Cape Town – The behaviour displayed in the National Assembly in recent months was a very dangerous phenomenon, ANC Deputy Chief Whip Doris Dlakude warned on Thursday evening.

Delivering a farewell address at the end of the final 2014 sitting of the House, she condemned the “senseless behaviour, mudslinging and character assassination” which, she said, had characterised the country’s Fifth Parliament.

“The behaviour that has been displayed in this House, where the rules have constantly been undermined to push an agenda of defiance and disruption, is indeed a very dangerous phenomenon in the life of our democracy.

“We have witnessed how tension has escalated to violence in this House; and we have witnessed a clear disregard for the presiding officers… who are tasked with ensuring it functions effectively.”

Dlakude called on MPs to refrain from putting South Africa’s future in jeopardy.

“We have witnessed such senseless behaviour, mudslinging, and character assassination, which have inflicted much damage – not just to the affected individuals, but mostly to the reputation and credibility of this institution.”

Instead of promoting tolerance, members had allowed the House to descend into “chaos and absolute mayhem”.

Dlakude also took apparent aim at EFF MPs, who had earlier left the House following a tension-filled debate that saw the adoption of a report calling for some of their members to be suspended.

“Those who came here to wilfully, and with disdain, disrupt the proceedings of this House, should not interfere with those who have come to serve the people of this country.”

Earlier, MPs from other parties struck a similar sombre note in their traditional end-of-year farewell speeches.

Freedom Front Chief Whip Corne Mulder noted Parliament had been through a “very rough seven months” since the elections earlier this year.

“If we expect people to respect us, we should set an example of how we behave ourselves in the House.”

He too called on MPs to consider whether they were upholding voters’ expectations of how their representatives should behave.

Democratic Alliance MP Thembekile Majola reflected on the dignity of the institution.

“The dignity and decorum of this House has been pushed to its limits and beyond,” he said.

African People’s Convention MP Themba Godi noted that the public were not impressed with MPs’ behaviour.

“Everywhere one goes, there is hardly a good word or impression about this House, and us as members. This is due to the schoolyard behaviour of some among us.

“There appears to be a definite intent to render the House ungovernable by undermining and frustrating everything,” he said. – Sapa

London – David Cameron says he wears pyjamas, Donald Duck donned a nightcap and Marilyn Monroe wore just Chanel No 5 – but what is the best thing to wear in bed?

It seems that Marilyn might have been on to something. One in three adults sleeps in the nude, according to an international study by the US National Sleep Foundation, and it’s been shown to have all sorts of benefits.

Here, experts reveal how ditching pyjamas could improve your sleep quality, boost your relationship and may even help burn calories.

GOING NAKED MEANS A GOOD NIGHT’S SLEEP

Sleep experts agree it’s important to keep cool at night as your body (or “core”) temperature needs to drop by about half a degree for you to fall asleep. The brain, driven by your internal body clock, sends messages to the blood vessels to open up and release heat.

“Your core temperature is at its highest at 11pm and its lowest at 4am,” says Dr Chris Idzikowski, director of the Edinburgh Sleep Centre and author of Sound Asleep: The Expert Guide To Sleeping Well.

“If anything prevents that decline in temperature, the brain will wake itself up to see what’s going on, meaning you’ll struggle to get to sleep or you’ll have disturbed sleep.

“The advantage of sleeping naked is it’s easier for the body to cool and maintain the lower temperature the brain wants to achieve.” Russell Foster, professor of circadian neuroscience at the University of Oxford, says ditching nightwear may improve your slumber.

“If you’re wearing lots of bedclothes it’s going to be more difficult to regulate your temperature, so wear the least you can get away with.”

Disrupted sleep from being too hot doesn’t just mean you’ll get less sleep overall, but it might mean less deep sleep, the most restorative type.

Deep sleep is key for memory consolidation and the production of growth hormone – important for cell repair and growth.

Why does the body cool down during sleep? One theory is that it evolved to do this because our ancestors in Africa would grab some rest in the afternoon, and needed to keep cool in the heat.

SWAP BED SOCKS FOR A HOT WATER BOTTLE

Though it’s important not to get too hot at night, make sure you have warm hands and feet.

That’s because for your temperature to lower to the level that triggers sound sleep, your body needs to lose excess heat.

It does this by sending blood to the vessels near skin – in particular, those on the hands and feet – where heat is lost through the skin surface.

However, as Professor Foster explains, if your hands and feet are cold, the blood vessels next to the skin constrict and reduce blood flow in an effort to keep warm and stop heat escaping. This in turn means your core temperature won’t be able to drop so easily.

This is why people with Raynaud’s syndrome – a disorder characterised by extremely cold hands and feet (thought to affect up to ten million people in the UK, including 10 percent of all women) are more likely to suffer with insomnia. The condition causes the blood vessels in the extremities to spasm, reducing blood flow, so though sufferers’ hands and feet may feel very cold, their core temperature is too high.

Older people tend to feel the cold at night, probably because circulation problems become more common.

