Scandal of filthy hospital kitchens is the lead story in the Observer this morning

A searing indictment of the cleanliness of hospital kitchens is revealed today in research showing that almost half are plagued by vermin, risk infections by storing food incorrectly or employ staff with poor personal hygiene.
Official inspection reports reveal that breaches of food hygiene laws include infestations of mice and cockroaches, kitchen staff not washing their hands, food being kept at the wrong temperature and remnants of meals becoming stuck in equipment

Says the paper

Of 377 National Health Service and private hospitals surveyed in England, 173 - 46 per cent - were found to have poor cleanliness in their kitchens, or canteens or cafes used by staff, patients and visitors. Nine of the 377 were private hospitals, of which six were found to have at least one area of concern. Eleven of the 173 had experienced a vermin or pest problem, 57 employed catering staff who displayed inadequate personal hygiene and 18 were found to stock out-of-date food. Sixty-eight did not meet the legal minimum standard for food storage and 66 were storing food at the wrong temperature, which can stimulate the growth of bacteria.

The Sunday Times claims that

Terror alert on freed UK suspects

THE Pentagon has claimed that five terror suspects whom Britain wants back from Guantanamo Bay have close ties to some of Al-Qaeda’s most high-ranking leaders.
Only days after Gordon Brown took the surprise decision to call for their release, a senior American official this weekend disclosed previously classified evidence to show that the men are “extremely dangerous individuals”.
Sandra Hodgkinson, who is in charge of US detention policy, warned that the suspects may seek to rejoin the war on terror and could pose a risk to the UK if not kept under close scrutiny.

Meanwhile according to the Telegraph

US prepares to plug hole left by British troops

The White House and the Pentagon are understood to have drawn up detailed plans to secure the vital "umbilical cord" link road between Baghdad and Kuwait when the British depart.
Washington is also concerned that a British pull-out will leave the border with Iran undefended, as well as undermining US operations at a time when political pressure is mounting for an American withdrawal.

Meanwhile the Observer reports

Fatigue cripples US army in Iraq

Where once the war in Iraq was defined in conversations with these men by untenable ideas - bringing democracy or defeating al-Qaeda - these days the war in Iraq is defined by different ways of expressing the idea of being weary. It is a theme that is endlessly reiterated as you travel around Iraq. 'The army is worn out. We are just keeping people in theatre who are exhausted,' says a soldier working for the US army public affairs office who is supposed to be telling me how well things have been going since the 'surge' in Baghdad began.

According to the Independent

British livestock at risk from deadly bluetongue virus, scientists warn

Scientists warned last night that Britain is on the verge of a major new farmyard catastrophe with a disease called bluetongue that has ravaged mainland Europe and is poised to arrive in this country for the first time.
They said that the deadly virus – which is spread by midges that have been able to expand further northwards thanks to climate change – originated in Africa and has killed 1.8 million animals since it first appeared in Europe in 1998.



The paper leads with

Race against time to save 189 species from extinction

The biggest and most wide-ranging bird conservation programme the world has ever seen will be launched next week with the aim of saving every one of the planet's critically endangered species from extinction.
The task is urgent. There are now no fewer than 189 birds in this most precipitous category – 51 more than there were just seven years ago. Scientists say that if no action is taken then all of them could be gone within the next 10 years; 15 are already classified as "possibly extinct ".

The Telegraph leads with

Tories plan £14bn cuts to red tape

The proposals, to be endorsed by David Cameron, would achieve savings by scrapping huge amounts of legislation imposed on businesses by both Whitehall and Brussels, including rules on working hours and employee protection and restrictions on financial services.
John Redwood, the former cabinet minister who will unveil the findings of his economic competitiveness policy review group this week, said his proposals would be a "tax cut by any other name". They will come on top of "any tax reductions" an incoming Tory government is able to make.

The Observer also covers the story saying

The most controversial proposal in the report, which aims to improve the competitiveness of the British economy, would see a Tory government restore the opt-out from the European Social Chapter, which was removed by Labour in 1997. Redwood will also call for EU working time regulations to be repealed.

