Newspaper headlines: Tory nerves 'jangling' and Pippa's big day By BBC News

Staff Published duration 21 May 2017

image copyright PA image caption The Times believes the Tory manifesto has "bombed" which has led to a narrowing of the polls

Various opinion polls, which show a narrowing of the gap between the Conservatives and Labour, are reported by a number of Sunday's papers.

With the headline, "The dementia tax backlash", the Mail on Sunday claims Theresa May's hopes of an election landslide have been damaged by "strong opposition" to her plan to make more elderly people pay for social care.

The Observer says some "nervous" candidates are "urging the Tory leadership to make another attempt to explain the policy to voters".

And the Sunday Times says ministers have privately expressed fears that the policy could cost votes, but suggests it's not the only reason why the polls have narrowed.

It thinks the Conservative manifesto "bombed" when published and a "growing number of voters" appear to be connecting with Jeremy Corbyn's "unashamed" socialist pitch, "setting nerves jangling in Tory high command".

The Conservatives' care plan is defended by the Sunday Telegraph whose editorial praises the "courage" shown by Mrs May "on such an important issue".

Arguing she is "right" to place an emphasis on people taking as much responsibility for their own care as possible, the paper dismisses the term "dementia tax" as "patently" untrue and a "classic, nasty left-wing tactic".

But it warns the manifesto proposal is "only a temporary solution". Britain, it says, "must nurture a market in age insurance", requiring a "revolution in cultural attitudes" including the "full backing of the government".

A different view is offered by the Sunday Mirror, which credits Labour's improvement to the party's manifesto . It believes the party's proposals have "struck home with the public".

'Yes I'm weird'

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Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron has told the Mail on Sunday that "compassionate Conservatism is dead" as Theresa May is "making the Tories nastier than ever".

He says the prime minister's care funding plan is "the most heartless thing I have seen" and claims the policy was formed by rich, southern Tories who know nothing of the harsh realities of life in the north.

Mr Farron also uses the interview to address the findings of a poll that said he was seen as weird by voters. He describes himself as northern and working-class and lists his interests, including football, music, faith and family, before concluding "yes, that makes me weird for a politician".

School lunch policy 'risk'

Mrs May's plan to end universal free school lunches for infants will affect about 900,000 children from struggling families , according to the Observer.

It believes the move "risks punishing exactly the kind of families the prime minister has promised to help".

A Conservative source has questioned the figures, arguing they were "cobbled together" by the Education Policy Institute, which is led by the former Liberal Democrat minster, David Laws.

But the celebrity chef, Jamie Oliver, has written to the Sunday Times to condemn the policy . He says it's "madness" to scrap free lunches as Britain faces an obesity epidemic.

'Life and death cuts'

Mr Corbyn has told the Sunday Mirror that the Conservatives' plan to means-test winter fuel allowances "could put the lives of pensioners at risk".

He says he's been "astonished" at the Tory announcements made over the past week and criticises what he describes as "life and death" cuts.

But the Labour leader is given short shrift by the Sunday Express whose editorial lambasts his party for "lashing out at every Conservative policy".

The "difficult choices" made by Theresa May, it says, are "far better than the pie-in-the-sky suggestions of Labour, which would bring Britain to its knees".

Pippa's big day

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Finally, all of the papers feature photographs taken at Saturday's marriage of the Duchess of Cambridge's sister Pippa Middleton to the financier James Matthews.

Alongside the headline "Sealed with a sis", the Daily Star Sunday pictures Ms Middleton kissing her new husband "with her royal sister by her side".

The Sunday People highlights an image of a crying Prince George, describing him as the "Prince of wails" after he received a telling off at the wedding.