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

IRELAND

Shoppers on Grafton Street in Dublin on one of the busiest shopping days of the year. Eamonn Farrell Eamonn Farrell

• A man is recovering in hospital after the flight on which he was travelling diverted to Shannon Airport this morning to seek urgent medical assistance for him. 
• Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said it was a mistake for Fine Gael to select Verona Murphy as its candidate in the recent by-election, and that he accepts responsibility for that mistake.
• The piano at Dublin’s Pearse Station has been fully repaired and is back in action after being vandalised last month.
• Doctors at the Rotunda Hospital in Dublin have raised almost €80,000 following donations from members of the public to replace vital equipment at the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.
• Gardaí have seized suspected cocaine worth an estimated €160,000 during a search operation in Co Kildare. 
• A trade deal between Ireland and the UK has been made more difficult because the Prime Minister is “fixed on a harder Brexit”, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said.

WORLD

#ELSA Violent winds and torrential rain battered Spain and Portugal overnight leaving at least four dead, rescuers said today, as the Iberian Peninsula braced for the arrival of another storm.

#BREXIT BRITISH PRIME MINISTER Boris Johnson’s Brexit Withdrawal Bill has passed the House of Commons, setting a timeline for the UK’s exit from the EU next month.

#IRISH The new Alliance MP for North Down, Stephen Farry, used the Irish language as he addressed the House of Commons for the first time today.

Parting Shot

It was the talk of the summer and our very own Greg O’Shea, along with Amber Gill, claimed the title but Love Island has been back in the news recently, and not for the same reasons. 

Presenter, Caroline Flack was quit as presenter after she was charged with assault and once again the spotlight has turned to the Irish to save the upcoming Winter Love Island series. 

Today, Bray-native Laura Whitmore has been announced as the host of the upcoming winter series due to hit screens in January. 

Ian West Ian West