LAST UPDATE | 11 Nov 2021

GOOD MORNING.

Here’s all the news that you need to know as you start your day.

Suspending road building

1. In our main story today, Lauren Boland looks at how Wales has suspended building new roads pending a review of the projects as part of climate measures and whether Ireland should take a similar approach. 

COP26

2. Sticking with climate news, world leaders have been urged to help negotiators get a climate deal over the line as COP26 entered the final 48 hours of scheduled talks.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a brief visit back to the summit, where countries are under pressure to increase action to curb dangerous warming, yesterday where he urged leaders not to sit on their hands but to speak to negotiators to give them room to manoeuvre and get a deal done.

Affordable housing

3. In other news, the head of one of the country’s approved housing bodies has said it is seeing a “huge difficulty” in the delivery of affordable apartments to help ease the housing crisis.

Circle Voluntary Housing Association (VHA) has 2,000 homes across the country, and said plans to add an additional 1,500 to its portfolio over the next four years. 

Tuam excavation

4. A leading forensic expert has said that the Tuam babies identification and excavation process will take many years.

Dr René Garpert, who is originally from Germany, has been involved in high profile investigations across Germany and was recently part of the identification team at the Grenfell Tower disaster in London.

While Garpert is not involved at present in the response to Tuam he said in an interview that he would expect it to take years before answers are found.

Covid socialising

5. The Chief Medical Officer has urged people to consider reducing their social interactions by half over the next two weeks in order to reduce the number of Covid-19 infections.

“If you’re planning to go out two nights a week, maybe just go out once. If you’re planning to have 10 people over to the house for a particular event, maybe just have five,” Dr Tony Holohan told reporters at yesterday’s NPHET briefing. 

Dublin Airport runway

6. Regulators have recommended halting flights on Dublin Airport’s new north runway from midnight to 6 o’clock in the morning in an effort to keep noise levels down.

The runway is  due to open next year.

Tests recalled

7. An Australian medical tech manufacturer has recalled more than two million at-home Covid-19 tests shipped to the United States after finding an increased chance of false positives.

The US Food and Drug Administration issued an alert yesterday that the company, Ellume, had recalled 2.2 million tests since the issue was detected last month.

Alec Baldwin sued

8. In the US, the head of lighting on the film Rust has filed a lawsuit over Alec Baldwin’s fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, alleging negligence that caused him “severe emotional distress”.

Serge Svetnoy said that the bullet which killed his close friend narrowly missed him, and he held her head as she died on the set of the Western in New Mexico.

Irish aid workers at Polish border

9. And lastly, an Irish aid worker  who has visited in the Poland/Belarus border region has claimed that migrants “trapped” in the area have been beaten with rifles and electrocuted while attempting to get to safety. 

Concerns have also been raised that more migrants will die in freezing conditions if the situation in the area is not resolved soon.