UK papers focus on the Budget

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/uk/6473719.stm

Version 0 of 1.

The possible contents of what is expected to be Chancellor Gordon Brown's final Budget speech features heavily across Britain's newspapers.

According to the Times, Mr Brown suffered a "Black Tuesday", with the highest Retail Prices Index in 15 years and poor news in the opinion polls.

But an editorial in the Sun hails the Chancellor as a "towering political figure of international stature".

It says he has "never been seriously rivalled as Tony Blair's successor".

'Hypocrisy'

The Daily Mail says Gordon Brown will have been damaged by accusations from a top civil servant that his department operates with "Stalinist ruthlessness".

However the paper attacks the official who made the comments, Lord Turnbull, for the "hypocrisy" of attacking a government of which he was central to.

As for the Budget, the Financial Times predicts that Mr Brown will bow out at the Treasury with a "big" speech.

It predicts education will be at the heart of his final Budget address.

'Half-baked'

A council is said to be planning to catch residents who leave their rubbish out on the wrong day - with cameras hidden in baked bean tins.

The Sun says Ealing Council in west London will also put tiny CCTV bugs inside house bricks.

The Daily Star says the "Beanz Meanz Fines" plan is "half-baked".

Meanwhile, the Daily Telegraph features a study which suggests women who eat a lot of fatty food are at substantially greater risk of developing cancers.

Outsiders

The Telegraph and the Independent have some comfort for parents whose children like heavy metal music.

Researchers say many adolescent "metalheads" are extremely bright and use music to deal with the strain of being gifted social outsiders.

The Guardian tells how the father of psycho-analysis, Sigmund Freud, found happiness by the seaside in Blackpool.

It seems he never tired of Blackpool's sand, weather or food. He enjoyed beachcombing and rock pool hunting.