0 victory over Portsmouth. |
Osbon will continue to teach physical education at Dover, a post he has now held for 32 years. |
When Osbon took over in 1992, Dover was coming off a playoff season and he had enough solid players back to make it to the D-I playoffs and advance to the semis. |
But then he had to rebuild. The 1993 season was the first of his 10 rebuilding seasons. Dover missed the playoffs, came back in 1994 and 1995, losing both years in the playoff semis. They won in 1996, following that up with a tough loss in the Dover snow to BG in the 1997 semis, a game that still pains Osbon. |
In 2011, Osbon’s last team to make the playoffs was a reversal of 2002. Dover beat Spaulding in the semis, 24-21, on Cam Rewucki’s 29-yard field goal as time expired. |
The NHIAA realigned from six divisions to three in 2013, something Osbon openly opposed and still does. The Division II schools like Dover were moved to D-I and it’s been a struggle. The last three years, the Green Wave have been competitive thanks to a good cycle of kids, but the next two senior classes will be small,... |
Numbers went down during the first three years in the return to D-I, coupled with some other things that affected the program. Dover took its lumps, before it resurged. |
Dover went 6-3 in 2016, losing out on a playoff spot on the last day of the season. The Green Wave followed that up with 3-6 and 4-5 competitive campaigns. That 4-5 mark this past year could easily have been 5-4 or 6-3. |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.