The tabloids are full of the continuing story of Mr Canoe man.

SECRET LIFE OF MR CANOE says the Mirror

John, thought drowned off Cleveland in 2002, may have spent the years since in America with a woman he met on the internet. Last night he said he couldn't remember anything since June 2000.

The paper has a picture of

missing canoeist John Darwin and his wife Anne in Panama last year, when everyone thought he was dead.last night, the manager of a holiday firm said the couple rented a room in Panama City in July 2006 and posed for the extraordinary picture on the company's website.Former prison officer Darwin, 57, and Anne are both grinning as they audaciously pose for the photo beside Mario Vilar, boss of Move to Panama.

The Mail carries a front page interview with his wife

wife admits: 'Yes, I DID pocket the life insurance.'

The Mail tracked John Darwin's wife Anne to Panama City, where she emigrated six weeks ago after realising almost £500,000 from the sale of family property. She said she had claimed the insurance 'in good faith when I believed I had lost my husband'.

Whilst the later additions take the story further as the police arrest him in the early hours

The Sun reports that

It is believed Cleveland police found evidence that Darwin may have been in contact with other women when he disappeared.
Personal emails sent from his home computer were discovered.
Police also revealed they were tipped off three months ago that Mr Darwin may still have been alive.

Is Britain's economy heading for the perfect storm? asks the Independent

The storm clouds are gathering over the jobs market; the climate on the high street is growing distinctly chilly; a typhoon of bad debt is buffeting the banks. Could a "perfect storm" be about to hit the British economy?
The signs couldn't be much bleaker. The switchback in sentiment since the credit crisis began in the summer has been violent. The Nationwide Consumer Confidence Index recorded its largest drop yesterday, and joins the GfK/NOP survey earlier this week in suggesting that a wave of pessimism not seen for years is washing over the economy.

And more bad news in the Telegraph

1.5m 'will struggle to find affordable mortgage'

In one of the starkest warnings yet over the impact of the credit crisis on Britain's housing market, Clive Briault said higher mortgage costs could prove "too much" for many homeowners to afford.In one of the starkest warnings yet over the impact of the credit crisis on Britain's housing market, Clive Briault said higher mortgage costs could prove "too much" for many homeowners to afford.adding

The Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) also sounded the alarm over the property market yesterday with a prediction that one in three mortgage applications would be rejected next year if banks continued to be reluctant to lend to each other.

The Times leads with the news of

Secret trial to let GPs carry out abortions

The Department of Health has agreed to the trials at two unnamed hospitals that are now performing abortions using drugs in “non-traditional settings” — similar to GP practices.
An evaluation will be completed early next year. If successful, the scheme will be expanded to other locations, including doctors’ surgeries. Later it could extend to surgical abortions as well.

The Guardian adds that

In October, the Commons science and technology committee, which examined the case for lowering the 24-week legal limit, found women were experiencing unnecessary delays and called for easier access to terminations. The MPs also called for the requirement for two doctors' signatures to be scrapped and said nurses and midwives with suitable training and professional guidance should not be prevented from carrying out all stages of early medical abortions involving the use of drugs and early surgical abortions.

It reports as do most of the papers that

Baghdad kidnappers make video ultimatum: leave Iraq in 10 days or we kill British hostage

Shia militiamen who kidnapped five Britons in Iraq six months ago have threatened to kill one of them if British forces do not leave the country within 10 days.
The threat, made in a video broadcast on an Arabic television station yesterday, was condemned by Foreign Office officials who said it would cause great distress to the hostages' families.
One of the hostages identifies himself by his first name in the video clip and says: "Today is November 18. I have been here now 173 days and I feel we've been forgotten." He is flanked by two masked men brandishing assault rifles and in the background a banner with a sign reading "the Islamic Shi'ite Resistance in Iraq" is visible.

Brit hostage to die reports the Sun

The man, who gave his name as Jason, is one of five seized at the Iraqi Finance Ministry in Baghdad on May 29.
The footage, screened by Arab satellite TV channel Al Arabiya, showed the bearded, haggard-looking prisoner sitting on a floor flanked by masked gunmen.
As the thugs train their assault rifles on him, he said: “My name is Jason. Today is November 18.
I have been here now 173 days and I feel we’ve been forgotten.”


Iran still a danger to world peace, says Bush reports the Independent

President George Bush made a defiant defence of his policy on Iran yesterday, saying, "Iran was dangerous, Iran is dangerous and Iran will be dangerous if they have the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon". He was reacting to a newly declassified assessment by 16 American intelligence agencies which says that Iran closed its nuclear weapons programme four years ago.

