GOOD MORNING.

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

Housing targets

1. Work on revising the Government’s housing targets is to begin in the autumn, with expectations that the new figure could be set higher than 40,000 per year, with a push to get it out to 60,000 homes per year.

The Housing for All strategy estimates Ireland will need an average of 33,000 new homes to be provided each year from 2021 to 2030. However, it is estimated that 27,000 will be delivered by the end of 2023.

Following the publication of population data from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) census recently, progress will be made on reviewing the targets set out in the Government’s housing policy.

Donald Trump

2. Former US President Donald Trump blasted his historic federal indictment as “ridiculous” and “baseless” last night during his first public appearances since the charges were unsealed.

Speaking at Republican state conventions in Georgia and North Carolina, he painted the 37 felony counts as an attack on his supporters as he tried to turn dire legal peril to political advantage and project a sense of normalcy.

Trump cast his indictment by the Department of Justice as an attempt to damage his chances of returning to the White House as he campaigns for a second term.

UK politics

3. UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has been urged to call a snap general election after three quick-fire MP resignations left him facing by-election battles on multiple fronts.

Labour leader Keir Starmer said Sunak “must finally find a backbone” and send the country to the polls after the prime minister found himself three MPs down in the space of 24 hours.

The call was echoed by Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey as rival parties hope to inflict more damaging by-election defeats on the Tories.

Chloe Mitchell

4. A second man was arrested yesterday in the investigation into the disappearance of a young woman in Northern Ireland.

21-year-old Chloe Mitchell has been missing from her home in Ballymena for over a week.

One man, aged 26, was arrested in the Lurgan area on Thursday and a second man, aged 34, was arrested in the Ballymena area yesterday, police confirmed.

Island revival

5. Amid the happy laughter of beach revellers at the launch of a government policy for offshore islands this week, a stark warning was offered by the opening speaker to those gathered.

Jerry Earley, a longtime community organiser for Arranmore Island off Co Donegal, said that despite the island seeing growth in recent times, with remote working cited as one significant reason, if the population declines in future then it will show that all present will have “failed” at what they’ve set out to do.

Speaking to The Journal after the launch, the 57-year-old, who is a representative for Ireland-wide fishermen grouping for the island communities, said it is vital that a national plan for offshore islands unveiled this week makes living viable for future generations. 

Outdoor pools

6. An Irish MEP has called for every riverside town to get its own ‘lido’ style bathing site by the end of the decade.

In light of the recent spell of hot weather, Green Party MEP Grace O’Sullivan said she wanted to highlight the opportunities for making river towns more attractive places by creating “simple and safe outdoor swimming areas”.

Speaking to The Journal, O’Sullivan said: “Lockdown showed us that people were looking for ways of recreation and there was this kind of explosion of people taking to the seashores and the rivers around our island, trying to find spots within their local areas that they could access.”

Housing protest

7. Hundreds of people took to the streets of Cork city yesterday calling for immediate action from the Government to address the housing crisis.

SIPTU TEAC Division Organiser, Adrian Kane, told the crowd that the housing crisis will only be resolved by “radical political change”.

On the issue of far-right protesters who have held demonstrations at refugee accommodation centres and attacked camps for homeless refugees, Kane said: “When you hear the agents of hate blaming a Ukrainian mother escaping war, an Afghan student fleeing the Taliban, or any other of the most oppressed people who have reached our shores for our current housing crisis, remember that these are the same people who would be blaming the single mother or the welfare recipient for our other social ills.”

Unabomber dies

8. Ted Kaczynski, more commonly known by the alias ‘the Unabomber’, has died in a US federal prison at the age of 81.

A spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Prisons told the New York Times that Kaczynski was found unresponsive in his cell in North Carolina early yesterday morning. The cause of death was not immediately known.

Kaczynski pleaded guilty to killing three people and injuring 23 more during a mass bombing spree between 1978 and 1995.

Weather forecast

9. Very warm weather is forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday, with sunny spells and scattered heavy showers or thunderstorms expected, Met Éireann has said.

Highest temperatures will reach 23 to 26 degrees on Tuesday, possibly reaching 27 degrees in some spots, with just a light breeze.

Heavy showers are likely to develop on Wednesday, the forecaster said, with plenty of hazy sunshine.