Meanwhile the Times reveals

Brown takes record lead

GORDON BROWN has pushed Labour into a 10-point lead, the biggest since he took over as prime minister, according to a YouGov poll for The Sunday Times today.
The lead is also Labour’s biggest with YouGov since November 2002, before the start of the Iraq war, and underlines the turnaround in the party’s fortunes. The poll puts Labour on 42%, up two points on a month ago, with the Conservatives down one at 32% and the Liberal Democrats on 14%. adding that

If this pattern of voting were to be repeated at a general election, Brown would add roughly 100 to the 66-seat majority at the 2005 election.

New evidence suggests Madeleine is dead, admits police chief reports the Mail along with many of the other papers

The parents of Madeleine McCann yesterday marked the 100th day of her disappearance - as Portuguese police officially admitted for the first time that she may be dead.
Moments after Kate and Gerry attended a service to pray for her, Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa, one of the detectives leading the investigation, said new evidence had heightened the possibility she was killed.
He failed to say what the new evidence was, but added that neither parent was being considered a suspect, despite wild stories in the Portuguese media. And nor were any of the friends with them at the time.

According to the Sunday Mirror

Maddy was alive when taken

Missing Madeleine McCann's favourite pink Cuddle Cat toy was taken from her arms as she slept and placed beyond her reach by her kidnapper. That is why police are certain Madeleine was snatched while she was asleep - and was NOT killed or injured in the holiday apartment.



MADDY COPS WE'RE LOOKING FOR BODY says the News of the World

It leads with the news that

KERRY CATONA CHEATED ON HER HUSBAND

DRUG dealer Leighton Ogden last night bragged how TV star Kerry Katona seduced him behind hubby Mark Croft's back.Ogden, 20, said the romp exploded in his flat just months into her engagement to Croft.
His sensational revelation comes only a day after Kerry won back temporary custody of her daughters Molly and Lilly Sue after a court battle with ex-husband Brian McFaddden.

The Mail reports that

Police on terror alert over theft of top secret records on computer database

A major security alert has been sparked after the theft of a computer database containing thousands of top secret telephone records from police investigations into terrorism and organised crime. Worried police chiefs throughout the UK launched a massive inquiry into the removal of the sophisticated computer and other IT equipment from a private firm specialising in gathering evidence from mobile phone calls made by suspects.

According to the Times

Topshop clothes made with ‘slave labour’

ONE of Britain’s richest men is profiting from Asian workers paid less than £4 a day to make clothes for his latest Kate Moss range for Topshop.
Factories supplying Sir Philip Green, who is based in Monaco and is worth nearly £5 billion, employ hundreds of Sri Lankan, Indian and Bangladeshi workers in Mauritius where they labour for up to 12 hours a day, six days a week.
Workers told The Sunday Times that they were recruited in their home countries by self-employed agents who promised wages up to five times what they receive. They pay up to £725 to get the job, equivalent to seven months’ earnings.

The Telegraph claims that

Queen sends in lawyers over 'royal rage' film

Farrer & Co, solicitors to the Queen, have written to RDF Media Group, the film company which made the programme for the corporation. It is understood the letter - and a similar one to the BBC - warns that the programme makers have put themselves in breach of contract by their actions.

Along with many papers the Observer reports on

Tragic death of 17-year-old Natasha, the girl with everything to live for

One of the last things Natasha Coombs wrote on the social-networking website, Bebo, was 'I want a long, happy, healthy life with kids and grandkids and a handsome husband.' Then, 15 days ago she vanished.
Last night her family were told that the body of a teenager, discovered a mile from where Natasha disappeared, was likely to be that of their 17-year-old daughter. Essex police said clothing, a phone and a handbag found close to the scene led them to believe the body was that of Natasha. A police spokesman said they believed Natasha had been hit by a train and that dental records would be needed to confirm her identity.

Did Natasha kill herself over split with boyfriend? says the Mail

The Mirror claims an exclusive

Winehouse: My overdose hell

Troubled Amy Winehouse last night vowed to quit drugs - admitting she was "out of control" when she overdosed.
The 23-year-old singer spoke of the hell she's going through after a dramatic family meeting aimed at forcing her to curb her wild lifestyle.
Amy, who was taken to hospital after overdosing last week, said: "I never want to feel that way again. It was just crazy - one of the most terrifying moments of my life.


