Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Wednesday 29 Aug 2018

1. Scallop fishers attacked by French rivals

British scallop dredgers were attacked yesterday 12 miles off the coast of Normandy by their French rivals, as they tried to fish legally. The French boats are subject to a seasonal fishing ban to protect scallop stocks and want the British to also respect this ban. Boats were damaged and stones and metal shackles were thrown.

2. Tories fear infiltration from Ukip members

There has been a sharp rise in applications to join the Tory party in constituencies with pro-EU MPs, prompting fears Ukip member are trying to infiltrate the party to unseat moderates and elect a pro-Leave prime minister. Leave.eu founder and Ukip donor Arron Banks called on 50,000 Ukip supporters to join the Conservative Party.

3. Hurricane Maria death toll set at 2,975

The official death toll caused by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico in September last year has been set at 2,975 – a huge increase on the original estimate of 64 and significantly higher than the more recent claim of 1,400 deaths. US President Donald Trump has previously said there were few casualties compared to “a real catastrophe”.

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4. One quarter of 14-year-old girls self-harm

The Children’s Society says nearly one quarter of 14-year-old girls in the UK self harm. A survey by the charity of 11,000 children found 22% of girls, and 9% of boys, said they had self-harmed in the past year. The charity’s research suggests that both girls and boys struggle to live up to the roles enforced on them by gender stereotypes.

5. No-deal Brexit medicine supply ‘to cost £2bn’

The pro-EU campaign group Best for Britain is warning that Health Secretary Matt Hancock’s plan to set aside six weeks’ worth of important medicines to keep the NHS afloat in the event of a no-deal Brexit could cost £2bn. Labour MP Owen Smith said: “Every day it seems as though there is another hidden cost being revealed.”

6. Trump recorded warning priests of ‘violence’

A recording of Donald Trump speaking to evangelical Christians on Monday has been leaked. He urged them to make sure “all of your people vote” in the mid-term elections and said if Republicans lose: “[The Democrats] will overturn everything that we’ve done and they’ll do it quickly and violently. And violently. There’s violence.”

7. Musk appears to repeat ‘paedo’ slur on diver

Elon Musk has sent tweets which seem to repeat his groundless accusation that a British cave diver who rebuked him for interfering in the rescue of trapped Thai boys was a paedophile. Musk, who apologised for the slur after Tesla shares nose-dived, wrote on Twitter that it was “strange” that Vernon Unsworth has not yet sued him.

8. Advert for contraception app banned

The Advertising Standards Authority has banned an ad which appeared on Facebook for an app which allows women to keep track of their fertility in order to try to avoid pregnancy. The Swedish firm Natural Cycles was warned not to exaggerate the efficacy of the method or make misleading claims that it was “highly accurate”.

9. Hong Kong woman ‘tricked’ into marrying

A 21-year-old Hong Kong woman says she was tricked into marrying a stranger from the Chinese mainland when she thought she was receiving training to work as a wedding planner. The un-named woman was made to sign a marriage contract when she visited the mainland and told it would be void afterwards.

10. Briefing: is air pollution making us stupider?

Students who take exams amid heavy air pollution may perform worse than those who take the same test on a clear day, according to a new study.

The report, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, compared the results of language and maths tests conducted on 20,000 people across China between 2010 and 2014 with data measuring levels of nitrogen dioxide and sulphur dioxide in the air.

Is air pollution making us stupider?