Greek island holidays: Boys will be boys in Kos... and Mum can stop whinging and chill out

Four years ago we found the perfect getaway for our boys - an activity holiday with plenty of other teenagers to share it with. It was such a success that last summer we decided to repeat this experience. It was a gamble and we had no idea if it would pay off.

Now aged 15 and 17, our sons are becoming more independent... and lazy. During the summer holidays, unless they are playing cricket or an electronic game, they stay in bed late, get up and empty the fridge, then spend the rest of the day busy doing nothing.

Why, I wonder, are they able to trek up Ben Nevis and exist on cereal bars for the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme but totally incapable of navigating their way to the dishwasher or find a drawer in which to put away their clean clothes?

Beach boys: Matt and Dan finally get out of bed for some kayaking

That"s why I decided that if I couldn"t beat them (they are too big) then I may as well join them. So last August we headed back to the Greek island of Kos to find out if the Mark Warner formula still worked for us.

The Lakitira Resort is on the south of the island just 15 minutes from the airport. On arrival we were shown to our newly refurbished rooms, a teenage heaven with flatscreen TV, fridge and complimentary bathrobe.

Matt and Dan immediately took to their beds and checked out the TV channels, while I unpacked and set off to check out the activities of interest to me - namely the spa and the beach.

I started with the "Welcome" meeting where I was reminded of the wide range of activities on offer - sailing, windsurfing, scuba diving, sea kayaking and snorkelling.

But the main focus at this resort is tennis; the 11-court centre has been voted "Best of the Best European Resorts". The last time we came the boys humiliated us so badly on court that this time I decided to book separate courts so that we could make idiots of ourselves while they were still in bed.

I soon realised that to make this holiday a success for all of us, I had to let the boys do their own thing and "stop nagging". On our previous visit we had stayed in one of the whitewashed villa-style family apartments, but this time we chose hotel rooms with a balcony and sea view.

Our room was next to the boys but I decided not to enter their space - they could stay in bed all day if they wished and I left their mess to be dealt with by the maid. Mum and Dad would just get on with our week in the sun and leave them to it.

Keeping mum: Jenny left the boys to their own devices and spent the week relaxing

By the end of the first morning I had booked a Pilates session andarranged a rejuvenating facial for later in the week. I then collectedmy book and headed off to the beach.

The resort is set infour acres of flower-filled gardens with two separate beach areas - onefor families and one adults-only - which is a great idea for parentswho prefer to get away from their own, or even other people"s,children.

The Waterfront crew are around to supervise the huge flotilla ofdinghies and windsurfers and there is plenty of roped-off sea to swimin for those of us who chose not to opt for a buoyancy jacket andlife-threatening experience with a kayak.

By lunchtime wewere ready to check out the new and improved catering facilities. Thehotel restaurant offers a vast choice at the buffet breakfast anddinner, there are pizzas in the trattoria or meze and fresh fish at theGreek taverna. The boys rarely made it for breakfast but devoured aconstant supply of pizzas at lunchtime.

During our lastvisit the wine was complimentary but drinks are no longer on the houseso this time we went for quality rather than quantity.

Despitemy "no nagging" policy, I couldn"t help feeling irritated that the boyswere missing out on all the wonderful facilities, but I needn"t haveworried.

After a few days, Matt appeared for the morning Indy club and found that as most of the older teenagers didn"t emerge until the afternoon, he had the windsurfing instructor to himself.

Danventured out into the afternoon sunshine to join fellow sleepyheads forwatersports, volleyball and the odd game of cards. When all thisactivity was too exhausting-they would join us on the beach and to mydelight they started reading books.

Unfortunately, as theboys had instructed me that all they needed for their week in the sunwas a pair of shorts, a toothbrush and a ton of electronic leads andheadphones, it was our carefully selected books that they looked to fortheir reading matter. We soon found ourselves delving-into the libraryof books left by other guests.

As my plan was to be as lazy as the boys, I didn"t want to overdo things. We did play some tennis, but I was looking for a more sedentary form of exercise and decided on Pilates.

Each afternoon I had personal instruction from the very patient Marc, who taught me the basics. By the end of the week I may not have developed a flat belly but I had found my neutral spine position, perfected the one leg circle and confronted my abs. How come those boys who spend all day sleeping or eating have perfect six-packs?

