Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Friday 1 Oct 2010

published 1 October 2010

Our popular news catch-up service is posted Monday to Friday at 8.0 am, and on weekends at 11.0 am. You can rely on it to keep you up to date with the main news talking points... RAIN AFFECTS RYDER CUPThe 38th Ryder Cup golf contest between the USA and Europe got underway at 7.45 am today at Celtic Manor, with Lee Westwood and Martin Kaymer representing Europe in the first four-ball match against Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson. The odds are in favour of the UK - the United States haven't won in Europe since 1993. The heavy rain predicted for Wales soon arrived and play was suspended after just two hours. M4 bus lane scrapped The government is to scrap the M4 bus lane from December 24. The bus lane, introduced by the Labour government in 1999 to speed up public transport from Heathrow airport to London, is hugely unpopular with motorists who blame it for tailbacks on the motorway. The lane, which was also criticised for being rarely enforced, will be used one more time for the 2012 Olympics and then scrapped for good. Motorists celebrate the end of the M4 bus lane 'COPYCAT' SUICIDE PACT SUSPECTEDTwo young women found dead in a flat in Putney, southwest London, are believed to have killed themselves in a 'chemical' suicide pact. Police wearing gas masks and 'nuclear' suits found the windows had been taped. It is feared they may have met online and arranged a copycat suicide following the deaths last week of Joanne Lee and Stephen Lumb, who also died from inhaling toxic vapours. Coline Covington on the comfort of strangers TUSSLE OVER SHADOW CHANCELLOR APPOINTMENT Labour leader Ed Miliband is said to want Yvette Cooper to be his shadow Chancellor, not Ed Balls, who has hankered after the job for years and expected to get it, especially after his very public support for Miliband since Saturday's election. The problem is Cooper and Balls are married. Few believe she is prepared to trample on her husband's dreams. The Mole on Miliband's possible ploy PETE ROUSE TO REPLACE RAHM EMANUELPresident Barack Obama is set to appoint Pete Rouse, one of his most trusted advisers, as his new chief of staff to replace Rahm Emanuel, who leaves today to run for mayor of Chicago. Rouse, who has been close to Obama ever since he became a senator, is widely respected in the White House and on Capitol Hill - not something that could be said of his feisty predecessor. Alexander Cockburn on Obama's dud Svengali BENEFITS REVOLUTION CREATES 'UNIVERSAL CREDIT'Millions of welfare claimants will see their various benefits scrapped and replaced with one "universal credit", saving an estimated £9bn a year, according to the Times. The new system - the brainchild of Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith - will guarantee that anyone in work is better off than someone on the dole, and will be much more difficult to defraud. It will take three years to implement. ECUADOR'S PRESIDENT ATTACKED BY POLICEThe Ecuadorean government has declared a state of emergency after mutinous police officers, protesting against pay cuts, physically assaulted President Rafael Correa and then besieged the hospital where he had been taken for his safety. Correa told state TV: "They're trying to get into my room, maybe to attack me. I don't know." He was later rescued by soldiers and returned to the presidential palace in Quito. TORONTO ANAESTHETIST 'ASSAULTED 29 WOMEN'An anaesthetist at North York general hospital in Toronto has been accused of assaulting 29 women while they were undergoing surgical procedures between June 1992 and February 2010. Dr George Doodnaught, 61, was charged in February this year with three alleged assaults. The further 26 cases were announced yesterday after police had urged other women to come forward. MAN CITY AND LIVERPOOL DRAWManchester City and Liverpool did not fare as well in Europe as their Premier League counterparts last night. After all five British clubs in the Champions League won this week, City and Liverpool had to settle for draws in the Europa League competition. England winger Adam Johnson scored as City came from behind to salvage a point against Juventus, while Liverpool were held 0-0 by Dutch side Utrecht in Holland. TONY CURTIS AND THE DRAG QUEENThe death of Tony Curtis at 85, announced yesterday, has prompted many anecdotes - including this from the filming of Some Like It Hot, for which Curtis and Jack Lemmon were disguised as women. Director Billy Wilder brought in a drag queen from Berlin to coach them. "This guy told us to keep the cheeks of your ass tight," Curtis recalled years later. "You tighten up - which you did if you were in the Navy anyway - and make one step good before the other. So when we started to put it together, it all became a very charming manner." In pictures: Tony Curtis dies