EVERY DAY, TheJournal.ie brings you nine things you really ought to know with your morning cup of coffee.
1. #ROSCOMMON The accident and emergency department at Roscommon General Hospital has closed this morning. An urgent care centre has opened to treat minor and non-emergency injuries between 8am and 8pm, seven days a week. The row over pre-election promises from the Taoiseach rumbles on and two Fine Gael councillors on Roscommon County Council have resigned over the closure.
2. #BORD GAIS Householders across the country will face significant increases in their electricity bills later this year when Bord Gáis announces new price hikes this week, reports the Irish Independent. The cost of electricity will rise by between 10 and 14 per cent while the cost of gas could rise by as much as 28 per cent. The Irish Times reports that energy bills for customers could rise by more than €300 per year.
3. #HACKING News International CEO Rebekah Brooks could face police questioning this week. The former editor of the News of the World at the time the newspaper allegedly hacked into the voicemail of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler will be interviewed as a witness and not a suspect. Dow Jones chief Les Hinton could be the most high-profile casualty of the crisis at Rupert Murdoch’s empire.
4. #GOOD NEWS A four-year-old girl from Cork has been given the all-clear by doctors in the US after she had been given just weeks to live. Megan Malone has recovered from a rare brain tumour after eight months of going through intensive chemotherapy in New York, the Irish Daily Mirror reports.
5. #JUDGES’ PAY The Minister for Justice Alan Shatter is embroiled in a row with judges over a memo on the courts.ie website in which judges criticise the way in which the government was going about the proposed referendum on their pay which is due to be held in the autumn. The Irish Independent reports that the Attorney General gave the go-ahead for the memo to be published.
6. #PAKISTAN Relations between the US and its key ally in its fight against terrorism have worsened after the Obama administration suspended some $800 million in military aid to the country, the New York Times reports. Tensions between the two countries have risen since the killing of Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil in May despite several attempts to improve ties.
7. #ITALY Is Italy the new Ireland? Senior EU officials are meeting later today to discuss the growing debt problems in Italy which have sparked fears that it could be drawn into the eurozone debt crisis. BBC News reports the talks, arranged by European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, are not a crisis meeting according to a spokesman.
8. #DALLAS A new series of the US soap opera Dallas, which left millions worldwide asking “Who Shot JR?”, will return to television screens later this year. Larry Hagman, Patrick Duffy and Linda Gray will reprise their roles with a preview to be broadcast on American television tonight, the Guardian reports.
9. #OXEGEN It’s all over now after a brilliant final day at Oxegen which played host to superstar artists Beyoncé and Coldplay on the main stage. No doubt many will have their own highlights of the weekend but the appearance of Christy Moore on stage with Coldplay last night was pretty special. Check it out:
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