Child"s play: Once the teenagers were up there were a lot of activities on offer to keep them entertained

Most of the Mark Warner guests seemed quite happy to stay on the complex but after a few days of doing absolutely nothing I did feel slightly stir-crazy, so we headed off to explore Kos.

The town is overlooked by an impressive castle from which the Knights of St John once repelled Turkish invaders and pirates. We wandered around the ancient harbour walls and saw the ruins dating from the Hellenistic and Roman periods which were revealed after an earthquake in 1933.

We saw the plane tree under which Hippocrates is believed to have taught his medical students and in Kos museum found mosaics and marble statues from the ancient world.

Elsewhere, Turkish fountains, mosques and Art Deco featured among shops selling mosaics, rugs and pottery.

After a cold beer by the marina we made our way back to the resort before we got too used to life "outside". The boys, engaged in a game of poker, hadn"t noticed we were missing. More...Crazy for Corsica: A child-friendly resort in San Lucianu makes for a perfect lazy holidayAll rest and no work as Kalamata family resort caters for every whimFind more family holiday ideas here

As we lay on the beach watching Matt and Dan wafting past on windsurfers, it occurred to us that this might be one of the last family holidays that we spend together.

With Matt heading off to university and Dan gearing up for the season of music festivals, it won"t be long before us "olds" will have the freedom to birdwatch, ramble, visit museums or do whatever else it is that redundant parents are supposed to get up to.

Financial hardship will probably be the only incentive for them to holiday with us in the future. This saddens me because once they wake up they are very good company. We spent some lovely evenings in the taverna and playing cards in the bar.

It is hard letting go and I"m not sure I"m ready for it yet, so I"m wondering if I can squeeze one last week of doing nothing into a Mark Warner activity holiday before at least one of them flies the nest.

Travel Facts

Mark Warner (0871 703 3880, www.markwarner.co.uk) offers a week at Lakitira Beach Resort from 595 per adult, 357 per child aged two to 11, and 100 for infants. It includes return flights, transfers, half-board accommodation, childcare for over twos, and tennis, sailing, windsurfing and fitness lessons.

WINTER OLYMPICS 2010: Britains bobsleigh star Nicola Minichiello admits - I wish to win bullion to answer the bullies who done my hold up a wretchedness

If Nicola Minichiello can succeed in adding an Olympic gold medal to her world championship crown when the two-woman bobsleigh competition is played out here in the early hours of Thursday morning, it will a triumph for sport"s ability to conquer adversity.

For the 31-year-old"s motivation runs far deeper than a competitor"s desire to be the best.

What drives Minichiello is the bitter memory of the racist bullying she suffered as a schoolgirl and her continuing grief over the death of her brother from a heroin overdose.

Going for gold: Nicola Minichiello and Gillian Cooke will compete in the bobsleigh in Whistler

Minichiello grew up in Dronfield, Derbyshire, six miles from Sheffield, which she now calls home.

She never knew her father but was brought up, along with tragic brother Andrew and younger sister Amanda, by her mother Evonne Gautier, whose own parents were from Jamaica.

"As a kid from a mixed race, single-parent family growing up in an affluent white community, I had a tough time," said Minichiello last week.

"We didn"t fit in. We were brought up on benefits and it wasn"t the norm around there. Kids can be cruel and I was bullied physically as well as mentally.

"Life was difficult for us. Mum struggled. She didn"t have much money, but no matter what I needed she was always there. She has been my inspiration."

Sport offered Minichiello a haven from the misery she experienced at the hands of the bullies, who had given her such low self-esteem that she admits she could easily have followed her brother into a life of drugs.

"Sport saved me," she said. "Through sport, I had an avenue to build my confidence. It was the making of me. If it wasn"t for sport who knows what would have happened in my life?

"I found my voice in sport. That"s why I love the work I do now withthe Youth Sports" Trust as an athlete"s mentor, allowing me to reachout to youngsters.

"I wasn"t the most naturally talented ofathletes but I was determined and very focused. I was going to prove tothe bullies that I was a worthwhile person. Just because I fittedvarious stereotypes, that didn"t sum up who I was. For me, it was aboutproving points. I honestly discovered myself through sport."