Women are also more likely to suffer with cold hands and feet, especially at certain points in the menstrual cycle – oestrogen regulates the peripheral blood vessels in the hands and feet, and high levels can make them more sensitive to temperature.

A 2008 study by the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience demonstrated the importance of body temperature in sleep.

Volunteers slept wearing thermosuits, allowing researchers to manipulate their skin temperature without altering core temperature. The team found that when skin temperature was raised by just 0.4c, the volunteers were significantly less likely to wake in the night.

In elderly volunteers, the effect was pronounced: the 0.4c rise almost doubled the proportion of deep sleep and decreased the risk of waking too early from 50 percent to four percent.

Warming the skin caused blood vessels in the extremities to widen, so heat could be lost more easily. “They promoted sleep by raising skin temperature, allowing heat to flow from the middle of the body and the core temperature to fall slightly,” says Professor Foster.

In other words, to fall asleep easily, you need to be warm enough that your blood vessels won’t constrict, but not so hot that your body can’t cool down.

To ensure body temperature drops sufficiently, swap bed socks for a hot water bottle, says Dr Idzikowski. “Bed socks don’t allow you to lose heat from your feet, so you’ll end up too hot,” he says. “Hot water bottles get your feet warm, but then they cool down or can be kicked out of the way.”

Your bed partner can also be helpful for regulating your body temperature.

“If you’re cold, you can snuggle up to them and once you’re warm, you can move away,” says Professor Foster.

SLEEP IN THE BUFF TO BURN CALORIES

There is an increasing focus on brown fat, a type of tissue in the body that may protect against weight gain.

While ordinary body fat piles on when we eat more calories than we burn, brown fat seems to burn excess calories to generate heat. We know babies have lots of brown fat – they need it to keep warm – but studies have shown there are small amounts in the necks of adults, too.

Experts believe that certain activities could switch on this fat, potentially helping to burn calories at a greater rate. In a US study in the journal Diabetes, researchers found that sleeping in a cold bedroom could activate brown fat in adults.

Five healthy young men slept in climate-controlled bedrooms for four months. For the first month, the room was kept at 24c, then it was lowered to 19c, then it went back to 24c and for the last month raised to 27c.

They ate the same amount of calories and their calorie expenditure and insulin sensitivity – how much insulin the body needs to keep blood sugar levels stable – were measured each day. The results were striking. After four weeks sleeping at 19c, the men had almost doubled their volumes of brown fat.

Tests showed they burned more calories throughout the day when their bedroom was cooler (though not enough to lose weight) and their insulin sensitivity had also improved.

Senior author Francesco S. Celi said the study showed that over time sleeping in a cold bedroom could lessen the risk of diabetes.

Michael Symonds, professor of developmental physiology at the University of Nottingham and an expert on brown fat, says sleeping naked may be beneficial.

Brown fat can produce 300 times more heat than any other body organ, meaning if you can keep it activated for a prolonged amount of time you’d be less likely to lay down excess energy. “So anything you can do to try to activate it, such as lowering the thermostat and sleeping in the cold, may be of benefit.”

But room temperature shouldn’t be below a level at which you feel comfortable, otherwise you won’t sleep.

People who tend to feel hot at night and like to sleep naked, may have a high amount of brown fat, which causes them to feel warmer than others.

…AND LOWER BLOOD PRESSURE

Cosy pyjamas are tempting, but if you share a bed with a partner, going nude will generate a generous boost of oxytocin, a hormone that’s been shown to have a wealth of health benefits.

“It is triggered by closeness, particularly skin-to-skin contact,” says Dr Kerstin Uvnas-Moberg, a physiologist at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.

And an expert on oxytocin. “Sensory nerves on the skin send impulses to the brain, triggering the release.

“When a baby is placed on its mother’s chest, the blood in mother and child starts to pulse with oxytocin.”

Oxytocin has a protective effect on the heart, as it lowers blood pressure. It also boosts the immune system and reduces anxiety.

“But it only works if skin-on-skin touching is something you’re happy with.”

GIVE YOUR LOVE LIFE A BOOST

People who sleep naked have happier love lives, according to a survey of 1 000 British adults by a bedsheet company this year.

The study found 57 percent of nude sleepers were happy with their relationship, compared with 48 percent of pyjama wearers and 43 percent of nightie wearers (onesie wearers were just 38 percent).

Sleeping naked is a good strategy for those with body image issues, says Denise Knowles, sex therapist at counselling charity Relate.

“You can slip under the sheets and then take your clothes off, and then you can be touched, even if you don’t want to be looked at.”

Sleeping naked may increase the chances of sex.

“Pyjamas might give the message ‘not tonight’, but equally a lot of couples have a lot of fun taking each other’s clothes off.”

STOP GETTING INFECTIONS

Wearing nothing to bed can help women avoid developing yeast infections, such as thrush, says Austin Ugwumadu, a consultant gynaecologist at St George’s Hospital in South London.

“Thrush loves warm, restricted environments, so wear something loose or preferably nothing at all.

