NEED TO CATCH up? The Journal brings you a round-up of today’s news.

IRELAND

Artists from the Wexford Factory serenading Kay Doherty from Bishopswater on the streets of the town to mark the start of the 2024/25 Wexford Festival Opera’s Academy for young Irish and Irish based singers, repetiteurs and stage managers. RollingNews.ie RollingNews.ie

• The Tánaiste said his preference is for the government to go “full term”, indicating that the “ideal date” for the election is February.
• Average workers will benefit by €1,000 in this year’s budget, according to Finance Minister Jack Chambers.
• Meanwhile, Mary Lou McDonald came out swinging in response to criticism from Chambers, saying the Finance Minister would do well to remember that it was his party who “crashed the economy”.
• The Green Party and Sinn Féin voiced support for the State to respond to the actions of convicted paedophile Michael Shine.
• A man who had been at a party when he allegedly left a Dublin apartment building with a young child “under his arm” was remanded in custody.
• Sinn Féin TD Aengus Ó Snodaigh said the Government is failing to keep people in Dublin safe after a group of tourists was attacked in the city centre over the weekend.
• A man was arrested as part of an investigation into a gangland murder in west Dublin almost two years ago.
• Conservation works on the Hellfire Club in Massy’s Wood in the Dublin Mountains will begin tomorrow.
• RTÉ posted a deficit of €9.1 million in 2023, with the national broadcaster describing it as a “challenging year for the organisation”.

INTERNATIONAL

Former BBC broadcaster Huw Edwards leaves Westminster Magistrates' Court, London, where he was sentenced to six months' imprisonment suspended for two years after pleading guilty to three counts of making indecent images of children. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

#RYAN ROUTH: A man appeared in court charged with federal gun crimes after former US president Donald Trump was the target of what the FBI said “appears to be an attempted assassination” at his golf club in Florida.

#SENTENCING: Former BBC presenter Huw Edwards was spared jail after admitting accessing indecent images of children as young as seven.

#STORM BORIS: Authorities said flooding sparked by Storm Boris in central Europe has burst dams, knocked out power and killed at least 15 people.

#ASYLUM SEEKERS: Germany began random checks at land borders it shares with five Western European nations as it seeks to crack down on irregular migration.

#EUROPEAN COMMISSION: France’s Thierry Breton announced he is quitting the European Commission with immediate effect, claiming EU chief Ursula von der Leyen had asked Paris to withdraw his candidacy for the incoming executive.

PARTING SHOT

After donning the green jersey for Ireland on the rugby pitch for the last seven years, Bundee Aki became an Irish citizen today. 

Department of Justice Department of Justice

The sportsman was one of around 3,600 people to be granted Irish citizenship at a ceremony in Dublin’s Convention Centre.

Speaking to Virgin Media, Aki said it means “everything” to be granted Irish citizenship.

“There’s not a bad word I could speak about Ireland,” he said.