My Mobile Life

I was recently subject to charges of £70 from my bank for going 76p overdrawn! £35 was taken for going overdrawn with another £35 taken for sending a direct debit payment back. A direct debit payment I had cancelled a month previous I might add, but which was still taken due to an error on the bank's part. The banks are making money hand over fist while cutting jobs in the UK and moving call centres abroad to India in order to make even higher profit. It's been going on for too long now. Rise up people and get those charges paid back!! Make no mistake, these charges are illegal.


Banks have been accused of presiding over a current account "jungle" that disadvantaged vulnerable customers.

The National Consumer Council (NCC) said unfair banking charges "crippled" Britain's most vulnerable current account holders and called for better, clearer and more upfront information from providers.

It follows concern that people on low incomes and with limited financial knowledge are being hit with fees as high as £39 for going beyond their overdraft limit, pushing them further into debt.

In response to the Office of Fair Trading's (OFT) consultation on personal current accounts, the NCC is pushing for similar safeguards to those already brought in to the Northern Ireland market.

As such it is calling on the OFT to force banks to provide more information on bank statements, including explanations of how and when interest rates and charges are applied.

In addition, it wants the watchdog to investigate how the costs of "free banking" arise and how the burden of often hidden costs are split between different groups of customers.

And in a bid to get a better deal for the least well-off in society, the consumer watchdog called on the OFT to include basic bank accounts in the remit of its current investigation.

Ed Mayo, chief executive at the NCC, said: "Navigating through the current account jungle can be a real challenge. People are reluctant to switch because they are either worried about standing orders and direct debits not being paid, or feel that the process is too complicated.

"Those on low incomes or with limited banking experience are most likely to be adversely affected. For them a default charge of £39 is enough to push them into debt.

"It is about time banks stopped pulling the wool over people's eyes and started behaving more responsibly."

Yesterday, President George Bush thought he was going to a typical White House East Room photo op with this year's Presidential Scholars after which he planned to give a rah-rah speech in favor of the renewal of No Child Left Behind. Little did he know that the Scholars had a little surprise prepared for him. Prior to entering the room, they handed him a letter signed by 50 of their number asking that he treat the detainees in Guantanamo Bay humanely. The President was caught off guard, but he read the letter and guaranteed the young people that the United States does not mistreat its prisoners!

In a world where many adults think it's just fine to poke fun at teenagers or rake them over the coals for being stupid, lazy and mercenary, it feels good to report that those silly adults have got it all wrong. And now these teenagers have exercised their rights as Americans to personally address their President and ask questions that the adults surrounding Bush seem to sweep under the carpet.

In his remarks the President said "This is a program that honors high school seniors for exceptional academic and artistic achievements. Past winners have gone on to win the Pulitzer Prize, succeed at the highest levels of business, work here at the White House. This afternoon we honor a new class of promising young men and women. Your fellow scholars have pursued groundbreaking research, written scholarly papers, and performed at Carnegie Hall. Many of you have also reached out to those in need, and have given your time for causes greater than any individual need. And for that we thank you".

They also demonstrated that they have what it takes to speak the truth. Maybe President Bush could learn a lesson or two from them...

Laurelvale, with its neat gardens and tree-lined streets, seems like any other rural village - but look closer and you will see that its residents are gripped by fear.

Terrified parents have put their teenagers under a strict curfew or have arranged supervised activities. Others are monitoring their children's mobile phone messages and banning all use of the internet.

One scared mother has even confiscated her children's dressing gown cords - fearful of what sinister use they might be put to.

This rising tide of panic has been caused by an inexplicable "suicide epidemic" that has hit this previously unremarkable area near Portadown, with a population of just 800, in Northern Ireland.

In the space of a month, three 15-year-old schoolmates have killed themselves.

It is believed that all three, who were friends and pupils at Craigavon Senior High School, made identical knots in their hoodies to hang themselves. All the deaths happened at the weekend.

