Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Wednesday 7 Nov 2018

1. Democrats win House as Trump declares victory

The US Democrats have taken control of the House of Representatives for the first time in eight years, converting liberal anger into mid-term votes. The Republicans strengthened their hold on the Senate – and President Donald Trump declared the election a “tremendous success”. Holding the House will let Democrats block his agenda.

2. More women than ever before in US Congress

Votes are still being counted in the US mid-term elections, but the BBC says it seems certain that there will be more women than ever before representing electors in both houses of Congress. There were previously 107. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 29, became the youngest woman ever elected – and the first two Muslim women won seats.

3. Macron calls for European army to counter US

French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday called for the creation of a European army to defend the continent from Russia, China and US foreign policy. Speaking after lighting a flame at Verdun to mark the centenary of the end of the first world war, Macron cited Donald Trump’s decision to quit the 1987 nuclear treaty with Russia.

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4. Fifteen children found in refrigerated lorry

Twenty-one people, including 15 children, were found last week in a refrigerated lorry of sparkling water in Sussex, having entered the country from Dieppe. It is thought the group were from Vietnam – and a Romanian lorry driver has been arrested. The group did not require medical care but social services are helping the children.

5. Cigar-shaped object ‘could be alien probe’

Astronomers say it is just possible a strange object seen passing through our solar system last year was an alien probe. Dubbed Oumuamua, the object was thought at the time to be cigar-shaped and surprised astronomers by appearing to accelerate. Now Harvard academics say it might have been shaped like a sail – and made by aliens.

6. Ryanair fires cabin crew who ‘slept on floor’

Budget airline Ryanair has sacked six Portuguese crew whose photograph circulated online, saying the picture was staged and showed the airline unfairly in a bad light. The picture showed six cabin crew apparently sleeping on a hard floor in an office in Malaga Airport. The airline insisted that the crew were only in the office briefly.

7. Marks and Spencer warns sales still falling

Marks and Spencer says its clothing and food sales are still falling. Like-for-like sales were down 2.2% in the six months until the end of September, made up of 2.9% fall in food sales and a 1.1% drop in clothing and other sales. The high street stalwart warned trading conditions for the rest of the financial year were “challenging”.

8. ‘Single-use’ named the Collins word of year

Lexicographers at Collins have decided on their word of the year, compiled from a list of notable neologisms. ‘Single-use’ has been chosen as a term which has increasing currency, used in reference to plastic items which are made to be used once and then thrown away. Collins says it is now being used four times as often as it was in 2013.

9. Gauls embalmed the severed heads of enemies

Iron Age Gauls, living in what is now France, embalmed the severed heads of their enemies with cedar resin, archaeologists have confirmed. It has long been thought heads were taken as trophies in battle but now chemical analysis of skulls found at Le Cailar in the south of the country has confirmed the presence of resin from trees.

10. Briefing: the Senate and House of Representatives explained

Voters in the US have been electing new members to Congress in midterm elections that have been described as some of the most consequential in decades.

Like the UK Parliament, the US Congress decides and makes the laws that govern the country. It also has the power to impeach the president and remove him from office. So how does it all work?

US election 2020: the US Senate and House of Representatives explained