EVERY WEEKDAY EVENING, TheJournal.ie brings you the five stories you need to know before you head out the door.

1. #JOBSWATCH: Medical devices company Abbott is to seek 200 redundancies from its plant in Clonmel. RTE reports that the company, which employs 1,400 people at the Tipperary facility, is seeking voluntary redundancies from its staff.

2. #HELPING HAND: Finance Minister Michael Noonan has said Europe now owes Ireland after the country ‘took one for the team‘. In an interview on Bloomberg TV, Noonan said that Ireland has a strong case to get help from Europe to cut the link between sovereign and banking debt which has been a major burden for Ireland’s economic recovery.

3. #OSCAR PISTORIUS: The lead investigator in the Reeva Steenkamp murder inquiry has been removed from the case after accusations resurfaced about his involvement in an attempted murder. Oscar Pistorius’s bail hearing is to stretch into a fourth day tomorrow as deliberations continue about whether or not he will be entitled to bail.

4. #HOMELESSNESS: The Government has come up with dramatic proposals aimed at ending long-term homelessness by 2016. Housing Minister Jan O’Sullivan said the plan would provide homeless people with long-term, stable housing as early as possible.

5. #BANK HOLIDAY: Sinn Féin has proposed legislation which would make the Easter Rising anniversary a new national bank holiday. Under the plan, the new holiday on 24 April would be known as Lá na Poblachta – Day of the Republic – to commemorate the anniversary of the date when the Proclamation of the Irish Republic was declared.