The Telegraph reports on the

170 gangs on streets of London

Scotland Yard has just completed the task of counting how many street gangs there are in London. The results are staggering: there are more than 170, some of them up to 100-strong. It means on any given night, several thousand gang members are roaming the capital, many of them thirsting for violence. In other British cities, notably Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow and Birmingham, there is a frighteningly similar picture.

On the same theme the Indy reports on

Two tales of a city: Amid the wealth, the rule of gun law

A glittering new glass skyscraper commands the horizon in Manchester, a city literally and figuratively reaching for the sky. Beneath it is a land of Harvey Nichols, the five-star Lowry Hotel and the Bridgewater Hall where the Labour Party will again hold its annual conference next year since it feels like a place which has flourished on its watch.
But that's not quite how they feel about things down in Moss Side, a two-minute drive south. The 50-storey Beetham Tower skyscraper, visible on the skyline, is a reminder of the "new" Manchester but the newspaper billboards bring them back to the reality of the old. "Jessie: two arrests," it reads – the latest developments in the case of 15-year-old Jessie James, murdered almost a year ago as he cycled in Broadfield Park.

As does the Observer

Gangs want respect, so the innocent die

There was no mistaking the sound of gunfire. Even in the most incongruous and unexpected of settings - a sunny, afternoon in a pub garden full of families and children - those eight loud cracks were wearily familiar.
'One minute I was opening a packet of crisps for my wee boy, and the next the world was exploding around us,' said one man, still so shaken by the memory of last Sunday's drive-by shooting at the Arch Bar in Manchester that he insists on remaining anonymous. 'I just grabbed my son and dived under the table. I could see women and children running out of the garden, screaming and crying ... it was all so chaotic and unreal. My son and I huddled under the table until the police came.'

News from abroad and the same paper reports

Poisoned city fights to save its children

The company is a US corporation, Renco Doe Run. The gases are the product from the main smelter a mile or two down the valley. The high mountains around keep out the cleansing winds, meaning that airborne metals are concentrated in the valley. Neither humans nor nature can escape the company's outpourings of poisons. And, despite evidence that gases have been behind the premature deaths of workers and residents young and old, the business-oriented, pro-US government of President Alan Garcia is too afraid of foreign investors to do anything about it.

The Telegraph tells us that

Sarkozy crosses Atlantic twice for Bush lunch

Having been invited to Kennebunkport while on vacation last week in nearby New Hampshire, Mr Sarkozy suddenly found his presence required back in France on Friday to attend the funeral of Paris's archbishop, Jean-Marie Lustiger.
Yet such was his desire not to miss the scheduled lunch date the next day, he flew straight back to America on Friday night, notching up two transatlantic flights in less than 24 hours.

Murders in the Mist
Why were four gorillas shot dead and left untouched? says the Times

The gorilla deaths have stunned animal conservationists because the killings happened just as hopes were rising that Virunga’s gorilla population was stabilising and even increasing. Now conservationists are having to reconsider their strategy, analysing why the gorillas were killed and how the slaughter can be stopped.

Why Sir Norman Wisdom's family won't let his friends see him reveals the Mail on Sunday


As Sir Norman Wisdom sits alone in his spartan room in an anonymous nursing home in the Isle of Man, he must wonder how it has come to this.
The floor is covered in lino, the hospital-style bed uncomfortably hard. His furniture consists of two plastic chairs, a plastic wardrobe and a plastic chest of drawers. There are few mementoes, rarely any visitors, and little to break up the monotony of his days. The Mail on Sunday can reveal that there has been a bitter rift between Sir Norman's family and his closest friends.




The News of the World finally greets the new football season with


SOCCER bad boy Garry O'Connor kicked off the Premiership season at his new club by having a booze-fuelled orgy with four hookers, the News of the World can reveal.The striker, playing for newly-promoted Birmingham City at Chelsea this afternoon, paid £1,000 cash to have the girls join him and three mates in a luxury hotel.