Five things that got people talking in Liverpool this week - dancing lemur, pub closure and nurse strikes

In our weekly feature, LiverpoolWorld editor Dominic Raynor and video journalist Emily Bonner discuss some of the headlines which have stood out over the last week.

🏥 LiverpoolWorld joined the picket line as nurses and ambulance staff across Merseyside took part in the biggest ever day of strike action in the NHS on Monday and Tuesday. Union members walked out over pay and conditions and NHS workers told us that newly qualified nurses are quitting over poor pay, older nurses are tkaing early retirement and there’s already not enough staff on hospital wards to cope.

🍻 A much-loved city centre pub is set to close its doors and re-open under new management. According to The Beehive, the busy venue is set to close in February 2023 with the exact date not yet known and set to re-open as a modern pub/bar. The current landlady, Frances Lloyd told LiverpoolWorld that the new bar will sadly be under new management.

💡A new art installation has opened at Liverpool Cathedral. Coalescence features over half a tonne of coal, which represents the amount of power needed to light one light bulb for a year. We’ve been to take a look at the artwork which spans six metres in diameter.

🐒 Conservationists at Chester Zoo become the first in Europe to successfully breed a rare Coquerel’s sifaka lemur. The precious youngster arrived to parents Beatrice (10) and Elliot (10) – 18 months after the duo were translocated from the USA to Chester Zoo to begin a vital new conservation breeding programme, designed to protect the crtically endangered primates from extinction.

Born with a thick fuzzy white coat and weighing just 119 grams, experts say the baby will cling tightly to mum’s belly for several weeks, before riding on her back like a backpack until around six months old. Zookeepers will determine the sex of the tiny primate once it starts to branch away and explore on its own.

👨‍⚖️ A landlord who installed a manhole cover in the living room of a set of student flats has been fined £30k after flaunting licence rules on two properties in Liverpool. Trophy Homes Limited was described as ‘poorly run’ with a clear lack of regard for tenants by District Judge Hatton in a hearing at Liverpool Magistrates Court. The family-run landlord agency pleaded guilty to failing to apply for a HMO (Houses of Multiple Occupation) licence for student properties on Silvester Street, Vauxhall, and Highgate Street, Edge Hill.