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TRUCKING INDUSTRY IN TURMOIL
"The competitiveness of the UK economy could be dealt a severe blow in 2006 unless immediate action is taken to remedy problems of recruitment and retention in the logistics industry, according to the relevant sector skills council. The UK's largest ever survey into the road freight industry found that 60 percent of road haulage companies were already struggling to fill vacancies and compliance with the incoming European Road Transport Directive, which came into operation last March, will have a direct knock-on ef
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MAJORITY OF SMES IN MANUFACTURING SECTOR NOT COMPLIANT WITH STAKEHOLDER PENSIONS LAW
"Despite companies with over five employees being legally obliged to provide staff with a stakeholder pension, over half of the UK's small to medium sized manufacturing firms are failing to comply, according to new research from specialist cash flow provider Bibby Financial Services."
"Employers who do not fall within the 25 percent of small manufacturers that offer stakeholder pensions are exempt from doing so if they provide their employees with access to an occupational or personal pension scheme. How
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WASTE WATER TREATMENT SECTOR SHAKE-UP
Businesses that operate and manage waste water treatment facilities may have to obtain pollution prevention contol permits for the first time following a landmark case in the High Court.
"In the test case, the UK's largest water and waste water operator, United Utilities, argued that it was not required to apply to the Environment Agency for a permit under the Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations 2000 for work undertaken at six of its waste water treatment plants. <BR> However the High Court declared
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'MC-FAMILY' JOBS COULD LEAD TO RED-TAPE CHAOS
Employment law experts are warning that a scheme allowing employees to share jobs with family members could cause chaos for copycat companies.
"McDonald's is pioneering a scheme which allows husbands, wives, grandparents and children over 16 to job-share. The Family Contract is the first of its kind in England.<BR> Neil Gouldson, head of employment law at national law firm Rowe Cohen, says contracts like this can be plagued with potential pitfalls: ""Employers planning to follow McDonald's lead, r
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GREY AREA UNDER SCRUTINY
"On 30 January the High Court made an order that Sun Microsystems had to tell a parallel importer, if asked, which of the grey stock could be sold in the EEA and which could not in order to get an injunction lifted to stop sales of non European products. "
"This is a major shift in the way in which the Court has approached this problem: in the past, the risk has all been on an importer who had been injuncted to make sure all the stock was released for European sale; if he got it wrong, even inadvertentl
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DIGICLIP FOR AUTOMATION ENGINEERING
Mastering the core characteristics of machines is a decisive factor in protecting man and machine. It is also essential for ensuring productivity and product quality.
"Transmission of the I/O signals in the junction box or on site on the terminal in the control cabinet is prone to failure and increases the setup times and thus the costs of a machine. <BR> The computing power required of a central machine control also increases with growing complexity of the input and output tasks and easily becomes too big a
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ARUP'S FUTURE OF EMAIL MANAGEMENT
Arup is known worldwide for its work on iconic structures and its ability to create elegant solutions to complex engineering problems. So perhaps it should not be surprising that it has produced an effective and popular solution to a problem that most businesses must face.
"Background<BR>Not so long ago, most documents were created on paper. To send a note, one wrote a letter or sent a memo, then filed it with other related documents so that it could easily be found at a later date. However, when fax machine
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ID CARDS BY 2009
"The first identity cards will not be introduced until 2009, a year later than expected, the minister in charge of the scheme he said."
"Speaking just after the government saw off a backbench rebellion to reverse changes imposed on the controversial ID cards bill by peers, Andy Burnham, a Home Office minister, said public trust in the scheme would only be secured if the government became more open about its costs and civil liberty implications.<BR>Mr Burnham admitted ""the timetable has s
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LINDE TO BUY BOC FOR $14BN
"In the latest in a string of foreign acquisitions of UK companies, Germany's Linde has agreed to buy UK-based rival BOC Group for £8.2bn pounds, vaulting to top spot in the industrial gases market alongside France's Air Liquide. "
"Linde said it expected the deal to be approved by the end of May 2006, and to be closed in the third quarter of the year. The German group added it was confident that any pre-conditions can be satisfied,""<BR> To help finance the acquisition, Linde
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WOMEN COULD FACE 200 YEAR WAIT TO GAIN EQUAL POWER
New figures just released by the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) as part of its annual survey of women's representation in positions of power suggest equality between men and women will take:
"* 20 years in the top management of the civil service <BR>* 40 years at the director level of FTSE 100 companies <BR>* 40 years in the senior judiciary <BR>* Up to 200 years - another 40 elections - in Parliament <BR>Thirty years after the Sex Discrimination Act (SDA) came into force, "&
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Furness and West Cumbria’s West Coast is about to experience a major investment that will strengthen the tourism and industry s ...
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| National Stadium, Beijing |
At the pinnacle of its construction, the National Stadium in Beijing had 7,000 workers toiling over the infrastructure. ...
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No smoke without fire
It seems that commentators, industry heads, central bankers and, dare I say it, Industrial Focus’s own journalists have made so ...
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Innovation for the nations
Hope for the future has arisen from the turmoil of the last few months, as industrial technologies have spun out some marvels o ...
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Supposedly the construction
materials of the future, composites are increasingly seen in
applications where optimum efficiency is paramount including
aircraft construction and renewable energy. As two research
examples show in this video, composites really are the future
for efficiency.
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