The first victim in this sinister series of suicides was Wayne Browne - a taxi driver found the boy's body hanging from a lamp-post on Sunday, May 20.

Three weeks later, in the early hours of Saturday, June 9, a 15-year-old schoolgirl discovered James Topley hanging from the exact same lamp-post. Then last Friday, Lee Walker was found hanging from his bunk-bed by his father.

The village is still in a state of collective shock and incredulity, at a loss to make any sense of the deaths, which police are still investigating - the boys themselves had seemed happy enough and no suicide notes were found.

The lack of any reasonable explanation has given rise to wild and sinister speculation. One of the more grisly rumours doing the rounds, which could have come straight out of some twisted horror story, involves a mystery motorcyclist who rode into town, asked for the boys by name - then weeks later they all killed themselves.

A more recent one involves talk of an internet 'death list' of 12 local youngsters, including two girls, naming the day each will die.

This chilling list, which nobody has seen - and which the police are unable to "confirm" or "deny" exists - allegedly warns those unlucky enough to be named: "If you don't do it, somebody's going to do it anyway for you... you're going to die anyway."

There is also whispered talk of suicide pacts, Ouija-board sessions and a list of names hidden under a park bench, each one ticked off as those named die.

Such rumours have only cranked up the tension in Laurelvale even more. And as each weekend approaches, fear is palpable in the air.

Craigavon Senior High School principal David Mehaffey warns: "No one knows the truth behind these tragedies, but there are so many different rumours that most of them have to be wrong. These rumours are contributing to the build-up of something that borders on hysteria in the community."

One mum, who has a 10-year-old girl and a son aged eight, admits: "We are all petrified. You're supposed to look forward to the weekend but now we dread it, wondering who'll be next.

"I hardly sleep and when I do I wake up with butterflies in my stomach and run to check that my children are safe in their beds. I've even taken their belts off their dressing gowns, I am so scared."

Another worried parent says: "I keep phoning my 17-year-old to make sure she's OK. All the boys who died were friends of hers - she went to three funerals in a month in the middle of her GCSE exams.

"It's even more scary because the kids in the village predicted that somebody was going to kill themselves on the night Lee Walker died.

"We don't know what's going to happen next - it's like living in a horror movie."

The horror is certainly real for the bereaved families and friends. The schoolgirl who found James Topley is having counselling to help her deal with the trauma.

Yesterday her mother told how her daughter, neither of whom wish to be named, went to primary school with Wayne and knew Lee, too.

"This has been a very big wake-up call - we have to do something for the teenagers," says the girl's mother, adding that parents are arranging evening activities for their children in an attempt to prevent any further deaths.

Dorothy Browne, the mother of the first suicide victim, is still in shock over her son's death. Wayne worked part-time in a local restaurant and was looking forward to becoming a full-time chef. He lived at home with his parents and his sister Zoe.

Dorothy says: "I last saw my son when he went off to work and he said, 'Don't come for me Mammy, one of the chefs is bringing me home'."

But Wayne never came home. After spending a few hours with his workmates, he killed himself.

Dorothy, a psychiatric nurse, says: "I would have noticed if something was wrong. I'm flabbergasted.

"He'd been on the internet but had stopped using it a few months ago. He used to be on it for three hours a night. His sister told me the computer was broken - I didn't think anything of it. Now I wonder was there another reason for that?

"I just don't know. That's the thing about suicide. Wayne seemed happy and I didn't have any reason to be worried about him."

But she concedes that Wayne might have been more badly affected than anyone realised by the death of a neighbour in March - Stuart Fletcher, 28, hanged himself from a tree opposite the Brownes' home.

Certainly Michelle Cully, the mother of Lee Walker, is adamant that her son was deeply affected by the deaths of his friends when he took his own life.

"Lee was sad after James's death," says 38-year-old Michelle. "I asked him if he wanted to talk about it and he said no. Then he went to James's grave. He told me he'd been there and I said, 'Nothing is so bad that it can't be sorted out'. And he said, 'I know'."

