Elianne's 'legacy will live on' and Middle East 'on tenterhooks'
- Published
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The Daily Mail says Labour is facing "fury" for launching what it calls "toothless" small-scale investigations into grooming gangs, external, instead of a full national inquiry. The paper says the government has "back-tracked" after previously insisting that no new investigations were needed. The Guardian agrees that it's a significant change of approach, external, and says intense political pressure has pushed ministers into moving further and faster on the long-running scandal.
"Why aren't you wanting to find out the real truth?", external is how one victim responded to the news. Fiona Goddard told the Daily Express that a full national inquiry was needed, because past reviews had not even "touched the surface". She told the paper that the home secretary's announcement of local reviews was "just not good enough".
The Daily Telegraph, external leads with details of what it describes as Rachel Reeves' "fightback interview" on the BBC's Political Thinking podcast with Nick Robinson. The paper reports that she says she would be "happy" to be known as the "Iron Chancellor" - a nod to Margaret Thatcher's "Iron Lady" nickname - saying she "will make the right decisions". She also reveals that she brings her lunch in a Tupperware box to Westminster whenever she can, and sometimes takes pastries left over from meetings to eat for lunch.
The Times reports that financial regulators are considering giving banks and lenders more flexibility, external to allow "responsible risk-taking from borrowers", which could make it easier for first-time buyers to get on the housing ladder. The paper says the move is in response to demands from the chancellor for them to embrace a "pro-growth" agenda. It adds that regulators are also examining whether to scrap the £100 limit on contactless payments, to allow payment companies to set their own limits and make it easier for consumers to make big transactions.
Both the Daily Mirror and the Metro lead with reaction from the family of 15-year-old Elianne Andam, after Hassan Sentamu, 18, was found guilty of her murder. "Justice is done but our hearts are broken", external is the Metro's headline. The Daily Mirror reports that Elianne's parents have vowed to honour her memory, external by fighting knife crime.
The Daily Telegraph reports that patients were placed on mixed-sex hospital wards nearly 50,000 times last year, external, which it says is a record high. It quotes the chief executive of the Patients Association, Rachel Power, as saying that the "alarming increase" in breaches of the practice, which was supposed to have been banned in 2010, was "deeply concerning" for patients. A spokesman for NHS England said the NHS was committed to offering same-sex accommodation and that there was more to do to "eliminate unjustified breaches".
The front page of the Times carries a striking picture of Donald Trump., external It's his official portrait before his inauguration as US president next week. The paper says it shares "something of the defiance" of the mugshot of Trump, taken in 2023 when he was charged with trying to overturn the 2020 vote in the US state of Georgia.