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GOOD MORNING.
Here’s all the news that you need to know as you start your day.
1. Gardaí are investigating the deaths of an infant and child in a car fire in Co Westmeath yesterday afternoon.
The car was discovered on a rural road at Lackan shortly after 4pm in the Multyfarnham area, where gardaí and emergency services attended the scene.
An infant boy was removed to hospital but was subsequently pronounced dead at the Midlands Regional Hospital in Mullingar. The remains of an older girl were also discovered at the scene and brought to the Midlands Regional Hospital in Tullamore.
2. Most of Ireland’s energy suppliers have not yet started to pay households for surplus solar power sent back to the grid, despite customers being told that payments would start from July and be made by the end of August “at the latest”.
Only one energy supplier could confirm that it started to pay microgenerators – households, businesses or farms producing a small amount of energy mostly for their own use – before 31 August while at least eight had not yet commenced payment, Lauren Boland writes in today’s lead story.
Microgenerators that produce their own renewable energy, which is most often done through solar panels, are supposed to be able to sell back any surplus power to their supplier under a programme called the Microgeneration Support Scheme.
3. King Charles III will be formally proclaimed the British monarch during an Accession Council ceremony televised for the first time.
Charles automatically became King on the death of his mother, but the Accession Council, attended by Privy Councillors, will confirm his role this morning.
The new monarch will not attend the ceremony, held at the State Apartments of St James’s Palace, only joining after he has been proclaimed monarch, at 10am, to hold his first Privy Council meeting.
4. The Green Party believes that being in Government is the “right thing to do for the country” as it heads into a think-in focused on key Budget issues like energy.
At a think-in today in Co Clare, the Green Party will be looking at the year ahead with a particular focus on energy and the cost of living, chairperson Senator Pauline O’Reilly said.
In an interview with The Journal, O’Reilly said that being in Government “isn’t always the easiest” but is “the thing that, we believe, is the right thing to do for the country”, outlining the Greens’ focus on pushing for measures that reduce pressures caused by the significant rises in the cost of living this year.
Political parties are holding think-ins this week and next week to convene members as a new Dáil term begins.
5. A man in his 20s has died in a two-vehicle collision in Co Clare.
Gardaí and emergency services attended the scene of the fatal collision on the R463 in Parteen last night. The collision, involving two cars, occurred shortly before 10pm.
A man, aged in his 20s, received fatal injuries from the collision and was later pronounced deceased at the scene by paramedics. His body has since been taken to the morgue at University Hospital Limerick.
A second man, in his late teens, and from the same vehicle, was taken to University Hospital Limerick to receive treatment for serious injuries.
6. It’s rare that a musician cries on stage during a stadium gig – but if you’re Garth Brooks, you cry not once, but five times. Yes, five times.
The tears were perhaps not wholly unexpected, given the long journey to get to tonight’s event (though The Journal did think ‘again?!’ on the fifth round, Aoife Barry writes).
They weren’t fake, either. They were as real as Garth himself – a man who eschews ego and instead wears earnestness like an old, comfy leather coat.
But the thousands of us in Croke Park for the long-awaited gig – the first of five, but you knew that already – could understand why the country superstar was so emotional. He really, really wanted this string of gigs to happen. He’d tried before, but he got rejection. Now he was back.
7. China cannot cooperate with the UN human rights office after it released a report criticising Beijing’s policies against Uighurs and other ethnic groups in western Xinjiang, a top Chinese diplomat has said.
However, Chen Xu, China’s ambassador to UN institutions in Geneva, distinguished between not working with the human rights office and cooperating with the world body overall.
Chen said the report issued last week – which said some rights violations under China’s anti-terrorism policies could amount to crimes against humanity – offered up “groundless blame” of China’s policies and practices.
Human rights groups have accused China of sweeping a million or more people from the minority groups into detention camps where many have said they were tortured, sexually assaulted, and forced to abandon their language and religion.
8. A federal judge has dismissed Donald Trump’s lawsuit against 2016 Democratic rival Hillary Clinton and former top FBI officials, rejecting the former US president’s claims that they and others acted in concert to concoct the Russia investigation that shadowed much of his administration.
US District Judge Donald Middlebrooks said in a sharply worded ruling in Florida that Trump’s lawsuit, filed in March, contained “glaring structural deficiencies” and that many of the “characterisations of events are implausible”.
He dismissed the idea that Trump had sued to correct an actual legal harm.
9. And finally, the weather.
Any early mist or fog patches will clear to leave a largely dry day with sunny spells, according to Met Éireann.
There is the small possibility of a few showers developing in the southwest during the afternoon. Maximum temperatures will range from 18 to 22 degrees Celsius, dropping to 10 to 14 degrees tonight.
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