Implications of Commons Act 2006 for the registration of land as a town or village green

This paper describes the main changes of Commons Act 2006 for the registration of land as a town or village green. The purpose of the Commons Act 2006 is to protect common land and promote sustainable farming, public access to the countryside and the interests of wildlife. The changes under s15 of the Commons Act 2006 include the additional 2-year grace period for application, discounting statutory period of closure, correction of mistakes in registers, disallowing severance of rights, voluntary registration, replacement of land in exchange and some other provisions. The transitional provision contained in s15(4) Commons Act 2006 is particularly a cause for controversy as DEFRA has indicated buildings will have to be taken down where development has gone ahead and a subsequent application to register the land as a green is successful, obliging the developer to return the land to a condition consistent with the exercise by locals of recreational rights, which sums up that it would be harder in future to develop land which has the potential to be registered as a town or village green.

Hybrid fault detection and isolation in an heater bank of an HVAC system

In this work a hybrid technique that includes probabilistic and optimization based methods is presented. The method is applied, both in simulation and by means of real-time experiments, to the heating unit of a Heating, Ventilation Air Conditioning (HVAC) system. It is shown that the addition of the probabilistic approach improves the fault diagnosis accuracy.

Land, rights and the gift: the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 and the negotiation of citizenship

The Countryside and Rights of Way Act came into force at the end of 2000 with,as part of its content, new provisions relating to public access to the English and Welsh countryside. In this paper we review the main elements of the Act and assess its meaning in relation to citizenship, territoriality and the place of land in English law and society. We invoke Mauss’s (1954)concept of Gift to explain the process of brokerage being made over access and rights in the countryside. In conclusion we reflect on the Act as being indicative of a wider move towards Bromley’s (1998)post-feudal scenario for land and its governance.

Evaluating the Bank of England density forecasts of inflation

We consider evaluating the UK Monetary Policy Committee's inflation density forecasts using probability integral transform goodness-of-fit tests. These tests evaluate the whole forecast density. We also consider whether the probabilities assigned to inflation being in certain ranges are well calibrated, where the ranges are chosen to be those of particular relevance to the MPC, given its remit of maintaining inflation rates in a band around per annum. Finally, we discuss the decision-based approach to forecast evaluation in relation to the MPC forecasts

Identification of forged Bank of England £20 banknotes using IR spectroscopy

Bank of England notes of £20 denomination have been studied using infrared spectroscopy in order to generate a method to identify forged notes. An aim of this work was to develop a non-destructive method so that a small, compact Fourier transform infrared spectrometer (FT-IR) instrument could be used by bank workers, police departments or others such as shop assistants to identify forged notes in a non-lab setting. The ease of use of the instrument is the key to this method, as well as the relatively low cost. The presence of a peak at 1400 cm−1 arising from νasym () from the blank paper section of a forged note proved to be a successful indicator of the note’s illegality for the notes that we studied. Moreover, differences between the spectra of forged and genuine £20 notes were observed in the ν(OH) (ca. 3500 cm−1), ν(CH) (ca. 2900 cm−1) and ν(CO) (ca. 1750 cm−1) regions of the IR spectrum recorded for the polymer film covering the holographic strip. In cases where these simple tests fail, we have shown how an infrared microscope can be used to further differentiate genuine and forged banknotes by producing infrared maps of selected areas of the note contrasting inks with background paper.

The Mystery of Privity: Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada v Robinson (1915)

This article examines a little known decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council: Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada v Robinson (1915). The examination is historical and it provides a different insight into the understanding of privity of contract, a doctrine central to contract law. The examination reveals a process of trans-Atlantic legal migration in which English law was applied to resolve an Ontario case. The nature of the resolution is surprising because it appears to conflict with the better known decision of the House of Lords, Dunlop Pneumatic Tyre Company, Limited v Selfridge and Company, Limited, which a similarly constituted panel delivered in the same week. This article argues that there was a greater malleability in the resolution of cases concerned with privity than was thought to have existed. It is also argued that the power of Canadian railway capitalism is a significant factor in understanding the legal resolution of the case. Finally, it the article considers the use of English and American precedents relevant to the case. The application of English precedents to the case led to a resolution not entirely befitting Canadian conditions.