“If you wear something tight it means less air gets to the area and you’re more likely to sweat, which can cause irritation.” – Daily Mail

Johannesburg – Steve Hofmeyr went to court to protect his dignity, but his bid to be protected against a puppet’s “obsessional tweeting” against him fell flat on Thursday.

Outside the court, his visibly annoyed supporter and Afrikaner rights activist, Dan Roodt, took out his frustrations on Chester Missing, slapping him around.
For more http://www.iol.co.za

Cape Town – The Economic Freedom Fighters peacefully filed out of Parliament on Thursday after the National Assembly adopted a report calling for their suspension, vowing to contest it in the high court.

“Tomorrow we are taking this to court. The papers are read, we are getting an urgent interdict to stop this,” EFF leader Julius Malema told singing and dancing supporters on the steps of Parliament’s Marks Building.

Minutes earlier, the ANC majority had secured a vote of 210 in favour of the report sanctioning his party for heckling President Jacob Zuma to repay money spent on his Nkandla home, with 111 against and three abstentions.

 The approval of the report will leave half of the 20 EFF MPs out of pocket in December, as their salaries will be docked for that month.

The other 10 will be suspended for 30 days.

Undeterred, Malema said the EFF would pursue the issue and insist the president implement Public Protector Thuli Madonsela’s order that he reimburse the state for luxuries added to his home.

“We are going to demand that Zuma pay back the money whether they suspend us or not. The only crime we committed was to ask for the money of the people that was stolen by Jacob Zuma.”

Earlier, after a fraught debate and filibuster by the EFF, Malema asked Deputy Speaker Lechesa Tsenoli whether the adoption of the report by the powers and privileges committee meant that the suspension had taken effect.

There was no clear answer.

“If the suspension kicks in now, we will be back for the State of the Nation” address in February, EFF MP Andile Mngxitama said. “For them, that does not make sense.”

Malema told supporters the EFF fully intended disrupting the formal opening of Parliament unless Zuma heeded opposition parties’ calls to answer questions on the Nkandla controversy in the legislature.

This is now a technical impossibility, as Thursday’s special sitting was the last for the year.

“If Jacob Zuma does not come to answer questions between now and the State of the Nation, then he must know he is not going to give that State of the Nation,” he threatened.

In the debate on the report, Malema had called Zuma a criminal.

This time the slur went without objection as Tsenoli and ANC MPs clearly sought to have the sitting – watched over by a sizeable police presence – run its course without a repeat of the violence that ensued a fortnight ago when riot police removed an EFF MP who called Zuma a thief and refused to withdraw the remark.

The EFF objected vehemently to the speech by ANC MP Lemias Mashile, who chaired the committee that found them guilty of contempt charges, after he said all members had agreed not to call Speaker Baleka Mbete and other MPs as witnesses.

Malema said Mashile was lying when he said the committee agreed not to “call Baleka” and other witnesses.

When Tsenoli urged him to respect the rules by prefacing any direct reference to Mbete and Mashile as “honourable” as customary, he snapped: “There is nothing honourable about Mashile.”

At one point, as several EFF MPs clamoured to make interjections, Tsenoli resorted to having their microphones switched off, drawing even more protest.

“Cutting off microphones is not one of the things you should do,” EFF Chief Whip Floyd Shivambu snapped.

After the debate, Shivambu embarked on a filibuster masked as an attempt to move an amendment to the committee’s report, clearly having done his homework to find loopholes in parliamentary rules.

He brandished a speech Malema made at the start of the committee’s work in September, as well as Madonsela’s 400-page report on Nkandla, warning that he would quote at length from both to motivate his amendment.

Countless objections from the ANC and counter-objections from the EFF later, Shivambu dared Tsenoli to say openly that he was preventing him from continuing.

The deputy speaker did so, after several senior ANC members, including Science and Technology Minister Naledi Pandor, urged him to be firm with the EFF and end the filibuster.

“You have been given ample opportunity… so we are taking it that you are not moving an amendment,” he said.

The report adopted by the house recommends that Malema, Godrick Gardee, Shivambu, Mpho Ramakatsa, Khanyisile Litchfield-Tshabalala and Mbuyiseni Ndlozi be suspended without pay for 30 days.

Fellow EFF MPs Elsabe Louw, Ngwanamakwetle Mashabela, Nthako Matiase, Hlengiwe Maxon, Magdalene Moonsamy, and Andile Mngxitama, are to be suspended for a fortnight and eight more ordered to submit a verbal apology to the House.

Most opposition parties had strongly opposed its adoption, agreeing with the EFF that the process was not fair because the committee was weighted with ANC MPs.

“This little committee’s investigation was little more than a kangaroo court,” the Democratic Alliance’s Mike Waters said.

The sitting ended a term dominated by opposition parties’ demands that Zuma account to Parliament on Nkandla and outrage at the Speaker’s decision to send police into the chamber.

On Thursday morning, Mbete wrote to parties’ chief whips noting that the EFF had threatened “blood on the floor” and reminded them of the provisions of the Powers, Privileges and Immunities of Parliament and Provincial Legislation Act.

That law allows the Speaker, or the person chairing the sitting at the time, the right to call in the police if lives are in danger. – Sapa