Rhys Williams Testimonial rasies money for children’s hospice

Cardiff Blues rugby player, Rhys Williams has helped raise money for children’s hospice, Ty Hafan.

As his career reaches a decade, it is only right that he celebrates in style. The Rhys Williams Testimonial held a Ladies Night at Cardiff’s prestigious Marriott Hotel with tables going for £450 each!

For this astonishing amount of money, this is what you got;

Champange Reception, Three Course Dinner, Entertainment, Charity Auction, the chance to mingle with your favourite rugby players and of course what would any ladies nightbe without a buter in the buff!

Rhys has chosen the Ty Hafan Childrens Hospice charity in Sully, Vale of Glamorgan which opened in 1999 and requires in excess of £2.5 each year to keep running.

 

For those of you who don’t know, Ty Hafan is a restbite, palliative and end of life care centre for children who suffer from conditions which mean they will not reach adulthood.

The night was a huge success raising well over £2,000 for the charity not including the money that was also rased from the raffle which was held.

I took the chance to catch up with some of the lucky ladies who attended;

“It’s been such an amazing night, one i certainly wont forget in a while! It’s great that all the money we have raised tonight is going to a good cause and i hope it can make a difference to at least one childs time in the hospice.” – Thomasin Spencer

“I think it is really sweet that Rhys has chosen a chaity to base these events around, it gives them a purpose and people aren’t shy in donating either!” – Angharad Rees

 If you would like to make a donation to Ty Hafan Hospice, please follow the following link -

http://www.tyhafan.org/

 For more information on Rhys Williams’ testimonial, please visit the following site -

http://www.rhyswilliamstestimonial.com/

 

Lecturers’ to strike over pay row

Lecturers’ at colleges and institutes of higher education ascross Wales are to stage a one day strike over a pay row.

The Lecturers’ uninion, the UCU, said the employers organisation fforwm had refused to start paying more experienced Lecturers’ a higher wage as agreed. UCU also claims that fforwm have refused to guarentee the new national agreement throughout Wales.

UCU memebers in colleges in Wales voted in a ballot with 72% in favour of a programme of strike and 90% in facour o withdrawing from key duties associated with college quality management.

Thousands of FE Lecturers’, including large numbers who are part-time and hourly paid can’t reach the higher pay levels  that are enjoyed by school teachers. None of the FE Lecturers’ receive the allowances enjoyed by 50% of school teachers worth between £2,364 and £11,557 p.a on top of the pay scales.

UCU Wales offical Margret Phelan said,

“The principal has been accepted in Wales that Lecturers’ should be paid the same as school teachers.UCU signed a national agreement with the employers, in good faith, and we expect it ot be fully implemented.”

This is the first national FE strike to take place in Wales for over a decade. The picket is due to be held outside the Senedd building in Cradiff Bay.

Fforwm have laid the blame for the postponement of payment on the Assembly Government claiming they did not provide the money to cover the progression to a higher pay level thoughout 2007-2008.

Guy Stoate, of UCU Wales commented on the situation saying,

“The employers are seeking to undermine a national agreement that not only restores fair payent to FE Lecturers but also directly beefits students by promoting excellent professional practice.” 

For more information on the strike or UCU Wales, visit the following website-

http://www.ucu.org.uk/

For more information of fforwm, visit the following website-

http://www.fforwm.ac.uk/

A bit of rain won’t hurt. Or will it?

The people of Gloucestershire have today woken to a sight for sore eyes as record amounts of rain has fallen leaving the county severely flooded. The majority of the county’s 600,000 residents have been affected with 140,000 of those being without clean running water.

A mass rescue and recovery operation is taking place as water levels continue to rise. Bowsers and two to three million litres of bottled water have already began to be distributed.

At an earlier press conference, Alan Payne, General Manager, Water Services for Severn Trent said,

“140,000 houses are currently without water. We’re doing everything we can to address that as a priority and we have two to three million litres of bottled water a day being delivered to Cheltenham Racecourse to be distributed by the military at 17 centres.”