Lee was found by his 43-year-old dad, Tony Walker, who cradled his son in his arms after trying desperately to revive him. Tony pleads with other youngsters not to "put other families through the unbearable pain his family is going through".

As well as parents keeping a tighter rein on their children, the local police have stepped-up their nightly patrols. But they can't watch all the people all the time.

If parents are afraid, so too are the children, as they frantically text and email one another to ask if their name is on the 'death list'. One teenager, who has been told his name is on the list, yesterday talked about how "paranoid" he has become since the three suicides.

"I got a phone call from a mate saying the word on the street was that I was on the list," says the 17-year-old, who did not wish to be named.

"I'm not going to do anything like that, but after hearing the rumours about you dying anyway it has worried me.

"The other day I saw two men wearing black hoodie tops at the bottom of my lane, they were swinging a red light back and forward and standing by a blacked-out car.

"They were there for at least an hour. Seeing that really freaked me out. These rumours have really messed me up."

But the boy dismisses suggestions that the three schoolboys who died had made a suicide pact.

"Wayne did it, then James and Lee were devastated and just couldn't handle it," is his explanation. "That's all there was to it."

Another 17-year-old boy says he spent days trying to convince his family and friends that he was not about to kill himself.

Someone had phoned his home when he was out and asked his mum if he was dead. The same boy also received texts from friends begging him "not to do it". The following day, his mother received a condolence card. False stories of his death are said to have begun circulating after a dummy was strung up, sparking fears that there had been yet another suicide.

Reverend Brian Harper, who has talked to eight of the boys on this so-called 'death list', admits, "There is panic within the community.

"Children are getting text messages saying they are next and that is getting their parents frightened and annoyed.

"It's just cruelty. I don't think the list exists but somebody is being very cruel."

This is a wider problem. Northern Ireland has experienced an epidemic of suicides since the end of the Troubles - they exceed deaths from road accidents. Last year 291 people in the province took their own lives - 10 years ago the figure was 138. Most of the victims were young males.

It is something that even the experts are at a loss to explain.

Psychologist Dr Arthur Cassidy, who is helping to counsel the village children in a mobile caravan unit, says: "It is very strange. We don't understand what is causing it and I don't rule out the internet.

"There could be a number of other factors, including drug abuse and low self-esteem."

Amid all the uncertainty, one thing is for sure - until the people of Laurelvale are convinced it is safe to do otherwise, they will be keeping their children close by.

Kylie Minogue has confirmed the release of a 2 hour DVD documentary called 'White Diamonds'. The production extensively followed Kylie over 12 months as she dealt with recovery from breast cancer and preparations for her comeback tour, 'Showgirl: Homecoming'. The documentary is set to reveal the private side of Kylie's life, giving the public full access into her thoughts and fears. New songs have been recorded by Kylie specifically for the documentary, including a number of jazz classics.


Work on Kylie's long-awaited 10th studio album, her first in four years, is currently underway. With a tentative release date of Nov '07 for the new album, we may see the first single release as early as September.


Add to this, her upcoming role in the Christmas special of Dr Who, which begins filming next month, plus a rumoured US tour in 2008, and it seems that Kylie is once again set to rule the world stage.


A glimpse of footage from the new documentary was recently released on Kylie's official website and proves the nation's favourite pop princess hasn't lost her touch for pure 'gay' glamour!!

At first glance, one can only assume that it’s an April fool or an elaborate hoax, but Pentagon officials confirmed last Friday that they had considered developing a “Gay Bomb”.

Surprisingly, this wasn’t a weapon which would target the gays by intelligently seeking out saunas, after-hours discos and Kylie concerts. Oddly enough, the U.S. military sought to create a hormone bomb that might turn enemy soldiers into rampant homosexuals, leading to an orgiastic gang bang.

Apparently, and understandably, this pornographic scenario would be preferable to a largely heterosexual enemy, hell bent on killing U.S. soldiers. It’s hard to disagree, really, when you think about it.

