The former vice-president Walter Mondale announced his readiness to run for senator of Minnesota yesterday after an emotional

The former vice-president Walter Mondale announced his readiness to run for senator of Minnesota yesterday after an emotional memorial service for Paul Wellstone, whose death in an aircraft crash last week created the Democrat vacancy.
A number of high-profile figures including former president Bill Clinton and the 2000 presidential candidate Al Gore were among 20,000 people who attended a memorial service for Mr Wellstone on Tuesday night that turned into an impassioned rally at which his friends vowed to fight to elect the person who will replace him. The OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights has been campaigning for some time to improve electoral standards in some of the older, established democracies.. However, that might not have been a bad idea, given the experience of the presidential election and the more recent Democratic primary, when voting machines again malfunctioned and hundreds of people complained of being disenfranchised.Rather, the team will look at the broader picture of Florida’s electoral laws, how they are applied, and the ways in which US practices fall short of the stringent requirements imposed on emerging democracies in Eastern Europe and elsewhere.This is the first time international monitors have gone to the United States. “Whatever else it is, it will be an experience,” said a tight-lipped Ilirjan Celibashi, head of Albania’s Central Electoral Committee.Mandated by the OSCE, the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the 10-man delegation will not be manning polling stations. It remains to be seen whether Florida isn’t too tough a nut to crack, even for them. After receiving a decade of lectures from Western democracies about overhauling their own systems, they also have a good idea how to overcome them. Now, the joke has become reality.
A high-level delegation of European and North American election observers – including members from Russia and Albania – arrived yesterday for a week-long mission to watch Florida’s mid-term elections, which take place on Tuesday.Their task: to see if the world’s most powerful democracy has learned anything from the disastrous 36-day showdown between George Bush and Al Gore in 2000, in which the world saw every wart in Florida’s deeply flawed electoral system without ever discovering for sure who had won.Certainly, the Russians and Albanians know a thing or two about flawed, rigged or fraudulent elections.

It also comes just months before the planned flotation of its electricals arm in France.Mr Murphy, 46, said he was keen to stay at Carlton for the next few months while it edges closer to a merger with its network rival Granada. It is clearly important that no momentum is lost.”The changeover comes as Kingfisher takes full control of the French home improvements chain Castorama. “As soon as the new chief executive is named the existing one loses his raison d’etre,” one retail observer said.Sir Geoff said: “Naturally, I am sad to be leaving the business before the process of transformation, which we started two years ago, is finally complete. However, relations between the two men are understood to have become increasingly tense. Sources close to Kingfisher said Francis Mackay, the group’s chairman who orchestrated the changeover to please investors, was “quite hopeful” that Mr Murphy would agree to bring forward his 2 February start date.As recently as last month, Mr Mackay said he planned for Sir Geoff and his successor to have a hand-over period.

Kingfisher, the retail giant, hopes to persuade Gerry Murphy to bring forward his start date as its new chief executive from next February to December.
Mr Murphy, currently head of the media group Carlton Communications, was yesterday officially named as successor to Sir Geoff Mulcahy, the retail veteran who has been at Kingfisher since its inception 20 years ago.The abrupt departure of Sir Geoff, who leaves at the end of this week, will leave a void at the helm of the B&Q-to-Comet conglomerate. “There is no substitute for a vibrant local economy based on local traders,” she said.The Association of Convenience Stores said totally independent stores, rather than other chains such as Spar, would be unable to compete with the buying power and distribution system of Tesco, but stressed that the deal showed the buoyancy of the total market. This will reinforce the consolidation of the market, it will restrict consumer choice and will affect smaller business.” She said that because of Tesco’s regionalised distribution system, the stores would be less likely than the small independent retailers to sell produce from local suppliers. The result will be a loss of local colour and diversity.”Lucy Michaels, of Corporate Watch, a campaigning environmental group, said the development was “very worrying … These will suffer because people will gravitate towards Tesco. He said: “Many of these are located in the typical shopping parade of a few shops and may include an off-licence and a greengrocer. The supermarket giant Tesco took another leap towards dominance of Britain’s food shopping yesterday by buying the country’s second- biggest chain of corner shops – a move critics said drove another nail into the coffin of independent traders.
Tesco, which already has the principal 18 per cent share of the supermarket trade, paid £377m for T&S Stores, which has 850 convenience store outlets, mainly in the Midlands but also in the South and in the North-west.