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BBC News
10-07-2025
- BBC News
Death of man who drowned in Douglas Harbour was accidental
The death of a fisherman who drowned after falling off a ladder into Douglas Harbour was an accident, an inquest has ruled. The body of Lee Scott was recovered from the water by divers on 13 November following a five-day search operation. The 46-year-old, who lived in Douglas, lost his footing as he made his way off a friend's fishing boat on the morning of 8 November as he collected equipment from the James Brooks said Mr Scott was likely to have been weighted down by the items he was carrying when he fell into the water. The inquest heard Mr Scott had phoned his friend to ask if he could borrow some fishing equipment and was told he could collect it from the other man's boat, the Manx footage showed him arriving at the harbour shortly before 09:45 GMT carrying a black bag, which he left on the pier near to his own vessel. He was then captured walking along to the area his friend's vessel was berthed before climbing down a harbour ladder to get onto the boat. The inquest was told that Mr Scott had a "difficult relationship with alcohol" and had gone for a drink at the nearby Old Market Inn shortly before making his way to the reports showed his alcohol levels were more than twice the legal limit for driving at the time of his was reported missing on the morning of 9 November by his then partner who had not heard from from a diver who recovered Mr Scott's body from the harbour stated lead rope, a fire extinguisher and two bags containing fishing tools and safety equipment, including a lifejacket, were found on the seabed in the items were spotted beside a piece of the lower section of a harbour ladder, which was rusty and had broken off, the inquest was her evidence, Mr Scott's mother Joan Scott described her son as a sociable person who was "kind and considerate"."My life will never be the same without Lee. I hope he rests in peace in heaven," she Brooks said he was "satisfied" that Mr Scott had been able to board the boat on 8 November to collect the items but had fallen into the harbour when attempting to climb off the vessel carrying the weight of the equipment, his intoxication levels, and the likelihood that the lower part of the ladder was already missing at the time, he had lost his footing and was weighed down by the items after falling into the water, he concluded the death was accidental. Read more stories from the Isle of Man on the BBC, watch BBC North West Tonight on BBC iPlayer and follow BBC Isle of Man on Facebook and X.
Yahoo
01-07-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Gary Sánchez's bases clearing double
Denmark expands military draft to women for first time After almost four months of military training, newly conscripted women are completing the final exercises near the Danish Army's barracks north of Copenhagen. (AP video shot by James Brooks) 0:57 Now Playing Paused Ad Playing
IOL News
17-06-2025
- Science
- IOL News
'Spectacular' Viking burial site discovered in Denmark
Conservator Helle Strehle points to x-ray images on a computer screen showing a preserved Viking Age casket discovered at a Viking Age burial site in Lisbjerg, a village seven kilometres north of Aarhus, Denmark's second largest city Image: James Brooks / AFP In an accidental find, a 10th-century burial site believed to have belonged to a Viking noble family has been discovered in northern Denmark, packed with a "spectacular" trove of ancient objects, a museum announced Tuesday. The discovery came when pearls, coins, ceramics and a box containing a gold thread were unearthed during construction work near Lisbjerg, a village located seven kilometres (four miles) north of Aarhus, Denmark's second-largest city. Archaeologists found the site contained around 30 graves dating from the second half of the 10th century, when the famous King Harald Bluetooth reigned, said the Moesgaard Museum in Aarhus. According to the museum's archaeologist Mads Ravn, the graves are most likely linked to a noble family from the Viking Age -- which lasted between the eighth and 11th centuries -- whose farm was discovered less than a kilometre from the burial site in the late 1980s. "This could have been one of Harald Bluetooth's earls or stewards," Ravn told AFP. Ravn noted that the king, who introduced Christianity to what is today Denmark, tasked nobles with managing certain regions. Researchers also discovered some human remains, such as teeth and bones, at the site. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ Ad Loading An aerial photo shows archaeologists working at a Viking Age burial site in Lisbjerg Image: James Brooks / AFP "People basically took what was important to them into the grave because they wanted to transfer it to the other world," the archaeologist said. One of the graves, which scientists believe belonged to an important woman, contained a box filled with decorative objects and a pair of scissors. The "magnificent" box is a remarkable find, according to Ravn, with only a few having been discovered before, including one in southeastern Germany. "It's very rare, there's only three of them we know of," he said.
Yahoo
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Alaska Capitol to host military exercise, including National Guard, FBI and other agencies
The Alaska State Capitol is seen behind a curtain of blooming branches on Saturday, May 17, 2025. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon) Cruise ship passengers in Alaska's capital city, visitors to the Alaska State Capitol and residents could be greeted by officials in hazmat suits next week as the city hosts a large-scale military exercise. 'Operation ORCA' will test the readiness of first responders and members of the Alaska National Guard for a terrorist attack that involves chemical, biological, nuclear or explosive weapons, said Lt. Col. Brett Haker, commander of the 103rd Civil Support Team, which is putting on the exercise. Haker said ORCA is held every other year in Alaska, but this is the first time for Alaska's capital city and for the State Capitol itself, where they will stage a scenario involving an attack by fictitious Russia-based terrorists. Streets on three sides of the Capitol building will be closed to traffic for three days, June 9, 10 and 12, according to the Juneau Police Department. The Capitol itself will remain open to the public during the exercise. Haker said some parts of the scenario will involve a houseboat at or near Juneau's cruise ship docks, which welcome more than 1 million visitors per year. 'They will see us in our hazmat suits. We will have signs up, and ultimately, they'll see us entering and exiting. We'll have our vehicles — they are all like a blue Air Force color. They look civilian, but they all have lights on, and they look like, like an emergency vehicle,' he said. The exercise will involve about 100 people, he said, including members of the FBI, U.S. Border Patrol, the U.S. Coast Guard, local police and fire departments, and local governments including the Tlingit and Haida Central Council. Some members of the National Guard from other states will also participate, and large military cargo planes will be involved. Haker credited his operations officer, Capt. Kyle Rehberg, for organizing much of the exercise but said it will also be a test of organization for everyone involved. 'Ultimately, the main purpose is to improve interoperability, so that we are all speaking the same language when we work with all these additional first responders … and we have these complex problem sets that we have to work through collectively,' he said.