Sadly, her brother"s life took a different path, one that led to his death nine years ago.

"Unfortunately, there are people who just don"t find somewhere to fit in life," said Minichiello.

Perfect pair: Cooke and Minichiello at last year"s World Championships

"Andrew fell in with the wrong crowd and he was involved with drugs from a young age."

Two weeks after her brother"s funeral, Minichiello, an aspiring heptathlete who had represented Britain at the World Student Games, was asked to audition for the British bobsleigh team. It was a call that changed her life and eventually led to the partnership with brakeman Gill Cooke that brought them the world championship at Lake Placid last year.

"I had nothing to lose by trying out for the bob team," said Minichiello. "I thought that maybe I was being offered an opportunity for a reason. Andrew"s death, after such a tragic time for him and for all the family, was one of the catalysts for me getting involved in bobsleigh. I never stop thinking of Andrew. We were very close. He"s part of my inspiration."

It has been a troubled season for Minichiello. She needed laser surgery six days before Christmas and then again just 16 days before the Games to repair 80 per cent blindness in her left eye and she has not won a race all winter.

But, as reigning world champion, she will have the utmost respect. "I"ve been building up to this all my life and will put my heart and soul into winning," she said.

Her mother, now suffering from arthritis, has been unable to travel to the Olympics, but Minichiello said: "She"ll watch on TV and call and that"s good enough."

Her sister Amanda was in Lake Placid to see Minichiello"s triumph but her work as a maternity nurse means she also cannot be in Canada.

When Minichiello competed at the Olympics in Turin four years ago, her marriage to Toni Minichiello, coach to Britain"s heptathlon world champion Jessica Ennis, was unravelling and she came a disappointing ninth.

But she found her bobsleigh partner, Cooke, who had competed for Scotland in the pole vault and long jump, when she posted a message on Facebook detailing her vacancy for a brakeman.

Five months later they became world champions. Next month Minichiello celebrates her 32nd birthday, so she is unlikely to have another chance to win an Olympic medal. "I"m in a happy place," she said. But surely no competitor will have had to follow a more heartbreaking road to get there.

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From this day brazen prerogative tied together couples Matthew Parris

Matthew Parris & , : {}

To the infancy appropriate of my knowledge, in the 4,000-odd columns Ive created for The Times so far, theres been frequency a word about marriage. But afterwards Ive created small about motherhood and zero about apple pie. All these are so seemingly great things, and so seemingly merit support, that it seems roughly a rubbish of breath to contend so.

Or so I thought until an ludicrous row blew up about such an patently great thought as the Tory plans to recognize wedlock in the taxation system. To listen to a small of the overheated explanation that has swirled around this evidence in new weeks, one competence suppose that the matter that wedlock is great for infancy who select it, beneficial for bringing up children, and of good to multitude as a total is deeply controversial.

But in the eyes of the strenuous infancy of people of all ages, all races, both sexes and all passionate orientations, it is deeply uncontroversial. To infancy of us these truths about the worth of wedlock are obvious. As viewable to me as a happy man as they are to my five heterosexual brothers and sisters, mercifully shouldering the charge of propagating new Parrises eleven when last counted. Far from begrudging any scored equally together integrate a medium worth in their taxation dues, Im as unwavering as infancy happy men are of all the distractions, costs, headaches and time commitments that a pram in the corridor brings. Though outrageous happinesses competence come with it, I unequivocally dont mind chipping in.

But the some-more than that. I hold that for a multitude to hold wedlock close to the heart is so alone life-giving a thing that (like skewing the taxation complement in foster of adults who have free donations) the gesticulate is critical not usually financially but as a statement, too, about something a republic values.

BACKGROUNDWe mustnt divorce ourselves from marriageMy wedlock is similar to a really prolonged car journeyWe are still in love with marriageCameron woos electorate with wedlock offer

If you think this is an peculiar view for a happy man to express, afterwards you possibly dont know infancy happy people or youve been profitable as well infancy courtesy to a green but slim minority. For heres something that for scarcely a decade I tried, as a parliamentary vice-president of the Conservative Group for Homosexual Equality, to hit in to the heads of an stupid Tory party. Gay men, I kept revelation them, are an astonishingly regressive territory of society.

