An engineering expert who helped advise the Italian government on flood defences in Venice insists that the river Lee dams can protect Cork from river flooding without the need for "high walls".

A TD has criticised the Office of Public Works’ Cork flood defence plan, describing it as a “crude” solution which is too focused on costs.

Fashion designer Don O’Neill; Cork-based Irish furniture designer Joseph Walsh; and art historian and author Nicholas Fox Weber were conferred with honorary doctorates at a ceremony in the Aula Maxima at UCC yesterday.