Tueday's papers

A new poll in the Guardian this morning shows that the Conservatives have gained ground on key policy areas and are now the overwhelming public choice to form the next government.

Labour has lost the August battle on health, with more voters thinking the Conservatives would improve the NHS than think the party would make it worse. While 48% think healthcare would be better under a Tory government, only 41% agree with Labour warnings that it would be worse. Even 24% of current Labour voters think the Tories would improve the NHS.

The Independent meanwhile carries an exclusive on spending as Andrew Grice reveals that

Gordon Brown is to issue a list of specific spending cuts before the general election in an attempt to convince voters that Labour will reduce the soaring deficit in public finances.

adding that

he will acknowledge that the Government needs to go beyond the £35bn of efficiency savings it has already promised. The aim will be to show Labour is serious about reducing the deficit, which is set to rocket to £175bn in the current financial year and to £173bn next year.

The Times carries an exclusive as the paper reports that the shortage of helicopters in Afghanistan can be traced to a “disastrous” Ministry of Defence decision to try to economise by designing its own software.

The MoD agreed in 1995 to buy eight Chinook Mk3s from Boeing for £259 million. The avionics software would have cost a further £40 million, but defence insiders say that the ministry wanted to fit its own software — in spite of a warning from Boeing that it might not work.

The controversy over the Lockerbie bomber continues.The Telegraph reports that Kenny MacAskill, Scotland's justice secretary, accused Libya of breaking a promise not to give a hero's welcome to the freed Lockerbie bomber.

Mr MacAskill was speaking at a special session of the Scottish Parliament, recalled from its summer recess to allow MSPs to question him on his decision to free terminally-ill Megrahi.

The paper leads with a question.One estimate puts the total number of CCTV cameras in Britain at 4.2 million, or one for every 14 people. If they do not stop crime or catch criminals, what are they for?

The huge extent to which the NHS needs foreign doctors to treat patients out of hours is revealed today says the Mail as it reports that

A third of primary care trusts are flying in GPs from as far away as Lithuania, Poland, Germany, Hungary, Italy and Switzerland because of a shortage of doctors in Britain willing to work in the evenings and at weekends.

It's official,Michael Jackson was killed,the Sun leads with the story that

THE Los Angeles County coroner has ruled Michael Jackson's death WAS homicide, legal sources said tonight.
The finding makes it more likely criminal charges will be filed against Dr Conrad Murray, who was with the pop star when he died.

The Express leads with the news that

A major breakthrough in the search to find a cure for breast cancer has been made by British scientists.Instead of looking at how to stop tumours from ­forming, this new research has found a key molecule that cancer manipulates to spread throughout the body. It is this that kills 90 per cent of cancer victims.