There are, of course, hundreds of thousands of exceptions to that generalisation, and to those generalistions that Im about to make. But if the Conservative Party can finish the charge of dispelling slow doubts about either it has incited the behind for ever on old prejudices (and David Cameron equates to to) afterwards I envision that inside of a decade pollsters will be perceptive a medium certain association in between happy electorate and Tory supporters.

Conservative (you competence be astounded to learn) in amicable attitudes as well as politics. We gays are flattering clever on the work ethic, and rather some-more desirous with the workshy than a small of the heterosexual associate voters. We can turn a small bit some-more grouchy, a small bit some-more cantankerous, some-more set in the ways a small progressing in the lives than a small of the true friends. We can be (whisper this) a tad some-more fanatic of minorities.

Were rather traditionalist, infancy of us. We do, you know, have families. We do have fathers and mothers, and we do love them. We are sons, and uncles, and grandchildren too. We have sisters and brothers and nephews and nieces, usually similar to true people. Some of the infancy appropriate friends are straight. And infancy of them are couples. And we similar to that. We similar to the friends marriages. We similar to marriage.

So this happy man, at least, would suggest Tory policymakers to hang to their guns on wedlock taxation breaks. They have far wider, deeper support, from a far some-more opposite range of human sorts in Britain, than a outspoken (and in all left-leaning) minority competence lead them to believe.

Three dangers, however, for Tories to beware. First, dont moralise. People will do the moralising for themselves. The point about complicated wedlock is not the altar: the the commitment, the life and the recognition. A wedlock obligation is the evidence, not the substance. Thats all you need to say. Dont contend a integrate who havent scored equally the tangle will regularly be undeserving of a taxation break. Say the tough to think of a approach of arranging it.

Second, equivocate so far as probable proposals that can be described as punishing young kids innate out of wedlock. For this reason Im puzzled about the thought of restraining the taxation mangle to the prolongation of children, as though the bona fide baby comes with a annuity turn the neck, whilst the deceptive kid is unrewarded. Steer transparent of child-related rewards. The horrors of the Victorian tarnish trustworthy to the unwed mom and her kid are still clever in the British imagination.

Third (and this pulls in the alternative direction) find a approach to shorten this taxation mangle firmly sufficient to concede it to be appreciable. For a start, conflict the evidence that, for equalitys sake, homosexual polite partners should be eligible. Dont conflict this on principle: contend the a good thought for the future, as the still-novel establishment of polite partnership settles down, but whilst moneys parsimonious it creates clarity to begin with the kind of partnership infancy expected to engage children. Avoid exactly the evidence about the relations worth of opposite sorts of partnerships: demand that all partnership is good, but wedlock is the easiest to prove.

The greatest worry fundamental in the Tories idea, however, is no reliable or informative objection. Its an evidence of mercantile efficiency. Why give a hugely costly Exchequer welfare to tens of millions of couples, the immeasurable infancy of whom are scored equally together already and need no incentivising? And if you extent the cost by creation the good negligible, afterwards the outcome could be a small token, vitriolic a minority, charity the scored equally together infancy zero estimable and the unwed small to expect.

So because not have the taxation mangle generous, but extent it to those who wed after the Budget proposals are carried in to law? This would have the early costs really modest. Some would cry foul, but to those scored equally together already the answer would be that zero was being taken afar from them; and it is not opposite for new benefits (or the withdrawal of old benefits) to be done impending only, for new claimants.

There will shortly be dual classes of impending pensioner: comparison workers enjoying the inexhaustible employers grant schemes theyve paid into, on the conditions already contracted; and younger workers to whom usually less inexhaustible contracts are available. Couldnt post-2010 marriages, likewise, validate for opposite treatment?

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Gordon Brown says Tories would short shift voters

Robin Henry & , : {}

Gordon Brown currently shielded the governments jot down on the retrogression observant Conservative measures would short shift families.

The budding apportion pronounced the supervision had been consistently valid right in the decisions it had done to guarantee the economy, whilst the Conservatives had been valid wrong.

Addressing the Welsh Labour discussion in Swansea, Brown laughed off new allegations that he had bullied staff at Number 10 observant he had been indicted of all short of Killing Archie Mitchell in EastEnders.

He added: I guarantee you, I didnt even lay a finger on him.