ABC News
27-05-2025
- Business
- ABC News
Small businesses are making building homes more expensive, CEDA report warns
Australian housing costs have surged, due in part to a shortage of homes relative to a rapidly increasing population. But what if you could build 12 per cent more homes each year than we are currently with no extra workers? Both the federal government's Productivity Commission and the Committee for Economic Development in Australia (CEDA) believe that is possible by improving efficiency in the construction sector. "The Productivity Commission has found that, even when adjusting for size and quality improvements, construction labour productivity per hour worked has declined by around 12 per cent since 1994, and still significantly underperformed the wider economy, which experienced labour productivity growth of around 49 per cent over the same period," noted CEDA economists Melissa Wilson and James Brooks. In a report released by CEDA today, the two economists argued that the commonly blamed suspects of industrial relations and workplace conditions in the building sector are not among the key drivers of this productivity decline. They argue the key culprits include complex and slow building approvals processes, a lack of innovation, skills shortages and a lack of scale. It is the latter issue they focused on in their report. "There are currently 410,602 construction firms in Australia, of which 98.5 per cent are small businesses with fewer than 20 employees," they observed. "Ninety-one per cent of construction firms are microbusinesses with fewer than five employees, up significantly from 43 per cent in 1988/89." This makes construction one of the least concentrated industries in Australia, with these micro and small firms accounting for more than half of the money spent on building work in Australia. Yet they achieve far less output than the small number of larger construction firms. "We found that Australian construction firms with 200 or more employees generate 86 per cent more revenue per worker than Australian construction firms with five to 19 employees," CEDA's economists noted. "If firms in the Australian construction industry matched the size distribution of firms in the manufacturing industry, the construction industry would produce 12 per cent, or $54 billion, more revenue per year without requiring any additional labour. "This is equivalent to gaining an extra 150,000 construction workers." Not that all experts agree that smaller building firms are inherently less efficient than large operators. "I do not agree with the conclusion that big is the answer," wrote former NSW building commissioner David Chandler on LinkedIn in response to the report. "The Tier1 contractors in Australia are mostly foreign owned and amongst the most risk adverse and expensive players." However, in their paper, Ms Wilson and Mr Brooks noted that overseas research has produced similar findings about the overall productivity benefits of larger firms. "Researchers have found a strong connection between firm size and productivity in US residential construction, where firms with 500 or more employees produce six times as many units per employee than firms with fewer than 20 employees, and firms with 100 to 499 employees are twice as productive," they wrote. So why are smaller construction firms so much less efficient than larger ones? Ms Wilson and Mr Brooks concluded that smaller firms are less able to achieve economies of scale. "Consultation with CEDA members and other industry experts has confirmed that the construction industry tends to be fragmented, insular and lacking incentives to adopt new ways of doing things," they argued. "They have less capacity to innovate, to invest in equipment and technology, and to devote to training and capability building, which are all important drivers of productivity growth." The economists said the boom-bust cycles prevalent in construction seemed to have accelerated the trend towards using subcontractors, and therefore the dominance of smaller firms and independent contractors. "As subcontracting fragments the industry, this has likely increased the time and effort spent on procurement, contract negotiations, supervision and regulation, and dispute resolution," they noted. "Our consultation has identified reworks and disputes as a major source of inefficiency in the sector." So, if smaller operations are so much less efficient than larger ones, why have they proliferated? The authors say perverse incentives in the federal tax system are a major suspect. "Being self-employed can result in paying less tax than a salaried employee earning the same pre-tax income," they observed. "Our analysis of HILDA income data for people working at least 30 hours per week shows around 8.5 per cent of independent contractors in the construction sector disclose income under the tax-free threshold of $18,200, and therefore pay no tax, compared with just 2 per cent of salaried construction workers. "A high-income construction worker earning $148,000 per year would pay 26 per cent tax as a salaried worker. As a contractor, they could structure their income with a discretionary trust and a 'bucket' company and pay just 18 per cent tax — a difference of $12,400 in annual-take home pay after tax. "Additionally, in trust structures, a high-income individual can distribute income across household members, who may pay even lower tax rates. Or, in rare cases, contractors can simply misrepresent their income and avoid tax altogether." Not to mention that small businesses have been able to access an instant asset write-off that further cuts their taxes, when they buy things like tools or utes. Independent economist Saul Eslake said the "excellent report" identified some of the costs of what he labels "small business fetishism". "Small business fetishism refers to the widespread (and bi-partisan) belief that there is something inherently more noble about running a small business than working for a big one, a government or a not-for-profit, and that therefore small business operators should pay less tax on any given amount of income, and enjoy preferential treatment in many other respects, than people earning wages or salaries, large businesses, and others less 'noble'," he wrote on his LinkedIn page. Aside from income tax minimisation, the authors also identified complex and localised building approvals processes, state-based trades licensing, and the lack of a stable workflow due to the demise of the public housing sector as factors preventing the growth of more large construction firms. "To encourage scale, governments should: They also noted that reduced planning regulation appeared to be correlated with an increase in construction productivity in Auckland.
