Newspaper headlines: Tory MP 'refuses to quit' and Becker 'to serve time'

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By BBC News
Staff
Pool

Under the headline "Porn MP refuses to quit as he loses whip", the Daily Telegraph reports on growing anger among female Conservative MPs over the way the party has handled claims that their colleague Neil Parish watched pornography on his phone while in the Commons.

Dame Caroline Dinenage, who sits on the women and equalities committee, tells the paper she cannot see how his position is sustainable and described the situation as "just utterly bizarre".

According to the Guardian, Labour is accusing Conservative whips of initially trying to "cover up" for Mr Parish, before deciding to suspend him from the parliamentary party. In its leader, the paper speaks of "a sense of rising anger" about the way some women are treated in parliament and the "culture of impunity that continues to surround MPs".

The i reflects on the story with a cartoon of cleaners in the House of Commons spraying the leather benches of the Commons with disinfectant, using the headline: "A stain on British democracy".

Photographs of Boris Becker are also featured on many of the front pages, following his being jailed for two and a half years for hiding assets to avoid paying debts after declaring bankruptcy.

The Times declares his sentence to be the "fall of a champion", while the Daily Mirror describes it as the "downfall of a legend".

The Sun has a picture of an umpire at Wimbledon, where Becker became the men's champion at the age of 17, declaring "time!".

In its leader column, The Times suggests his early success sowed the seeds of his eventual demise. "Plainly he had too much, too young," it argues, which "led to him having not enough when he was no longer young".

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The Daily Mail focuses on calls from senior Tories for the police to further investigate allegations that the Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer and his deputy Angela Rayner broke lockdown restrictions at an event in April last year.

Sir Keir, who was pictured having a beer at the Durham Miners' Club, has insisted there was no breach of the rules. The Mail, which refers to the saga as "beergate", describes the decision by Durham Constabulary not to conduct a more thorough inquiry as "a shameful dereliction of duty".

The Financial Times warns of what it calls a "global downturn driven by surging inflation and the Ukraine war". It says new data suggests that European growth is weaker than expected, the American economy is "stalling", and there are deep concerns about the impact of the latest wave of Covid-19 in China.

One economist is quoted as saying the "world is in really bad shape", while the FT also reports that Europe is expected to be hit by what's described as a "double whammy" of an economic downturn and rising borrowing costs.

The Daily Express reveals that loved ones may soon be able to end their video calls with a realistic kiss, thanks to the latest virtual reality technology.

It explains that researchers in the United States have come up with a system which uses highly focussed sound waves, which can be focussed into beams that create sensations on the lips. But the scientists warn that it will take time to perfect because the sensation of kissing is so complex.