Reid labours in 'political hole'

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The furore over prisons overcrowding threatens to engulf Home Secretary John Reid, the papers have said.

As the Guardian sees it, the furore about the overcrowding of prisons is threatening to engulf Mr Reid.

The Daily Telegraph believes the latest crisis is a personal disaster - the letter he sent to courts urging fewer sentences may be a "death warrant".

That letter is also put under the microscope by the Daily Mail - it calls it meddling with a vengeance.

'Wretched week'

The Independent thinks that the problems facing the Home Office are signs that the authority of the prime minister is ebbing away.

It has been a truly wretched week for Mr Blair, it says - the crisis in the prison system is damaging him.

As the Times sees it, the crisis caused by overcrowding in prisons has forced Tony Blair to prop up his beleaguered home secretary.

That, it reckons, betrays a sense of drift; a drift that is draining the entire government of its credibility ahead of the elections.

'Stick-thin'

Both the Times and the Guardian have entered the row about "size zero" fashion models.

The Guardian reports that health experts are demanding High Street shops stop using "stick-thin" shop window mannequins, linking them to eating disorders.

Several papers highlight what happened to eight-year-old Courtney Williams when she forgot her school lunch money.

The Daily Express says she got bread, water and a banana instead of fish and rice at the Gloucestershire school.

Looted suitcase

Several papers report how a suitcase sent to South Africa from Sidmouth in Devon ended up less than two miles from its starting point.

It was washed overboard from the stricken container ship, Napoli.

Marilyne Simony had sent the case to her boyfriend and it went via Felixstowe to Antwerp before being loaded onto the vessel.

Her boss recognised a photo of her discarded on the beach. Marilyne is appealing for the rest of the suitcase's contents.