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Thursday, 05 April 2007 |
I am trying to register a Nissan Micra from
England that my mother has given me, here in
France. However, my mother has lost the
original VAT receipt for the car, which is 11
years old, and I wondered if you knew if the
authorities will be able to re-register the car
without this document, bearing in mind the age
of the car? Any advice would be most welcome.
Best regards,
Ruth Giles
Brian McCulloch replies:
I assume the car is UK-registered although it is
not said. I imagine it will not be a problem,
particularly if the car was owned by the mother
from new. You do not pay VAT on gifts do you?
It may be worth getting a letter from Mum
giving a brief history of her ownership of the
car and saying that it is being given as a gift,
which will then have to be translated into
French, unless it is written in French to begin
with. Again I may be assuming a lot but I
imagine the Hotels d impots in Finistère are
used to the Brits and will be helpful, especially
if asked in French.
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Thursday, 05 April 2007 |
Dear Editor,
Before coming to live in France in 2001, I
was for seven years a voluntary helpline
and outreach worker with my local
branch of Women’s Aid, and I should like
to congratulate Lindsay Woodster on her
excellent article about domestic violence.
She has painted a very clear picture of a
much misunderstood and underestimated
social problem, which does indeed cut a
wedge through all nationalities, and all
layers of society. In my opinion, France is
very badly in need of a programme of
public education about domestic abuse,
and of newspaper and magazine articles
of this type – written in French.
I take strong issue with Lynn Webster
(as quoted by Ms Woodster) concerning
the difficulties involved in effecting
appropriate changes in French law, and
enforcement of same. I am unsure about
the situation in Scotland, but in England
and Wales every police force has a
Domestic Violence unit, staffed by
specially-trained officers of both genders,
who usually have strong liaisons with
their local branch of Women’s Aid. On
this particular subject, British law has
come out of the Dark Ages, and is clearcut:
violence against another human being
is a crime, wherever, and by whomever, it
is inflicted, and the police, if summoned,
must intervene. Why should this not be so
in France? Our cultures are, in the final
analysis, not that different from each
other.
May I add to your list of informative
web sites: www.womensaid.org.uk
T M, name and address supplied
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Thursday, 05 April 2007 |
Men and women are becoming equals in all spheres. In
France, parity between the genders is a hot election issue.
All main candidates have policies on sexual equality in the
workplace and even in the home: equal pay for men and women,
salaries for stay-at-home mums and measures to encourage
women back into the work place.
There is even equality in the election race itself: Socialist
candidate and mother of four, Ségolène Royal is striking a blow
for women’s rights by being the first ever woman with a serious
chance of winning France’s highest office.
Now there is equality in the sexual domain.
The age at
which young men and women have their first sexual experience
is now almost the same. Boys are doing it for the first time
at 17.6 years, and girls are losing it at 17.4 years. Just 10
years ago, the ages for first timers were 17.9 years and 18.9
years respectively.
Under French law, girls and boys can do it legally at 16. In
former times, girls were allowed to do it at 15, but boys had to
wait until they were 18.
Does this mean that France has attained perfection in terms
of sexual equality? Probably not. As all grand slam tennis
tournaments adopt the idea of equal prize money for men and
women players, the top notch Paris tournament Roland-Garros
remains the only championship on the grand slam circuit where
the sexual earnings differential has been maintained.
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Thursday, 05 April 2007 |
The Asiatic hornets (reported in
‘French News’, March) are
already showing up further north
of Aquitaine, and the Charente
has found its first signs of
invasion (see nest in
photograph). This is viewed
with concern by the association
Charente Nature, since bees are
already under stress from the
widespread presence of toxins in
the environment.
Last year, Bill Warren
watched his bees being preyed
on by what he thought were
robber wasps. They hovered
outside the hive and dived on
the workers as they came and
went. “I was horrified,” he says,
“and I caught as many as I
could, then noticed they all went
off up the hill in the same
direction. That’s where we’ve found the Asiatic hornets’ nest.
There’s no point destroying it as it will be empty, and this year’s
queens will be looking to establish themselves in new sites.
”
This comes at a time of difficulty for apiculturists. It is one
thing to move bees around the country in a form of
transhumance, in order to glean a coveted harvest of specifically
forest or lavender honey, but it is common now for beekeepers to
move their hives in desperation to find a harvest. Wildflowers are
no longer so common. In France the government makes grants
available so that beekeepers can move their hives.
In the USA a recent spate of reductions in honeybee swarms,
called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), is being described as an
epidemic.
Pollination by bees is calculated to be responsible for
bringing in 30% of the food produced in the country.
Mme Caillet of Villefagnan (16) has between 300 and 500
hives. Last year she had half the harvest of the year before, and
in general has one third of what she was harvesting in 1986. “For
us to get our current average 15kg per hive we have to transport
the bees,” she says. The mountains and the Jura are cleaner areas
than the Charente. “Everybody knows it. Nobody will admit”,
she says, adding ominously: “If the bee disappears, we can only
give four years to humanity.”
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