Rights, the environment and Part V of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994

Using figures derived from the UK Home Office, this paper analyses and reviews the impact and deployment of Part V of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 since its enactment. This is done with special reference to its impact on citizenship and the regulation of ‘the environment’ and associated rural spaces. It is argued that, notwithstanding the actual use of the public order clauses in Part V of the Act, its underlying meanings are largely of a symbolic nature. Such symbolism is, however, a powerful indication of the defence of particularist constructions of rural space. It can also open out new conditions of possibility, providing a useful ‘oppressed’ status and media spectacle for a range of protesters and activists.

Assimilation of RAPID array observations into an ocean model

Experiments assimilating the RAPID dataset of deep temperature and salinity profiles at 26.5°N on the western and eastern Atlantic boundaries into a 1° global NEMO ocean model have been performed. The meridional overturning circulation (MOC) is then assessed against the transports calculated directly from observations. The best initialization found for this short period was obtained by assimilating the EN3 upper-ocean hydrography database prior to 2004, after which different methods of assimilating 5-day average RAPID profiles at the western boundary were tested. The model MOC is strengthened by ∼ 2 Sv giving closer agreement with the RAPID array transports, when the western boundary profiles are assimilated only below 900 m (the approximate depth of the Florida Straits, which are not well resolved) and when the T,S observations are spread meridionally from 10 to 35°N along the deep western boundary. The use of boundary-focused covariances has the largest impact on the assimilation results, otherwise using more conventional Gaussian covariances has a very local impact on the MOC at 26°N with strong adverse impacts on the MOC stream function at higher and lower latitudes. Even using boundary-focused covariances only enables the MOC to be strengthened for ∼ 2 years, after which the increased transport of warm waters leads to a negative feedback on water formation in the subpolar gyre which then reduces the MOC. This negative feedback can be mitigated if EN3 hydrography data continue to be assimilated along with the RAPID array boundary data. Copyright © 2012 Royal Meteorological Society and Crown in the right of Canada.

Postnatal development of the mucosal immune system and consequences on health in adulthood

The intestinal microbiota is a dynamic multifaceted ecosystem which has evolved a complex and mutually beneficial relationship with the mammalian host. The contribution to host fitness is evident, but in recent years it has become apparent that these commensal microorganisms may exert far more influence over health and disease than previously thought. The gut microbiota are implicated in many aspects of biological function, such as metabolism, angiogenesis and immune development: disruption, especially during the neonatal period, which may impose life-long penalty. Elimination of the microbiota appears difficult, but manipulation of the ratios and dominance of composite populations can be achieved by alterations in diet, rearing environment, antibiotics and/or probiotics. Components of the intestinal microbiota are frequently documented to affect normal function of the mucosal immune system in experimental animals and in domesticated, agricultural species. However, it is not always clear that the effects described are sufficiently well understood to provide a sound basis for commercial intervention. Some microbial interventions may be beneficial to the host under particular circumstances, while detrimental during others. It is essential that we further our understanding of the complex and intricate host-commensal relationship to avoid causing more long-term damage than advantage

Generation and analysis of the 2005 land cover map for Mexico using 250m MODIS data

Land cover plays a key role in global to regional monitoring and modeling because it affects and is being affected by climate change and thus became one of the essential variables for climate change studies. National and international organizations require timely and accurate land cover information for reporting and management actions. The North American Land Change Monitoring System (NALCMS) is an international cooperation of organizations and entities of Canada, the United States, and Mexico to map land cover change of North America's changing environment. This paper presents the methodology to derive the land cover map of Mexico for the year 2005 which was integrated in the NALCMS continental map. Based on a time series of 250 m Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data and an extensive sample data base the complexity of the Mexican landscape required a specific approach to reflect land cover heterogeneity. To estimate the proportion of each land cover class for every pixel several decision tree classifications were combined to obtain class membership maps which were finally converted to a discrete map accompanied by a confidence estimate. The map yielded an overall accuracy of 82.5% (Kappa of 0.79) for pixels with at least 50% map confidence (71.3% of the data). An additional assessment with 780 randomly stratified samples and primary and alternative calls in the reference data to account for ambiguity indicated 83.4% overall accuracy (Kappa of 0.80). A high agreement of 83.6% for all pixels and 92.6% for pixels with a map confidence of more than 50% was found for the comparison between the land cover maps of 2005 and 2006. Further wall-to-wall comparisons to related land cover maps resulted in 56.6% agreement with the MODIS land cover product and a congruence of 49.5 with Globcover.