The report changes nothing says the Times

In a White House press conference, where he was bombarded with questions about the implications for his own credibility, Mr Bush declared he had seen nothing to change either his own mind or Washington's policy on Iran's nuclear ambitions.
“Iran was dangerous, Iran is dangerous and Iran will be dangerous if they have the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon,” he said.

The Telegraph reveals that

Lost data discs 'endanger protected witnesses'

Hundreds of people in police witness protection programmes have been put at risk by the loss of millions of child benefit records, The Daily Telegraph can reveal.The missing data discs are understood to contain both the real names and the new identities of up to 350 people who have had their identities changed after giving evidence against major criminals.

The Guardian leads with a report on

how UK banks exploit charity tax laws

Britain's high street banks have raised billions of pounds in funds through complex financial deals that use supposedly charitable trusts which are not donating a penny to good causes, the Guardian has learned.
A dozen of the country's best-known banks and financial institutions have raised funds on the back of £234bn-worth of home loans over the past seven years, using trusts which have charitable status but rarely give anything to charity

Anti-terror chief stands down after accusations of 'improper contact' reports the Independent

Britain's top anti-terror police officer has retired after being accused of bombarding a woman at the office of the police watchdog with 400 phone calls and text messages.
Andy Hayman was already under pressure over his expenses claims and criticism of his conduct after the killing in Stockwell of Jean Charles de Menezes. But he made the decision to step down when confronted by suggestions that he had improper contacts with an employee at the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC).

MoD admits to failings behind Nimrod crash says the Telegraph

Des Browne, the Defence Secretary, and RAF chiefs were forced to issue unprecedented public apologies to the families of the dead men after an official investigation into the destruction of Nimrod Flight XV230 painted a devastating picture of complacency, neglect and miscalculation by officials.

MoD failings caused Nimrod crash - inquiry says the Guardian

Failure by the Ministry of Defence to ensure the safety of one of the RAF's oldest but most hard-worked aircraft lay behind the crash of a Nimrod reconnaissance plane in Afghanistan, causing the biggest loss of life of British forces since the Falklands war, a board of inquiry revealed yesterday.

The Mail reports on the return of the teddy bear teacher

'I was terrified - but I'm sorry to leave Sudan'

Exhausted but relieved, Gillian Gibbons arrived home after her Sudan jail ordeal yesterday.
She joked: "I went out there to have a bit of an adventure and got more of an adventure than I bargained for."

The Mirror adds

To say I was terrified was an understatement. I was treated the same as any other Sudanese prisoner.You are given the bare minimum of comforts. I was in two different prisons. The first was like a lock-up.
"Then I was moved to another prison and the Ministry of the Interior sent me a bed, which is possibly the best present I've ever had.

The Express returns to the McCanns

POLICE TO CALL MCCANNS BACK

POLICE want Kate and Gerry McCann to return to Portugal before Christmas for fresh interrogations over the disappearance of their daughter Madeleine.
The couple could be forced into a confrontation with witnesses or be made to appear in an identity parade.
Their holiday friends are also expected to be asked to fly out for the meeting.

Many of the papers report that

British schools hit a new low

Teens have a worse grasp of the three Rs than pupils in most major countries, an international study showed.
Our secondary schools plunged from eighth to 24th in maths and from seventh to 17th in reading.
It means the UK has dipped out of the top ten in a host of tables reports the sun

Billions spent on education, but British schools slump in the world league reports the Mail

Many of the papers carry the story of the

Turkish tot row costs Brits £35k the Mirror reporting that

A turkish couple who came to Britain for a surrogate baby cost UK taxpayers £35,000.
The pair used a UK charity to strike a not-for-profit deal with a British woman who would carry their child.
But they ended up in an expensive legal wrangle because the law bans foreigners from adopting here.

More spending worries in the Mail

Don't expect the Olympic bill to stop at £9.3bn, warns organiser

The cost of the 2012 Olympic Games to the taxpayer could spiral still further, one of its leading organisers admitted yesterday.
John Armitt, chairman of the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA), told MPs there was "no guarantee" the final total would be within the current £9.3billion budget.
This sum is already nearly four times the estimate that helped London win the bid in 2005.

Finally the Sun reports that

SIXTY per cent of British adults will have dozed off by 4.22pm on Christmas Day.
After opening presents, lunch with too much booze, the Queen’s Speech and the first hour of the “big movie”, most of us can face no more, a survey found.
And just like TV’s Royle Family slob Jim, played by Ricky Tomlinson, they slowly nod off.
The poll found 58 per cent of adults are asleep between 4.15pm and 4.30pm and a further 20 per cent have had a doze in the half hour period before then.