Related LinksTory aphorism to be "vote for change"

Brown additionally pounded at the Conservatives new aphorism "vote for change", that was denounced at their open discussion today.

He said: "After their aphorism was voiced today, I unequivocally think we ought to ask them: how they can explain to be the celebration of shift when these policies - fortifying the Lords, subsidy fox hunting, estate taxation cuts - are not just new policies but the really policies that have tangible the Conservative Party for some-more than 100 years?"

The budding apportion went on to contend that the usually law in the Conservatives explain to be the celebration of shift was that they keep becoming different their mind.

His debate came after a rider of mercantile figures, that showed an alleviation in Britains expansion entrance out of the recession.

Brown pronounced measures such as receiving carry out of unwell banks and nationalising Northern Rock had been required to strengthen the assets of UK families.

He contrasted Labours proceed to the economy with that of the antithesis observant the Government had faced ideological antithesis from the Conservatives.

We had a preference to do what the Conservatives pronounced and let the retrogression take the course.

Brown pronounced open investment would be confirmed via the year until the highway to liberation is assured.

He claimed cuts being due by the Conservatives would short shift typical family groups and risk the liberation and the jobs, businesses and the homes of thousands of people.

While Brown was addressing activists in Wales, the Conservatives were phenomenon their new choosing debate at their discussion in Brighton.

They voiced 6 key themes to anguish voters, trimming from ancillary the NHS to reforming Westminster.

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Andy Robinson banks on Scotland pack to yield his sweetest feat Sport

Andy Robinson, the Scotland coach, is unfortunate to equivocate the Six Nations wooden spoon. Photograph: Derek Blair/PA

Andy Robinson rebuilt for his initial Calcutta Cup compare as Scotland"s head manager by articulate up England brazen of Saturday"s confront at Murrayfield. Any inside believe gleaned from his Twickenham days, he insisted, will be not pertinent if the visitors are authorised to fool around with gait and leisure and are not stopped at source by a inspired Scottish pack.

It will be the initial time that Robinson has sent out a side opposite England, with whom he played a distinguished purpose in the 2003 World Cup delight and was head manager for twenty-two games, winning nine, until his depart in 2006. Victory this week end would arrange in between the sweetest of his career but he is acutely wakeful rugby matches are essentially won by the deeds of players rather than by coaches with a measure to settle.

"I can promulgate about the [England] players but it"s still about going out there and delivering," pronounced Robinson, carrying picked Edinburgh"s Nick De Luca at outward centre to column the midfield counterclaim with Max Evans switching to the wing in place of Simon Danielli. "There are a series of really good players who fool around for England. They have a really good brazen pack, they"re really good at aggressive by Danny Care, they have got gait so they are a dangerous team. But if you get in their faces and stop them from playing, you ask genuine questions of them."

Defence, in alternative words, will be consequential if Scotland are to finish a hat-trick of home wins over England for the initial time given the early 1970s and equivocate a power wooden spoon. "It"s about reception the opportunities we emanate and interlude England scoring," Robinson said.

There is not a good understanding of love lost in between Robinson and Martin Johnson, who was in between those vicious of England during the ex-Bath flanker"s latter days in charge. Robinson, though, is all as well informed with the pressures of the England pursuit and has not been astounded at the slam Johnson"s group have been reception notwithstanding their stream Six Nations jot down of dual wins from 3 games: "If they had won 3 out of three, Martin Johnson would have been criticised. I can recollect operative with Clive Woodward and Clive was regularly criticised for what he was doing."

When asked if World Cup-winning captain Johnson showed coaching power when he was a player, however, Robinson"s reply – "He understands the diversion really well from the second-row position" – was not just drizzling with reverence. Johnson, in contrast, referred to Scotland"s pushing diversion "has softened given he"s been up there" and is expecting "a standard England/Scotland encounter" of substantial power and couple of frills. The Scots have had to reshuffle their bench, with the scrum-half Mike Blair and the column Alasdair Dickinson both ruled out by concussion and Alasdair Strokosch sidelined with an ankle injury. Rory Lawson, Geoff Cross and Alan MacDonald have all been declared in the matchday 22.