Edward Hammond, of Berkeley's Sunshine Project, used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain a copy of the proposal from the Air Force's Wright Laboratory in Dayton, Ohio.

As part of a military effort to create non-lethal weapons, the proposal suggested, "One distasteful but completely non-lethal example would be strong aphrodisiacs, especially if the chemical also caused homosexual behavior."

Distasteful? What, more distasteful than blowing up innocent civilians?

The documents indicate the Air Force lab asked for $7.5 million to develop such a chemical weapon.

"The Ohio Air Force lab proposed that a bomb be developed that contained a chemical that would cause enemy soliders to become gay, and to have their units break down because all their soldiers became irresistably attractive to one another," Hammond said after reviewing the documents.

"The notion was that a chemical that would probably be pleasant in the human body in low quantities could be identified, and by virtue of either breathing or having their skin exposed to this chemical, the notion was that soliders would become gay," explained Hammond.

The Pentagon told CBS 5 that the proposal was made by the Air Force in 1994.

"The Department of Defense is committed to identifying, researching and developing non-lethal weapons that will support our men and women in uniform," said a DOD spokesperson, who suggested that the "gay bomb" idea was quickly shelved.

Hammond said the government records he obtained suggest the military were keener on the idea than they’re suggesting.

"The truth of the matter is it would have never come to my attention if it was dismissed at the time it was proposed," he said. "In fact, the Pentagon has used it repeatedly and subsequently in an effort to promote non-lethal weapons, and in fact they submitted it to the highest scientific review body in the country for them to consider."

Gay community leaders in California said Friday that they found the idea of a "gay bomb" both offensive and ridiculous.

"Throughout history we have had so many brave men and women who are gay and lesbian serving the military with distinction," said Geoff Kors of Equality California.

"So, it's just offensive that they think by turning people gay that the other military would be incapable of doing their job. And it’s absurd because there's so much medical data that shows that sexual orientation is immutable and cannot be changed."

While there is a subtle streak of bad taste about the whole thing, basically stemming from the assumption that gay men can’t focus on anything but fucking, one can’t help but wish they’d succeeded in their mission.

Okay, even if we accept that sexual orientation is ‘immutable’ – this is the Pentagon. Who knows what freaky shit they could cook up in their super-secret labs.

It’s politically controversial, as one assumes that if they could make a ‘gay bomb’ they could make a ‘straight bomb’ too, which right wing governments could sling into gay pride marches.

Obviously, this would not be good. Gay go-go boys would be shagging trannies, then beating them up on finding their true gender, and lesbians would be snogging leather daddies and bears. From gay pride to gay shame in the drop of a bomb.

Perhaps the most impressive aspect of this highly entertaining story is that the Pentagon were seeking to create non-lethal weapons. In an age where Iraqi children are being scorched to cinders via white phosphorous bombs, it’s almost comforting to know that the U.S. military would consider a weapon encouraging gay love rather than bleak, horrific death. It’s almost commendable.

What also has to be considered is that if the Pentagon had developed this ‘weapon’, where would they have tested it, and on whom? Would they have used fresh, new recruits? Would they have filmed the results and would they have told the guinea pigs what the experiment was in aid of? Unfortunately, it seems we'll never know.

While gay groups might bleat about how offensive it all is, war in itself is far more objectionable, as is the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy. If this bomb had been developed just think of all the places it could have been dispensed had some gay terrorists got hold of it.

While there’s obviously some underhand gay sex going on behind closed doors anyway, the Vatican would be a good place to initiate a gay bomb campaign. Iraq could be solved in an instant, if the Shias and the Sunnis were to start fucking instead of fighting.

Afghanistan, the Israel/Palestine conflict, most of Africa, Chechnya/Russia, Kashmir/Pakistan- all these war-torn areas could do with a bit of gay love. On reflection, the Pentagon has done a lot worse in it’s time than cooking up a queer missile and in many, many ways, it’s a damn shame they didn’t succeed.