Wednesday's papers

MP's fight back over their expenses.

Normal political rivalries were suspended as politicians swapped “horror stories” about the demands made of them by Sir Thomas Legg. Senior MPs proposed that Conservative and Labour members meet to co-ordinate their opposition. Several said that they would challenge the Legg findings and some of those planning to retire at the election said that there was “no chance” that they would pay up unless he softened his demands.

reports the Times

The Telegraph says that Gordon Brown is facing a growing crisis of authority after his review into MPs' expenses threatened to explode in his face.

some Cabinet ministers blamed him privately for allowing Sir Thomas Legg's investigation to run out of control.
They accused Mr Brown of enabling Sir Thomas to decide his own remit which has led to hundreds of requests for retrospective expenses payments by MPs.

The other big news of the day concerned the Guardian and it unsuprsingly leads with the story that

An unprecedented attempt by a British oil trading firm to prevent the Guardian reporting parliamentary proceedings collapsedtoday following a spontaneous online campaign to spread the information the paper had been barred from publishing.

adding that

Carter-Ruck, the law firm representing Trafigura, was accused of infringing the supremacy of parliament after it insisted that an injunction obtained against the Guardian prevented the paper from reporting a question tabled on Monday by the Labour MP Paul Farrelly.

The Independent describes how

the most feared firm of libel lawyers in the country, beat a retreat yesterday as information that its client had hoped to suppress was spread across the internet by bloggers and tweeters.

It leads with a question-Could a national strike spell the end of the Royal Mail? reporting that

Emergency talks will take place with postal workers today to avert a national strike that would halt deliveries of 75 million letters and parcels daily, cost tens of millions of pounds and accelerate the loss of corporate business that imperils the Royal Mail's long-term future.

There is a rising clamour to get British troops out of Afghanistan.According to the latest populus poll in the Times

More than a third of voters (36 per cent) believe that troops should be withdrawn immediately, up from 29 per cent in mid-September. The growing unease at the armed presence has been driven by women. Four out of ten want Britain to quit Afghanistan, up from three out of ten over the past month. Opposition among men has risen from 29 to 32 per cent. Support for withdrawal is highest among Labour voters.

The Guardian though reports that the Prime Minister

will tell MPs today that he is prepared to dispatch extra troops to Afghanistan despite rising opposition to Britain's military presence. Under pressure from defence chiefs, he will say he has agreed to send 500 more soldiers to join the 9,000 deployed

The Mail leads with a report that tThe boss of Tesco has delivered a stinging attack on Labour's education record and described school standards as 'woeful'.

Sir Terry Leahy, who was knighted by the Government in 2002 and is a member of Gordon Brown's National Council for Educational Excellence, said employers were too often left to pick up the pieces.

The Express leads with a report that

LABOUR’S failure to crack down on scroungers has let three-quarters of incapacity benefit claimants get away with faking their illnesses.

the paper adds that

just one in 20 of those taking the tests was found to be incapable of getting any kind of job.

As the Telegraph reports that Boyzone singer Stephen Gately may have died from Sudden Adult Death Syndrome caused by an undiagnosed heart condition,the Sun tells how

a shattered Louis Walsh told yesterday how tragic STEPHEN GATELY "looked healthier than ever" when the pair met up last week.

Many of the papers report how

A City banker who killed his unfaithful wife after she asked for a divorce was found guilty of manslaughter yesterday but acquitted of murder after the jury agreed that there was no proof he had intended to take her life.

President Barack Obama's plans to overhaul the American health care system have cleared a major hurdle with Senator Olympia Snowe, a moderate Republican, backing a Democratic compromise bill. reports the Telegraph

Palestinian political leaders have expressed acute disappointment in the Obama administration, saying their hopes that it could bring peace to the Middle East have "evaporated" and accusing the White House of giving in to Israeli pressure.reports the Guardian as a leaked internal memo from the Fatah party comes to light.

Finally the Times reports that

Roman Polanski is putting the finishing touches to his forthcoming film from his prison cell in Switzerland, his friend and colleague Robert Harris said yesterday at The Times Cheltenham Literature Festival.