The flooding has taken people by suprise as there was little warning of the pending rainfall.

Cheif Constable, Tim Brian said,  

“Our sympathy goes out to those who have suffered loss or disruption in their daily lives and our thanks to members of the public for their continued patience and forbearance.”

“The emergency is not over, water is still high around Walham and there is a prospect of further peaks and the problem of retained water in the Severn basin is going to give problems for several days to come.”

With the prospect of more rain on the horizon, further precautions are being taken to protect those already affected and most importantly the Walham power plant which supplies the majority of the Gloucestershire area.

                                                                                                                           

With this natural disaster comes health issues. The risk of raw sewage leaking into the flood water could also bring illness to Gloucestershire, local Dr Shona Arora is warning people to stay safe and said,

“Please do boil bowser water as a precautionary measure. It is drinking quality but this does ensure you kill off any bugs.”

“If sewerage flows into flood water it gets very diluted so the risk to human health is minimal and so far there have been no reports of infection but people are advised to keep away from flood water and anything that looks like raw sewage.”

The people of Gloucester have seen their lives changed so dramatically on the day that it rained forever.

Follow this news linkfor further stories on what’s happened ion Gloucester so far,

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/gloucestershire/6911490.stm

Hip-hop or big flop?

The Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts, the largest greenfield music festival in the world. The festival, most notorios for it’s guitar based artists and for being an innovative festival has this year suffered unusually poor ticket sales.

Many believe this is down to their very controversial move awarding headlining act to hip-hop artist Jay-Z. But is it fair to pin the blame on Jay-Z? He is in his own right an amazing artist with world-wide recognition and is no doubt a worthy artist to perform at the festival, but to headline?

It baffled me a little when i found out that he is headlining as he doesn’t fit the usual Glastonbury genre and i think there are more traditioal bands that are deserving of being their headline act. But why can’t they break the mould? In previous years they have had acts like, Kylie Minouge, Shirley Bassey and Fatboy Slim headline and none of these acts caused as much publicity and contoversy as Jay-Z.

One person who is strongly against Jay-Z headlining is Oasis guitarist and singer, Noel Gallagher. The ever opinionated Mancunian has made public his feelings on this controversial move;

“If it aint broke, don’t fix it. If you start to break it then people aren’t going to go. I’m sorry, but Jay-Z? No chance.”

You can read in full what Noel had to say by ollowing this link-

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/04/14/bmglasto114.xml

Whereas i do agree with what Noel is saying i do feel he is being too harsh as Jay-Z is a well respected artist just like Noel and his band, Oasis.

Many feel the festval is being too ‘Americanised’ which i do agree with and feel we should keep it Bristish and stick to tradition. Also the public don’t seem to take well to change and it may benefit the festival to make some last minute changes to the line up.

What you think about Jay-z being the headline act? Or do you agree wih Noel Gallagher? 

From chic to geek!

It seems all celebs have gone crazy for the latest trend…….geeky glasses! What happened to the days where we were ashamed of our geeky glasses and did all we could to make them look cool and avoid wearing them at all costs!?

Do they look good or are they just fashion vitims, as these days many of these celebs jump on the band wagon so to speak, to avoid getting slated by the wonderful British press.

We all look to our favourite pop stars, it girls and film stars for what we should be wearing, how we should have our hair and for general inspiration from their wadrobes to style ourselves. But are they always right? Some celebs always get it right whilst others tend to get it wrong!

We would probably be better off looking to our favourite high street stores and fashion blogs or magazines as they give handy hints and tips as to what would suit you and answer the most common fashion queries.

But keeping up with the jones’s isn’t all it’s cracked up to be as you may end up looking just a little bit silly. Fair enough you want to keep up with the latest trend and fashions but sometimes they are not for us poor civilians. And on the rare occassion, even these georgous celebrities look, well….stupid!

Check out the pictures of these lovely celebrities and let me know what you think to this latest trend and whether you will be investing in a pair this summer.

http://www.moremagazine.co.uk/celebrity/gallery/default.asp?gallery_id=338