Every morning, TheJournal.ie brings you nine things you really need to know with your morning coffee.

1. #POLL: The Taoiseach’s support has plummeted to just 11 per cent according a poll by Red C for the Irish Sun. Thirty nine per cent of voters would back Eamon Gilmore, while Enda Kenny is at 23 per cent support. The paper also reveals that 8 per cent of people have split with their partner over the recession; one third of 25 to 34 year olds have been laid off, while one in two of us has health problems we attribute to the collapse of the property market.

2. #RECESSIONOMICS: Nonetheless, we’re due to spend €1.5 billion on Christmas shopping – twice the European average, the Independent and the Examiner claim today.

3. #ILLEGAL EVICTIONS: A Threshold report to be published today points to an increase in illegal evictions, deposit retention and poor standards of accommodation.

4. #LARRY MURPHY: The former Mountjoy governor John Lonergan has criticised the Irish Prison Service for “throwing Larry Murphy to the wolves on his release from prison” in the current issue of Intercom magazine.

5. #SAD: An elderly woman died in a house fire caused, when a candle went up in flames. Her electricity had been cut off by her son-in-law, because he claimed he could not afford to the pay the bills, the Irish Times reports. Meanwhile, over 18,000 older people have experienced some form of abuse or neglect since they turned 65, the first Irish study on the prevalence of elder abuse has indicated.

6. #BURMA: Between 15,000 and 20,000 Burmese refugees have fled to Thailand, as the country’s main pro-democracy parties concede electoral defeat .

7. #TORTURE: The former US President George W Bush is defending waterboarding as “legal” as he goes on a tour to promote his memoir, because “the lawyers said it was legal…[and] using those techniques saved lives”. History would judge him a success, he added, but he would be dead by then.

8. #STABLE DOOR: Tough sanctions aimed at banks, building societies and insurance companies will be introduced on January 1, as the Central Bank seeks to prevent a repeat of the implosion of the financial collapse, the Irish Times reports.

9. #SEEING RED: A proprietor whose hotel was the subject of an online rant by singer Chris de Burgh after his niece held her wedding there, has hit back at the singer, claiming he “hijacked her day”. Glenn Bond claims that de Burgh was a difficult guest and says that when the manager wished De Burgh goodbye and said he hoped he wouldn’t miss his flight, the crooner crooned: “It’s a bloody private jet, it’ll wait for me.”