EVERY EVENING, TheJournal.ie brings you a round-up of the latest news stories, as well as the bits and pieces you may have missed during the day.

• The seats for the Seanad’s agricultural panel have now all been confirmed, as have those of the Culture and Education panel. Counting is currently underway for the Labour panel.
• NAMA has appointed a receiver to the company and personal assets of developers Ray and Paddy Brehan.
• In his latest weekly column for TheJournal.ie, Nick Leeson writes that bankers’ bonuses awarded during the economic crisis are not contractual should be refunded – but warns that the issue of bonus culture could be a red herring.
• Worst job in Ireland? The Department of Finance is to advertise in the papers seeking expressions of interest to apply for nomination to the boards of the country’s banks.
• The headquarters of the ESB may be up for redesign after news that a planning application is to be put in place – although redevelopment has not yet given the green light yet. The current-day headquarters were built in 1981 amid great controversy after the ESB demolished twelve terraced Georgian houses that lined the longest existing Georgian facade in the world. See before and after pics below:

• A programme set up by the United States in the 1980s with the intention of monitoring potential extra-terrestrial communication has been scrapped. The Allen Telescope Array (ATA) project, operating out of California, has been cancelled by the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute following federal funding for the laboratory being cut to one-tenth its previous size.
• UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has condemned the use of force against Syrian demonstrators, as popular uprisings continue against president Bashar Assad.
• Ladies’ fashion sales in Ireland are lagging behind garden centre sales, according to new data published by Retail Excellence Ireland (REI).
• The actress and the cardinal: just which high-profile Irish personalities are to attend this week’s British royal wedding?
• Earlier today we asked readers to take part in our caption competition – to put into words what might have been going through the mind of the ESB CEO as he tried to climb the sculpture pictured below. And the winner is… (drum roll):

Stuart Kavanagh (@stukav): “And they tell me this job is for the birds…”

Image: Photocall Ireland

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