Sir Keir Starmer’s decision to scrap NHS England gets a warm reception in the Mail. “Finally! Patients to be put before NHS bureaucrats” is the headline.
The paper’s editorial says the government’s rhetoric “will have gladdened the heart of any meritocratic small-state Conservative”.
The Guardian’s comment page says the measure is “less a grand health reform and more a strategic positioning exercise”, and argues that the savings will be “modest”.
The “i” describes the plan as a “high-stakes political gamble”. The Financial Times says abolishing NHS England leaves “a slew of unanswered questions” about how the health service will be run once ministers take direct control.
Several front pages focus on Vladimir Putin’s reaction to ceasefire proposals. “I will agree truce but only on my terms” is the Express headline.
The former Conservative defence minister and British Army officer, Tobias Ellwood, has written a comment piece for the paper. In it he warns that we are “no closer to a workable ceasefire than when President Trump assumed office”.
The Times says President Putin “dealt a blow” to hopes of an immediate pause in the fighting, when he said he wouldn’t “back a deal that allowed Kyiv to rearm and regroup”.
The Mirror says the family of the murdered teenager, Elianne Andam, has called for tougher sentences to stop what the paper calls “Britain’s knife crime epidemic”.
Relatives say the punishment for her killer, which will see him serve at least 23 years in prison, falls “woefully short of true justice”. They say the legal system’s response has left them feeling “abandoned and unheard”.
The Mirror’s editorial says the “deadly curse” of knife crime must be “tackled to spare more families the agony of a lost loved one”.
The Telegraph says the Science and Technology Secretary, Peter Kyle, has been using artificial intelligence to come up with policy ideas. The paper says Kyle’s use of ChatGPT has been detailed in records obtained by the New Scientist magazine, under freedom of information laws.
They show he also asked the chat bot for suggestions for the “best podcasts” he could appear on to reach “a wide audience”. The paper says the software recommended, among others, BBC Radio 4’s Infinite Monkey Cage.
A government spokesperson says that while the secretary of state makes use of the technology, it’s not a substitute for the “comprehensive advice” routinely provided by officials.
A beaming Prince William appears on the front of the Sun, alongside the headline “why I fell in love with the Villa”. The Prince of Wales says he was taken by friends to an Aston Villa match as a boy.
He tells the paper he was gripped by the “sense of belonging”. He also reveals that he visits online fan forums anonymously and has a superstitious ritual that he follows if the team isn’t doing well.
The prince tells the paper that he starts moving himself and his children around the house quite quickly – in the hope that it will change his side’s luck.