Three organisation killed as Costa Europa journey boat is blown in to post at Sharm el-Sheikh

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Three crewmen died and 4 people were harmed 3 of them British women tourists when a journey boat struck a post in Sharm el-Sheikh on the Red Sea seashore of Egypt yesterday.

Officials pronounced that clever winds pushed the 54,763-tonne boat Costa Europa in to a post as it attempted to wharf at the resort. A 2m indenture non-stop in the hull, permitting H2O to inundate in to a cabin and trapping the crewmen: an Indian, a Honduran and a Brazilian.

The 24-year-old ship, carrying 1,437 passengers, had been on an 18-day journey from Dubai to Savona. It was due to be franchised to the British transport user Thomson Holidays for 10 years in April.

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Mervyn King: Quantitative easing might have to restart Business

Bank of England administrator Mervyn King. Photograph: Alessia Pierdomenicao/Reuters

Mervyn King, the administrator of the Bank of England, warned currently that the debility of the eurozone is jeopardising the UK"s recovery, and the puncture £200bn quantitative easing programme competence have to be re-started if the economy deteriorates in the entrance months.

"My sold regard at the impulse derives from the health of the tellurian economy, and in sold the vital trade partner, the eurozone," the administrator said.

Much of the 16-member eurozone bounced out of retrogression by last summer, but recently-released interpretation for the last entertain of 2009 showed that Germany, the eurozone"s largest economy, stagnated, and multiform alternative countries, together with Spain and Ireland, sojourn weak, whilst Greece is battling to equivocate a default on the debts.

Charlie Bean, the Bank"s emissary governor, warned that he expects liberation in the eurozone, as in the UK, to be "sluggish".

King struck a desperate note about the prospects for a tellurian recovery, and warned that the UK had, "embarked on a routine of healing," that would take a small time. He stressed that, "risks to the [Bank of England"s monetary policy] committee"s executive perspective of a light liberation of outlay sojourn to the downside."

Despite headlines last week that acceleration jumped to 3.5% in January, the administrator steady his insistence that the monetary process cabinet (MPC) stands ready to magnify the £200bn intrigue to siphon income in to the economy. The bruise fell some-more than 1.2 cents opposite the dollar during the hearing, from $1.5539 to $1.5413.

King"s remarks, to the cross-party Treasury name cabinet of MPs, came among uninformed justification of the infirmity of the upturn. The British Bankers Association pronounced debt approvals fell to an eight-month low in January, and lending to non-financial companies forsaken by £3.9bn.

David Miles, an eccentric part of of the Bank"s nine-member MPC, looming with King, told the MPs he had found the preference about either to magnify the £200bn item squeeze programme at the ultimate assembly progressing this month, "pretty finely balanced".

"If the headlines is that the mercantile opinion seems even weaker, acceleration vigour is reduce and that moves down that profile, I think there is a clever box afterwards for expanding serve the item purchases. If it goes the alternative direction, that would be a box for pulling in the alternative direction," he said. The MPC will encounter again subsequent week.

In a apart speech, Paul Tucker, the Bank"s emissary administrator for monetary stability, pronounced it would be a small months prior to it becomes transparent how the forces battering the economy would fool around out. "I think it will take at slightest until the center of the year for us to have most of a clarity of either expansion will be anaemic, or strong sufficient to proceed to catch the tardy in the economy," he said.

King combined that there was so far small pointer of the rebalancing in the general economy that would be required to move the downturn to an end. He forked out that at the new entertainment of G7 monetary ministers and executive bankers, each nation seemed to be relying on a liberation in direct elsewhere to kick-start expansion at home.

The administrator additionally steady his insistence that the government"s three-year special liquidity scheme, that authorised banks to sell hard-to-sell resources such as mortgage-backed holds for some-more liquid gilts, will not be extended, and urged banks to find alternative sources of appropriation prior to the intrigue starts to end early subsequent year.

"There is zero entrance out of this monetary predicament that would transparent the taxpayer appropriation the existent make up of the monetary sector," he said, adding that a small monetary institutions competence have to cringe their change sheets if they cannot fill the opening left by the removal of supervision aid.

The administrator once again urged Alistair Darling to benefaction a minute plan to understanding with the yawning necessity on the open finances; but he played down similarities with Greece"s predicament, indicating out that there is right away a transparent cross-party accord that borrowing contingency be tackled.